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PAMELA Z
solo voice & electronics concerts
Pamela Z has composed many short (3-8 minute) works for voice & electronics that she regularly performs on full evening solo new music concerts. She can easily combine these workts to create programs of any length or to perform on shared concerts with other artists. These programs are appropriate for a concert hall or performance gallery equipped with a good, stereo or multi-channel sound system. (Some of these pieces are excerpts from her larger works and, in some cases, include video projection.) (Contact Beth at Beauchamp Artist Services for availability.)
To hear selected audio documentation of Pamela Z solo concerts click here.
The following is a partial list of such works:
Bone Music
Solo Voice , Found
Percussion & Electronics, composed: 1992, duration: 8:00
This work for voice, electronics, and 5 gallon plastic water bottle layers
a haunting, wordless melody and frenetic, processed chattering in an imaginary
language over the polyrhythm of three boomy, percussive delay loops. This
piece was originally intended for the Qube Chix’ "Circle of
Bone", but didn’t really belong in the piece and became a staple
of Pamela Z's solo repertoire.
(audio sample) (video sample)
Pop Titles 'You'
(from Parts of
Speech) Solo Voice & Electronics, composed: 1986, duration: 3:30
Pop Titles 'You' is a found text piece for voice and three delay
lines. The text is taken from an issue of the Phonolog Report, a reference
publication that was found in record stores and listed the titles of available
recordings and their composers and performers (until it was replaced by
computers). This piece, which first appeared on the 1988 ZED recording, "Echolocation",
was later used as one of the segments of the 1995 sound work and 1998
performance work Parts of Speech. A recording of this piece is available on Pamela Z's CD "A Delay is Better".
(audio sample)
Syrinx/Birdvoice
(from Voci) Solo Voice & Electronics, sampled birdsong, composed: 2003, duration: 5:00
Birdvoice begins with sampled birdsong triggered with a gesture-based MIDI controller. Pamela Z then plays a short bird sample and begins to systematically shift it down in pitch until its individual sounds are slow enough to be imitated by a human voice. She then sings the slow version and shifts it back up until it once again sounds like a bird. This little excersize (inspired by her sound installation "Syrinx") serves as an elaborate introduction to a little art-song (sung in French and English and accompanied by digital delay loops) about the voice of the bird.
Badagada
Solo
Voice & Electronics, composed: 1988, duration: 3:36
The syllables "ba-da-ga-da-ga-da-ga-da-ga" are layered in a delay
line to form a harmonic, rhythmic accompaniment to a melody sung in English.
This song first appeared on the 1988 ZED recording, "Echolocation". A version of it is available on Pamela Z's CD "A Delay is Better".
(audio sample)
Typewriter
(from
Correspondence) Solo Voice & Electronics, composed: 1995, duration: 3:00
This short, spoken piece uses for voice, processing, and typewriter samples
(triggered with the BodySynth™ MIDI Controller). It grew out of a segment
of a collaborative work Pamela Z did with 77hz called Correspondence that was commissioned by the (then) Minnesota Composer’s Forum and
premiered at LACE in Los Angeles.
Nihongo de Hanasoo
(from
Gaijin) Voice & Electronics and Video, composed: 1999, duration: 5:00
This little work (excerpted from Gaijin) is an example of Pamela Z's love for found text. She recites the Japanese phonetic alphabet in a repeating, long loop over which she then sings and reads the chapter titles from a Japanese language text book. The segment is generally accompanied by a projected video of two, slow moving Butoh performers with an overlaid graphic of the 26 phonetic characters.
(video sample)
Pianobend
Solo Voice &
Electronics, composed: 1994, duration: 5:00
A work for voice, processing, and piano samples triggered and pitch-bent
with the BodySynth™ MIDI controller.
(audio sample)
Unaccompanied
Melody with Minor Ninths and Octaves
Solo Soprano Voice,
composed: 1989, duration: 4:30
Written for unprocessed soprano
voice, this is a work Pamela Z originally composed for Laurie Amat,
who premiered it at New Performance Gallery (now ODC Performance Gallery)
in San Francisco. The piece also occurs as a segment of the performance work Voci.
The Muni Section
(from Metrodaemonium) Solo Voice & Electronics, composed: 1995, duration:
3:50
For voice, processing, and sampled sounds from the San Francisco public
transportation system, this is part of a suite of pieces called Metrodaemonium which grew out of a commissioned (Secession Gallery), site-specific work
Pamela Z did as a portrait of downtown San Francisco. The samples are triggered
using the BodySynth™ MIDI controller. A version of it is available on Pamela Z's CD "A Delay is Better".
(audio sample)
In Tymes of Olde
(from Parts of Speech) Solo Voice & Electronics, composed: 1991, duration:
5:45
A song (about talking) sung in English over a delay loop that increases
in complexity as vocal layers are gradually added to its texture, In Tymes
of Olde appears on the 1992 Starkland compilation "From A to Z" and on Pamela Z's CD "A Delay is Better".
(audio sample)
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