Troy Night Out: Plants and Insects at the Arts Center of the Capital Region

I’m excited to play with members of Albany Sonic Arts Collective‘s Century Plants and Insect Posse for a performance dubbed Plants and Insects. The event is part of Troy Night Out so it’s free and drop-in friendly (how else do you say “come on by and stay as long or little as you’d like?”).

Friday, August 26, 5-9pm
The Arts Center of the Capital Region
256 River St.
Troy, NY
Free!

Post and Beam CD Countdown: Sequencing

I recently finished sequencing the tracks for my upcoming Post and Beam CD. The hardest part was figuring out where to put the long form instrumental pieces like Telephone Temple and Spring Dissent (Bubbling) among the shorter, more song-based pieces. After auditioning countless combinations and creating crazy mind maps of relationships between pieces, I finally decided to jettison the instrumental pieces altogether.

I’m disappointed they didn’t make the cut partly because I wanted Post and Beam to represent a typical set of my current work for banjo and electronics. At the same time, I can’t deny that the album (Yes, I’m actually thinking of it like that; and yes, I do feel old sometimes.) works better without them.

The good news is that they’re not going away forever. I can easily imagine them as the foundation for my next CD, or as online bonus material. And the other good news is that with the sequencing done I can move along with mastering and sleeve design and … and …

Summer Shoot at Mt. Washington

I’ve just started the summer portion of the Mt. Washington film shoot. I hope to write more later about how the mountain is different in the summer than the winter.

Here’s a photo of my audio gear in the corner of an office that was very kindly provided for our use. It’s followed by a shot showing the omni mic I rigged onto the strap of my recording bag. I was hoping to have a true Mid-Side setup this time around but couldn’t get the figure-eight mic I needed. This setup isn’t ideal but it gives me a different perspective on everything I record. (I’ve got two inputs on my recorder so might as well use them both.) The brown fuzzy is a DIY wind screen made from fake fur.

Shout Outs from Metroland: Best of the Capital Region 2010

Metroland Best of the Captial Region 2010; Cover photo by Alicia Solsman

Metroland’s Best of the Capital Region for 2010 came out last week and I am surprised and pleased to be included as the Best Retro-Futurist. Sure, it’s a made-up category, but it’s a good fit. Here’s what they have to say:

Composer and instrumentalist Holland Hopson has been a contributor to the region’s avant-garde music scene for the better part of 20 year—whether it’s vocal excursions that meld Gregorian chant and Dada, or soprano sax forays that come pretty close to “straight-up” jazz, the breadth and range of this iconoclast’s musical journey has always been intriguing, albeit way outside of the box. Hopson’s recent blending of traditional tunes (performed with vocals and banjo) and subtle electronics has turned him into one of the area’s most mesmerizing and memorable live performers. Catch him if you can, as his local shows tend to be few and far between.

Metroland has identified plenty of other (probably more deserving) best-of recipients including such friends and colleagues as Jason Cosco/Grab Ass Cowboys (Best Noise Wrangler); EMPAC (Best Music Curation) — this ought to read Micah Silver, in my opinion, since he is the Music Curator at EMPAC; The Sanctuary for Independent Media (Best Activist Community Arts Center); and Emily Zimmerman (Best Emerging Curator).

These accolades come on the heels of a conversation with a friend at the latest show presented by the Albany Sonic Arts Collective. We were talking about how important it is for a community of artists to receive some recognition from the local press and the concomitant pitfalls of letting it go to your head. A timely conversation for the former and hopefully we’ll avoid the latter. The ASAC event was a great set of performances, by the way, particularly from Fossils from the Sun (Ray Hare) and Family Battle Snake (Bill Kouligas).