Experimental Music

Improvisation, Double Bass, Electronics

Gahlord Dewald :: 8/25/23 :: Mānoa, Hawai‘i

I seek out meaningful gesture in composed music, improvised music, and experimental music. These three approaches—instructed, assembled from the materials at hand, and examined—sift through my live performances and recorded work.

Recent solo releases include Ashuelot, Strategic Game, and Coherent Light Enclosed Without.

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This is a playlist of my music. It's about an hour long.
  1. “Two Songs, a Dance, a Conclusion”Ashuelot album cover comes from the album Ashuelot. This recording is from a live performance at 32M Center for Creative Work for New York Modular Society's livestream series. The complete project of which this recording is a part includes essays on “and electronics” performance practice by several additional artists. Musician Ibukun Sunday says “Ashuelot is a piece of work that should be listened to, which also has a blend of natural sounds from the surrounding, sounds from double bass, foot pedals, and electronic sound devices.” Double bass, modular electronics, and encapsulated electronics.
  2. “In for Repairs,”Stone album cover from Stone, is part of a larger project centered on embedded rhythms, collage, and contemporary thought. Each track is paired with a small piece of dialogue from the larger story. It is the second installment of the wider narrative futures project in which it is embedded. Stone was created with cassette tape multitrack, modular electronics, sampling, field recordings, and a small arsenal of encapsulated electronics.
  3. “Poem for Star House”Upstairs at Vitek's album cover is from a live performance at Gateway City Arts in Holyoke, MA. It references the tiny house and land of my duo partner for Jaguar Stereo, Toussaint St. Negritude. It is a freely improvised piece which makes use of a variety of extended techniques for double bass including col legno battuto (and all kinds of other col legno).
  4. “? and ?”Strategic Game is from Strategic Game, a project which is comprised of close to 600 short segments of noise music, an ongoing video representation, and quite a few cross-signaled longer segments. Originally intended for distribution on streaming services, I just couldn't continue with that plan after several hundred million dollars was given to a misinformation grifter by the most prominent streaming platform. The complete project is available on hard disk. Modular electronics, electric bass, double bass, chaos-based collage software, field recordings. Voice of Col John Boyd courtesy USMC.
  5. “Fenestration”Arousing // Fenestration album cover was created for the 2018 Waking Windows Festival in Winooski, Vermont. Originally available for streaming, cassette (sold out, sorry), and DIY cassette (digital master so you can make your own cassette). No-input mixer is when the output of a mixing console is plugged into a channel input, creating a feedback loop. This loop is influenced through equalization knobs or any other electronics in the signal path. No-input mixer and encapsulated electronics.
  6. “Arc Study A”New Function album cover is from New Function, an expanding body of work focused on creating sound fabric for augmenting steady tasks of the anthropocene. Musician Chester says “This is excellent situational music for mundane tasks. It is currently my favorite music to wash dishes by (not a put down.) It has not only helped pass the time but has made daily tasks enjoyable.” Embedded sound engine, kalimba, rotation knob interface.
  7. “? and ?” is also part of Strategic Game, discussed above.
  8. “Side 2”Coherent Light Enclosed Without album cover is the second side of the vinyl release Coherent Light Enclosed Without. It was recorded at the Tank Center for Sonic Arts in Rangely, Colorado. It is a double bass recording in a unique sonic environment. The music review site Anti-Music for Anti-Fascists says “We are treated to brief moments in the starry night. We hear a wonderful string of the bass’s structure.” Solo double bass.
  9. “Inside up of outside when”Pulse album cover is from Pulse which is the first episode of the narrative futures project discussed above for “In for Repairs.” This sequence of music takes place before the elements of Stone. A single-device electronic work for laptop midi and the Moog Mother-32, all sounds including percussion are derived from one relatively small semi-modular synthesizer.
Experimental Music Program
Program from the AM Frequencies Experimental Music Series,
design by Jasmine Parsia

Discography

Experimental music

Improvisation

Double Bass + Electronics

Has a discernible beat