FEMS Exchange Concert 

Guitar Music was written in 1999 for the 8th annual Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival where it was premiered. It is the third in a series of works in which all of the sound sources are derived from traditional musical instruments utilizing extended techniques, in this case a classical guitar. In Guitar Music I was interested in exploring a sound world that begins where extended guitar techniques leave off, and ends where those same sounds are rendered all but unrecognizable by computer processing. Sounds are approached as physical objects and are developed and transformed via granular deconstruction and reanimation, time stretching and compression, and so forth. Special thanks to David Boyle for his assistance in coercing sounds from the guitar.

Ronald Keith Parks has been an active composer for over twenty years. His output includes orchestral, chamber, choral, electroacoustic, and interactive computer music. His compositions and papers have been selected for inclusion at national and international festivals and conferences including the Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival, SEAMUS, ICMC, SCI, and CMS. Dr. Parks received the BA in composition from the North Carolina School of the Arts, MM in composition from the University of Florida, and Ph.D. in composition from the University at Buffalo. He is currently lecturer in composition, theory, and computer music at Winthrop University.

Machine Language is based on the universe of chaos underlying everything, including that which seems motionless. Whether it's the Kinetic Theory of Matter, microbes in still water, or the hidden stream of binary numbers behind an unused but running computer, beneath any static object is a dynamic world of smaller ones.

John McElroy is a graduate student in music at the University of Florida. His research and composition focuses on phase vocoding. He is currently employed as a Java programmer at the North East Regional Data Center.

In Animate Personalities derives its sonic material from recordings the composer made of sounds produced by inanimate objects. Through the compositional process, the composer discovered that these inanimate objects took on personalities, which collectively consisted of many of the same traits, behaviors and idiosyncrasies that one can find in the personalities of living beings. After some time the composer began to no longer perceive these sounds as representative of machines or tools, but rather of a wide variety of sonic "creatures." Another concept the composer tried to work with is that of the interaction and contrast between sounds derived from inanimate objects and sounds derived from a human being.

Neil Flory is an active composer and poet. He holds degrees in music from the University of Central Florida, the University of Florida, and the University of Texas at Austin. He has studied with Stella Sung, Budd Udell, James Paul Sain, Donald Grantham, Dan Welcher, and Russell Pinkston. He has composed a variety of works both in the acoustic and electroacoustic mediums, and his music has been performed across the United States as well as in Europe, South America, and Asia. One of his electroacoustic works appears on Volume One of the University of Florida SCI Student Chapter's CD series, and one of his pieces for violin and guitar is available on the forthcoming Duo46 CD "Untaming the Fury" (available through GuitarPlus Records). His music has been published by Jomar Press and Go Fish Music, and his poetry has appeared in various publications such as Poetry Forum, Alternative Press Magazine, and Mind Matters Review. Recent commissions include a set of songs for flute, guitar, and voice, commissioned by Christine Beard, a Texas flutist, a work for solo oboe, commissioned by Jennifer Gookin, an Iowa oboist, and a work for chamber ensemble, commissioned by the Iowa Music Teachers' Association. The composer continues to be an active member of the College Music Society, the Society of Composers, Inc., and the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States. Dr. Flory is an Assistant Professor of Music Theory and Composition at Luther College.

Casting Out Nines: A Memory Imprint is a video work constructed from a series of synergetic overlapping 'scenarios' composed with a hybrid of digital time-based technologies. An examination of 'testimony' as subject and medium of transmission inform the project's conceptual possibilities and experiential specificity. 'Testimony' as subject is here considered as a vow to tell or promise, as an act composed of bits and pieces of memory, as occurrences not settled into any complete understanding or remembrance of past events. 'Testimony' as medium of transmission is performed as a reminiscent series of snapshots taken at specific intersections of material, place, and time. The event retroactively rediscovered or understood by visible marks or indications and assembled as a testimony addressed to others from the stance of the witness. In this volume, the 'testimonial artwork' functions in the capacity of witness to something cognitively dissonant without offering a completed statement or account of events performing a form of 'theoria.' In its Greek meaning, 'theoria' referred to a group of individuals ('theoros'), who had the function to "see and tell," attest to the occurrence of some event, to witness its happenstance.

David Govoni is an American artist in the field of Electronic Media. His art practice is primarily time-based. Recent artworks are hybrid constructions that are composed using film, video, and audio technologies that have been processed with a range of digital tools. The works are presented in multiple formats, utilizing digital video, compact disk, online, and inter-media performance. The significance of his work lay not in the production of specific artifacts, but rather in the potential for the making of meaning. A meaning that may be constructed from a translation of media elements and processes into a 'recombinant' language characterized by the interaction of the 'techniques' of the observer within an authored system for content exploration. The artworks have been produced within a context that engages the question: What form of Œcultural practice, will emerging technologies engender? The term Œcultural practice, is employed to indicate that an artwork that evolves within this context may take a different form from traditional static art media by exploring various non-standard exhibition possibilities outside the conventional art world exhibition sites of museums and galleries, such as broadcast, online, and other alternative venues. He was the recipient of a Florida individual Artist Fellowship in Media Arts for 2000-2001. He received his M.F.A. from the University of Florida in Electronic Inter-media and B.F.A. from the Rhode Island School of Design in Filmmaking.

Spinal Chords is an ongoing attempt to compose music for health related treatments (Healing Touch, Acupuncture, and Massage). While frequently "Healing Music" tends to attempt to anesthetize the listener into a state of "blissful relaxation" complete with bubble baths and incense and candles, Spinal Chords proceeds from a different center. This music is based upon the 17/16 ratio in Just Intonation and attempts to reveal blissful harmonies without a somnabulatic effect. Initially this music was composed for completion of MUC 6446 under the guidance of Dr. James Paul Sain, after an extended interview/video I completed on the work of La Monte Young.

Patrick Pagano is the Director of The Southeast Just Intonation Society, a Graduate of the University of Florida and a Software Consultant. Resonate and Extenuate. Pat Pagano can be reached at ppagano@bellsouth.net or visit his Sound and light environments at http://www.screwmusicforever.com/Shreeswift.

The Wasteland is an attempt at creating a sound landscape. The text, by Madison Cawein, is considered by many to be the basis of T. S. Eliot's poem of the same name.

Thomas Judson (b. 1976) received his BM in Music Composition and Theory from Appalachian State University, studying under Scott R. Miester, and his MM in Music Composition from the University of Florida, studying with James Paul Sain, Paul Richards and Budd Udell. He is currently studying towards his doctorate at the University of Iowa with David Gompper and Lawrence Fritts. His works have been performed in France, Italy, and throughout the United States. Mr. Judson has been commissioned to write for many organizations including The Playcrafters of North Carolina, The University of Florida Department of Theatre and Dance, Dance Alive, and the modern dance group ODC San Francisco.

Ghosts? (a box of cubans for Sigmund) is an exploration of a variety of synthesis methods including FOF, RM, filtration, and additive synthesis. The goal was to create cohesion when using a diverse collection of methodologies. The majority of the work is constructed from synthetic material, with a single sample of a voice. Ghosts? Is the first of several works exploring the interpretation of divergent sources (in this case the human voice), while still retaining an unspecified element of comprehension.

Michael J. Ladd (myklad@yahoo.com) is pursuing studies at the University of Florida. Current research if focusing on the development of open source music software, as well as optimizing Linux for real-time audio performance.

'dem darn ducks (1999), for tape, is created entirely from the manipulation recorded sounds. These include oboe honks and clicks, live ducks, and someone trying to imitate the sound of a duck. The listener should pay special attention to the striking similarities between the sound of an oboe and that of a duck. The piece is dedicated to my wife Amy, an oboist, and her many, many beginning oboe students.

Edward Martin (b. 1976), originally from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, holds a Masters Degree in Composition from The University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelors Degree in Composition from the University of Florida. His composition teachers have included Dan Welcher, Donald Grantham, Steven Montague, James Paul Sain and Budd Udell. He is also active as a pianist and studied piano with Kevin Sharpe and William Heiles. His music has received many performances including those at Society of Composers, Inc. regional and national student conferences. He is currently working towards a DMA in Composition at the University of Illinois studying with Stephen Taylor and Scott Wyatt.

Big Pile of Stuff is based upon recordings of some of my earlier works. Throughout life, one accumulates stuff, and unless that stuff is used for something useful at a later date, then what is the point of allowing it to accumulate in the first place?

Samuel J. Hamm, Jr. (b. 1968) is a composer of electronic, acoustic, and mixed-media music within a variety of genres including concert music, theatre, and dance. His works have been performed in the United States and Europe and have been selected for radio broadcast in the United States and South America. In 1996 he was selected as an Associate Artist at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, where he studied composition with Augusta Read Thomas. Sam holds a B.M. in Composition from the University of Alabama (1991), where he studied with Harry Philips, Marvin Johnson, and Frederic Goossen, and a M.M. in Composition from the University of Florida (1995), where he studied with John D. White and James Paul Sain. Currently, he is a Doctoral Fellow at the University Florida, where he working toward a Ph.D. in composition with James Paul Sain.

Coriolis Effect gets its title from the "effect" that determines, among other things, the swirl direction of water going down the drain. Like most Northern Hemisphere dwellers, I was delighted my first morning in Buenos Aires to witness the hemispherical difference of the swirl direction first hand. Coriolis Effect was composed as a tribute to all my wonderful Argentine friends as they search for the return of economic and cultural stability to the country they love so much. From the crunch of the harmonies in the tango to the exhalations of the bandeneón, from the creative navigation of their cars to the sharing of maté (a tea made from ilex paraguarensis) between dear friends, the passion of the Argentine people is evident in every part of their lives. This composition emerged from research initiated in the summer of 2001 when the composer was invited to Buenos Aires, Argentina, for the Sonoimágenes 2001 festival of electroacoustic music.

James Paul Sain (b. 1959) is an Associate Professor at the University of Florida where he teaches electroacoustic and acoustic music composition, theory, and technology. He is the founder and director of the internationally acclaimed annual Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival. His compositional oeuvre spans all major acoustic ensembles, instrumental and vocal soloists, and embraces electroacoustic music. His works have been featured at national and international societal events. International residencies include those at the Swedish Royal Academy, University of Lanús (Buenos Aires), Folkwang-Hochschule Essen, and EMS (Stockholm). Dr. Sain is currently an Executive Committee Member of SCI and an elected member of the American Composers Alliance. His music is available in print from Brazinmusikanta and on CD on the Capstone label.