Electric Rainbow Coalition Festival (review)

Organizer Eric Lyon declared as his intention in putting together the Electric Rainbow Coalition (ERC) to:

present every known form of electro-acoustic and computer music including but not limited to the following: spectromorphology, granular, ambient, glitch, interactive, sonification, computer music, 4beat, electronische Musik, collage, synth pop, electronica, break-beat, timbral, Hörspiel, musique concrète, electroacoustic, intelligent/ dolphin, trance, plunderphon-ics, organized sound, interactive cross-modal synthesis, text/sound, electro-metal, biofeedback, tape music, electronic music, stochastic, adaptive, industrial, house, digital hardcore, Internet music, turntable music, phonography, algorithmic, organolectric, drum 'n' bass, bruitisme, psytrance, new age, acousmatic, noise, soundscape, jungle, doltish/dodo, techno, acid jazz, trip hop, multimedia art, live electronics, IDM, recombinant, sound lowercase, cut-up, digital poetry, assemblage, remixology, microsound, mashup/ bootleg, samplephilia, junk music, sonic détournement, disorganized sound, systems music, circuit benders, futurism, cybersonics, microtonal music, homebrew, sine-wave, oral history, cinéma sonore.

This gathering, which took place 22– 24 August 2003 at Dartmouth College in the picturesque hills of western New Hampshire, was certainly an opportunity to hear an extremely wide range of electroacoustic work. The selection of pieces contained no bias toward "academic" work, as is so often the case at other conferences/festivals (there was no "conference" element to the event, in any case). There is apparently a generation, or "class," of composers who feel no aversion to creating techno-oriented works one could dance to, or to structuring their works in clear song-forms. Although such music would likely not get through the screening process of a "peer-review" selection committee, there is interesting work being done in such pop-oriented styles nonetheless. It was great to have a venue such as ERC to hear these styles programmed right in with everything else.

The musical part of the festival took place over two days, with prerecorded works being programmed to run non-stop for 12 hours each day, from noon to midnight. (The third day was reserved for "recovery," consisting of a vegetarian brunch on a balcony overlooking an idyllic pond just off of the golf course.) The Warren Bentley Theater was equipped with an octophonic sound system (some pieces were multi-channel, although this was apparent only from advance knowledge or careful listening—no such indication was given in the program), and the central floor area of the space was outfitted, to the great relief of many, with mattresses and pillows (apparently Jon Appleton's idea, although he declined to take credit for the tie-died coverings!). Mr. Lyon organized a team of student diffusers to man the mixer (yes, they were men, Dartmouth-ites, one and all: Steve Pierce, Masaki Kubo, Brent Reidy, Eric Lyon, and Yuri Spitsyn), and they kept the music rolling, along with a projector announcing the composer and title of each selection as it came up in the cue. They had each rehearsed their portion of the show, and all proceeded relatively smoothly, and the usual complaints of lack of rehearsal time, unfamiliarity with the board, and composers diffusing their own works at excessive levels, were entirely avoided.

In presenting a marathon of music, one of necessity imposes upon the listeners the need to make choices, to "program" the listening experience. In order to eat, sleep, chat, clear one's head, one must decide which pieces to listen to and which to miss (the printed program was very helpful in listing the diffusion time for each piece, so one could make a point of getting into the theater to catch the pieces one especially wanted to hear). Traditionally, a presenter would decide on the works and the order, and would provide a break in between each piece (applause, queue up next piece, etc.), and would wrap things up before everyone was too exhausted to listen further. The marathon is an interesting approach to programming, as it empowers the listeners, challenging them to become co-artistic directors of the experience. On the other hand, it risks propagating the "sample-and-forget" syndrome, whereby listeners drop...