Dates Announced for San Francisco Tape Music Festival 2017

As in the past, the new year will be celebrated by the annual San Francisco Tape Music Festival. This remains the only festival in the United States devoted to the performance of synthesized audio compositions projected into a three-dimensional space. That space is configured with 24 high-end loudspeakers; and, for many of the performances, the projection of the audio sources onto those speakers is controlled in real-time. The results are experienced by the audience sitting in total darkness.

Also as in the past, the festival will consist of four concerts over the course of a single weekend. Specific dates and times will be as follows:

• Friday, January 6, 9 p.m.
• Saturday, January 7, 8 p.m.
• Saturday, January 7, 11 p.m.
• Sunday, January 8, 8 p.m.

Details about the specific compositions to be performed at each of these concerts have not yet been released. However, the final concert will be devoted to the tape music of Pauline Oliveros, who died at the age of 84 this past November 24. In addition the 11 p.m. concert will concentrate on longer and ambient tape compositions and will include excerpts of the music that David Lynch created for the soundtrack of his film Eraserhead. Programming will also feature such pioneers as Bill Maginnis, Technical Director at the San Francisco Tape Music Center, Warner Jepson, one of the first to compose with Don Buchla’s first modular synthesizer, the Series 100, and one of the first creators of computer music, Jean-Claude Risset. Currently active composers will include Matt Ingalls, Thom Blum, and Kyle Bruckmann.

[Added 1/5/2017: Program details have now been announced as follows:

Friday January 6, 2017 (9pm)
JEAN-CLAUDE RISSET - Sud (1986)
WARNER JEPSON - selections from Tulliam (1967)
MARIE-HELENE BREAULT/MARTIN BEDARD - Replica (2013)
THOM BLUM - Cascade (2016)
KYLE BRUCKMANN - Predictable Epiphanies (2016)
MAXIME CORBEIL-PERRON - Cubic (2016)
SIVAN ELDAR - On Air | Behind Glass (2013)
MATT INGALLS - Boxed Buchla (2017)

Saturday January 7, 2017 (8pm)
CURTIS ROADS - Then (2014)
BILL MAGINNIS - Two Improvisations for Electronic Sounds (1965)
ELSE MARIE PADE - Rejsen til Bloksbjerg og Valborgsnat (from Faust Suite) (1962)
MAGGI PAYNE - Sferics (2016)
BRONA MARTIN - A bit closer to home (2014)
PAOLO PASTORINO - Dimensione aggiuntiva (2016)
CLIFF CARUTHERS - Last Breaths (1996)
CLAIRE HAAS - Crossing Under (2008)
KENT JOLLY - Mirrors (1995)
THEO MATHIEN - Throatsong to the Four-leggeds (2013)

Saturday January 7, 2017 (11pm)
DAVID LYNCH'S "ERASERHEAD" SOUNDTRACK excerpted (1977)
PETE STOLLERY - Three Cities (2012)
MATTHEW GOODHEART - Berlin Head Metal - I (2016)
LUIGI MARINO - Hau: a form of bistability (2013)
NICOLAS MARTY - Une des chambres n'aurait presque pas de fenêtre (2015)
KRISTIN MILTNER - Music for Slowing Down Time (2017)
DONALD SWEARINGEN - In The Kitchen (1992)

Sunday January 8, 2017 (8pm)
tentative program, subject to changee
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Time Perspectives (1961)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Bye Bye Butterfly (1965)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Rock Symphony (excerpts) (1965)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Big Mother Is Watching You (1966)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Alien Bog (1967)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Lion’s Tale (excerpts) (1989)
PAULINE OLIVEROS - Sayonara Sirenade (2001)]

All performances will take place in the Victoria Theatre, located in the Mission at 2961 16th Street, one block east of the 16th Street BART Station and the Muni bus stops on the corner of Mission Street. General admission will be $15 for each concert with a special $10 rate for the underemployed. In addition, “sweet spot” tickets for a reserved section in the middle of the seating plan will be sold for $25. As in the past, there will be a festival pass sold for all four concerts for $60; and those with festival passes will be entitled to “sweet spot” seating. Tickets will be available at the door after 7 p.m. on each of the three days of the festival, and only cash will be accepted. A Brown Paper Tickets event page has been created for both festival passes and individual tickets (except for the underemployed rate); but, as of this writing, that Web page is not currently processing ticket orders.