Karloff and I were invited to perform at the Orange County Center for Contemporary Art in the heart of Santa Ana’s Artists’ Village. Opening the show were “Between Ravens and Crows,” followed by Ain Soph Aur and, closing the show, was Madamn Grislee.
Due to an oversight on my part, the audio recording captured ambient sound where Karloff and I were seated, but not the sounds the audience heard. While not capturing what I intended, it still produced several nice sections, one of which I’m including here:
Last night Karloff and I were joined by Jeremy Morelock and Nial Morgan. We opened a wonderful show at Koos Art Center. We were followed by John Schneider’s breathtaking performance of microtonal music for refretted acoustic guitar, written by legendary American composer Lou Harrison. Following John’s performance, Master Ho’s Pin Peat ensemble performed Khmer Classical Music with intensity, precision, and passion. The room was thrumming with the energy flowing from the stage.
Ain Soph Aur’s performance was 30 minutes, but I excerpted two parts. The first is from the beginning, and the second from the end.
My dear friends have an adorable daughter, Gracie, who was having a grand old time a few weeks back. I happened to catch a few moments of high spirits:
What do jazz greats like Luis Conte, Lee Ritenour, Eric Marienthal, Tom Scott, and Ernie Watts have in common? Long Beach native son David Witham has lent his talent and artistry to each, and many more. He’s the principal pianist for Wicked at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, and was the long time band leader for George Benson.
He recently released a CD of original compositions titled Spinning The Circle on the Cryptogramophone label. The playing is stellar, and the writing diverse: In turns expansive, reflective, and joyous. Supported by top musicians like Nels Cline (Wilco, John Zorn, Geraldine Fibbers), Jay Anderson (Maria Schneider, Frank Zappa, Tom Waits), Jon Crosse (Captain & Tennille, Michel Columbier, Paul Anka), Greg Leisz (Willie Nelson, Beck, Joni Mitchell), Scott Amendola (Pat Martino, Charlie Hunter, Nels Cline), and legendary percussionist Luis Conte (Queen Latifah, Diana Krall, Eric Clapton), David’s playing and writing glistens and shines.
David’s not a one trick pony, though. In addition to his full time music work, he also produces a public access show called Portable Universe. With more than 100 episodes, he’s showcased a wide variety of artists, musicians and, with the help of Neon Hunter, explored his other passion: Neon art.
David took some time to speak with me about his work, and performed two songs. Click on the Podcast link to hear the interview, and on the video player below to watch the performance.
Here’s a video of David performing two original songs:
Watch Portable Universe Fridays at 8:30 pm on Long Beach Community TV (ch. 65/69/95 in LB and Signal Hill if you have cable) and 24/7 at www.portableuniverse.tv.
On April 5th 2008, Ain Soph Aur performed at Zero Point Space as part of Thee Dung Mummy 5th Anniversary Experimental Music Festival. In keeping with the organic fluidity of the group’s performance philosophy we, at the last minute, included a third artist in our performance. The artist known as ‘Catastrophic Mermaids on Parade’ joined us.
Here’s a flyer I made for the show:
I am offering up a room recording of our performance, which I decided to call “The Quality of Volition.” It is actually an excerpt, but a fairly long one. (About 15 minutes) The entire performance was about 25 minutes long.
