If you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area, join us for a special, site-specific performance event:

535 Powell Street, San Francisco, California (Union Square area)
Thursday, June 26, 2014, 7:00-10:00 p.m. PDT
Benefit tickets are available at the door: $35 suggested donation (sliding scale)

This final concert of the June Benefit Series celebrates the history and creative spirit of Meridian Music: Composers in Performance, featuring several of its curators, past and present. Emphasizing a theme of bridging the gap between art and technology, several of the participating musicians specialize in computer music and improvisation, sound art, and invented instruments. This dynamic, site-specific concert will take place on all three floors of the historic Perine Mansion, highlighting the wonderful Victorian architecture of the Meridian’s longtime home.

Like many San Francisco Bay Area arts and nonprofit organizations, the Meridian Gallery was recently threatened with eviction, and their landlord suddenly demanded an entire year’s rent to be paid in advance (approximately $100,000), despite their long-term, responsible tenancy. Many supporters in the community have rallied to assist the Meridian Gallery staff and Board of Directors in extending their lease, but they still need additional financial support. By the end of June, the founders of the Meridian Gallery hope to negotiate a longer-term lease and maintain their wonderful programs for San Francisco Bay Area youth, including their notable internship program, as well as the gallery exhibitions, mural program, and other unique Fine Arts programs. The June Benefit Month has featured special lectures on art, plus other musical artists, such as John Santos; and in addition to the June 26th Composers in Curation — History of Meridian in Music event, it will culminate with a dinner and concert, featuring jazz artist Kitty Margolis, on Wednesday, June 25th.

The Meridian Gallery was founded and is managed by Anne Trueblood Brodzky and Anthony Williams (photo above). They established the Meridian Gallery under the umbrella of their nonprofit organization, The Society for Art Publications of the Americas, in a San Francisco building near Union Square in 1989, moving it the current location a few years later. They co-founded the ongoing music series with Bay Area musician, music teacher, and chef, Philip Gelb, in 1998. Meridian Music: Composers in Performance presents a wide range of original new music artists from the vital Bay Area scene and beyond, with monthly concerts featuring both established and emerging composer-performers. There is also a Meridian Dance Program, an incubator for new works by San Francisco Bay Area choreographers and dancers.

Click here for directions and a map.

Here are the schedule and locations of the performances in the Meridian Gallery building:

7:00 p.m.
First Floor
Bob Marsh, performing his composition, The Visitor

Bob Marsh, composer, has over 40 years experience with solo and ensemble performances and public engagement projects. He holds a BFA in sculpture and MA in humanistic clinical psychology. He studied classical guitar and piano privately, taught himself other traditional instruments as well as inventing several of his own. He frequently blurs boundaries between art, performance, dance and music and is actively engaged in changing the relationship between performer and audience. He is currently combining sculpture, movement and music in a variety of wearable sculptures that make sounds when in motion.

7:15 p.m.
Third Floor
Andrea Williams

Sound Artist Andrea Williams composes immersive sonic environments with field recordings, laptop, small instruments, and room resonance.

7:45 p.m.
Second Floor
Bryan Day

Bryan Day is an instrument inventor and experimental musician based in Richmond, California. For this event, Day will be performing two-part piece using whiskerphones (amplified carbon-fiber filaments) and homemade radio transceivers.

8:15 p.m.
First Floor
Phillip Greenlief & Jon Raskin, performing their composition, 1+1

For more than 10 years, Greenlief and Raskin have been active in their celebrated 2+2 performance series, where the pair of saxophonists invite a pair of “like instruments” to join them in improvisations and graphic scores. The project has spurred more than 40 concerts, and as many recordings, working with numerous great musicians from around the United States. From time to time, the saxophonists pare the project down to a duo, where the same mix of improvisation and forward-thinking graphic scores (that are often referred to by others as works of art in their own right) are on the table to encourage dialogues between these accomplished Bay Area reed wizards.

8:45 p.m.
First Floor
David Samas

David Samas is a painter, poet, inventor, composer, philosopher, farmer and father of 4. A native San Franciscan, David performs, curates and catalyzes multidisciplinary collaborations which stem from a deep love of the natural world, a respect for the ancient ways and the profound sacredness of all life.He will perform on his sonic painting, The Dragon of Music.

9:15 p.m.
Third Floor
Tom Bickley (solo)

Tom Bickley, alto recorder and voice, performs his composition Basho (1996). This is a piece both noisy and meditative, an homage to the famous poet and the tradition of walking/wandering meditation.

9:30 p.m.
Beginning on the Third Floor, the Second Floor, and ending on the First Floor
The Cornelius Cardew Choir, performing:

Heart Chant, by composer Pauline Oliveros
Wind Horse, by composer Pauline Oliveros
7 Hums 7 Times, by composer/director Tom Bickley

The Cornelius Cardew Choir is a unique vocal ensemble that performs works by contemporary composers, which may include experimental musical scores, text, occasional instrumentation, improvisation, vocal sound effects, and movement. The choir was founded on May Day 2001, by Bob Marsh, Kattt Atchley, and Tom Bickley. Continuing under the leadership of Tom Bickley, the choir is a collaborative ensemble of vocalists and musicians, some of whom have composed pieces for the group. They have performed with Pauline Oliveros and the Deep Listening Band, and annually at the Garden of Memory event at Chapel of the Chimes, among many other notable performances and venues. The choir is named in honor of social activist and composer/performer Cornelius Cardew (1936-1981). I (Cathryn Hrudicka) will be performing as a member of the Cardew Choir.

The members of the Cardew Choir who will perform include (list may be updated):

Tom Bickley (Co-Founder, Director)
Bob Marsh (Co-Founder)
Nancy Beckman
Cathryn Hrudicka
Diane Caudillo
Brad Fischer
Katherine Setar
Ian Saxton
Marianne Tomita McDonald
Jed Holtzman
Sarah Rose Stiles
Joe Kuta
Aurora Mahassine
Derek Drudge
Kalonica McQuesten
Patti Deuter
Richard Morrison
David Samas

If you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area, we hope to see you in the audience for this very special site-specific event, a fundraiser for a very worthy cause, the sustainability of the Meridian Gallery in its current Union Square home. To be updated on my upcoming arts events, please subscribe to this blog or ask to be added to the Creative Sage Arts e-letter list for news about other events, projects, books, and performances in which I’ll be participating.

The Cardew Choir will be presenting an upcoming performance at the Center for New Music in San Francisco, in Fall 2014 (date to be announced), where we’ll be performing a premiere of composer Silvia Matheus’s new work, Cage Fermata, along with other pieces. I’ll post more about that performance as soon as details are confirmed.

Please feel free to ask questions or comment below this post — and come say hello afterward, if you attend this performance. We look forward to seeing you there!

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