Automation, Sound, Systems, Art

A short film on Tristan Perich

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

This short video documentary, *Tristan Perich: Mind the Machine*, by Russell Oliver, explores artist and composer Perich’s processes and thoughts on automation, sound, systems, and art. As Perich describes it, he’s interested in “where the physical world around us meets the abstract world of computation and electronics.” Perich speaks throughout, describing his approach to his work, and the video includes a studio tour — his studio being as much an electronics tinkering zone as it is a musician’s home recording space. He’s at work, for example, on a variation on the microtonal wall that consisted of 1,500 small speakers, and the studio is filled with clear plastic boxes to help him manage all his parts. He connects his own minimalist — “bare bones,” in his words — approach to that of his father, the artist Anton Perich. Like his father, Perich has explored an automated drawing machine, images of which open the film. There’s some especially glorious material toward the end in which a chorus of exposed speaker cones accompany pianist Vicky Chow in a live performance.

The video is a little over 17 minutes long and is streaming at [vimeo.com](https://vimeo.com/106707517). More on Perich at [tristanperich.com](http://tristanperich.com).

Disquiet Junto Project 0142: Call Center

The Assignment: Make music from the near silence of phone calls.

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

20140918-callcenter

Each Thursday in [the Disquiet Junto group on SoundCloud.com](https://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/) and at [Disquiet.com](https://disquiet.com/tag/junto/), a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate.

Tracks in the project will be added to this setlist:

This assignment was made in the evening, California time, on Thursday, September 18, with 11:59pm on the following Monday, September 22, 2014, as the deadline.

These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at [tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto](http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto)):

Disquiet Junto Project 0142: Call Center

The Assignment: Make music from the near silence of phone calls.

This week’s project explores the near-silence inherent in phone calls. These are the steps:

Step 1: Record the near-silent sound of phone calls between your phone and three different other phones.

Step 2: Develop a short, original piece that accentuates the differences between the sounds of these three calls.

Step 3: Upload the track to the Disquiet Junto group on SoundCloud.

Step 4: Listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow participants.

Deadline: Monday, September 22, 2014, at 11:59pm wherever you are.

Length: Your finished work should be between one and three minutes in length.

Upload: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, only upload one track for this assignment, and include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please include the term “disquiet0142-callcenter” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, please be sure to include this information:

More on this 142nd Disquiet Junto project — “Make music from the near silence of phone calls” — at:

Disquiet Junto Project 0142: Call Center

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

Disquiet Junto general discussion takes place at:

https://disquiet.com/forums/

Photo associated with this project by Georgie Sharp and used thanks to a Creative Commons license:

Phone Home