Michael Croswell at Spark Festival

Posted on February 19, 2009 by John CS Keston

Here’s a short section of Michael Croswell’s ambient combination of french horn and sampled industrial sounds from his performance on Wednesday, February 18, 2009. This was the first “Nightlife” performance at Spark, and lots of really great music has happened since, so there is much more to come.

This is one of the first times I have used the Sony PCM D-50 to record a performance other than my own. What was nice about this instance is that the audience was very quiet. Micheal’s music was quite dynamic throughout his entire performance, but in very slow sweeping waves with few abrupt movements. This recording would not have been possible with a noisy audience.

Michael Croswell

Spark Festival of Electronic Music and Arts

Posted on February 16, 2009 by John CS Keston

This year’s Spark Festival of Electronic Music and Arts starts on Tuesday, February 17 and goes through Sunday, February 22 at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Festival features dozens of accomplished artists, performers, and speakers from around the globe. The content ranges from the experimental, electronic sounds of STEIM to the glitch, minimal dub of Stefan Betke, aka Pole.

My group, Keston and Westdal featuring Graham O’Brien on drums, are appearing at the festival on Thursday, February 19, 2009 at the Bedlam Theatre. We will be performing works based on material from our 2008 collection of experimental compositions, One Day to Save All Life (Unearthed Music, 2008). The concert is free and open to the public, ages 18 and up. Here’s Upward Not Northward from our last album. You might notice an abrupt ending on this piece because it’s taken from a gapless master.

Upward Not Northward

Keston and Westdal at Nublu NYC

Posted on February 6, 2009 by John CS Keston

One Sound Every Day entries are likely to be a little scarce until Monday or Tuesday because I’ll be in New York for a performance at Nublu. The group playing is Keston and Westdal with Graham O’Brien on drums. We’ve been busy preparing for this and other events lately, including the Spark Festival in Minneapolis. I’m excited to be visiting New York again. This will be our fifth performance there as Keston and Westdal, and the third time at Nublu, which is a really great venue. I’m also eagerly anticipating the Spark Festival having just learned that Pole will be performing on February 21, 2009.

That said, while I’m in New York I’m planning on making some binaural recordings of environments, street musicians, musical performances, and general mayhem as I encounter it, so I expect to catch upsoon after I return. New York readers and visitors, please stop by Nublu (between 4th and 5th on Avenue C) this Saturday, February 7. We’ll be playing two sets starting at midnight. Here’s an example of what you might hear during our show.

Ostracon
by Keston and Westdal (Unearthed Music, 2008)

Audio Cookbook on Make: Blog

Posted on January 28, 2009 by John CS Keston

Yesterday afternoon the popular and renowned Make: Blog posted an article about my recent ACB entry, Processing Sound Using Photoshop. From the article:

Over at Audio Cookbook, John Keston has been running a few experiments with using image filters in Photoshop to process sound. Running the audio data through a Gaussian blur or Spherize filter, he was able to create some incredibly diverse effects from a simple electric piano input.

Thanks to Make: Blog author Jason Striegel for the good words. Checkout the full article over on the Make: Blog website. In addition to Make: the article has been written about on many other blogs in English and German including Synthtopia and Media Synesthesia. Who knew it would create such a stir?

Live Looping: Not Just for Breakfast Anymore

Posted on January 18, 2009 by John CS Keston

A few years ago I created a technique for live looping in Ableton Live. I wanted to record and stop recording a clip in the session view without using a bulky MIDI foot controller. So, I came up with the idea of modding a mouse by connecting a simple sustain pedal into the left button. This way I could keep playing my instrument with both hands and record to any clip that the mouse cursor was resting on.

I found that I could do lots of other things while continuing to play two handed, like start a scene, stop a clip, mute a track, etc. Usually I reserve setting up my modded mouse for shows, but it’s a very useful tool in the studio for capturing two handed keyboard parts, like the Rhodes in this segment from a new track.

Live Looped Studio Rhodes