Bio

Phil Curtis is a composer, sound designer, and performer whose work has been featured in numerous venues for new and experimental music. Phil also frequently creates sound design and music for film, TV, theater, dance, and the web. Films that he has scored have been featured in the San Diego Film Festival, the Festival Internacional Del Nuevo Cine Latinamerica in Havana, Cuba, and as a part of the traveling exhibit "Muestra de Cine Colombiano A–os 90s." Performances of his music have been given by Amsterdam's Nieuw Ensemble, the New Century Players, The New York New Music Ensemble, and he has performed on laptop electronics with Anthony Braxton, Thomas Buckner, Anthony Davis, Vinny Golia, Earl Howard, Wadada Leo Smith and the New York City Opera. His music has been described as "...predictably acerbic" by the Los Angeles Times, and Alan Rich, writing for the LA Weekly, has observed that it has "genuine wit...not at all perfunctory."

Artistic Statement

My work falls in the intersection between music, sound and new media art. With the ubiquity of recorded music in this era of the ipod, I seek an environment for sound that is immersive, in the moment, and responsive to the listener. Electronic music requires an alternative presentation to the traditional concert, an alternative that bridges the gap between audience and performer - a gap that is often a byproduct of the increasingly obscure methods of sound production in contemporary audio technology, where prerecorded samples abound and the performer typically makes vague gestures behind a computer screen.

I work primarily with computers and electronic sounds, although my background is in composition and improvisation and I frequently perform with acoustic instrumentalists. My experience with improvised music has given me the conviction that a performer needs to be responsive to the audience, to the other musicians on the stage, and the musical moment itself. The interface between the electronically-generated sound and the actions performed in shaping that sound should be as direct and straightforward as possible, which is not to say simple. A mouse and computer keyboard are generally not enough to control complex processes - more subtle controllers are needed, and there should be many of them controlling many parameters of the resulting sound if the computer is to be an instrument in its own right. These controllers can have the added benefit of providing more of a performance spectacle for an audience, and can even provide the audience with an avenue for direct control of their experience.

My interest is in creating hybrid sound installations/performances that allow the audience to influence the sounds they hear via various physical objects that act as controllers. This allows the collective will of a group of people to decide the resulting sound within a complex network of actions, interactions, and reactions that approximates a more traditionally skilled improvising ensemble. The participating "audience" in this situation thus understands in a visceral way the range of the sound material that is being shaped, and experiences firsthand a third dimension of a composition, which is the dimension of real-time variability. Alternatively, if multiple physical controls are placed in the hands of a rehearsed group of skilled people, who may be playing other instruments as well, a sort of collective hyper-instrument can be created.

The larger macrostructure of this composition/improvisation is typically controlled by a performer-composer-programmer-conductor (usually myself). While a more egalitarian distribution of power within the ensemble might be a more idealistic goal, in practice a person that understands how the equipment works is always going to have to oversee the proceedings to some extent, if only to control the overall volume. It is my belief that a more interesting result is be achieved if the pace and development of an idea is directed by someone with foreknowledge of the sounds inherent in the pre-programmed structure.

As computing power increases while becoming more affordable, this type of immersive art becomes practical. Audiences that have been weaned on video games with sophisticated graphics and interactive controllers (as in the Nintendo Wii), will expect similar interactivity from their art. There is great potential for digitally generated audio and video to feed off of each other, and for real world objects to be activated by computers via robotics.

The aesthetic of the art that will created by this new technology is still in the process of being created, but it will doubtless be informed by the last 40+ years of new media artistic practice. New types of virtuosity will become possible within this new field of possibilities, and artists, who in some cases will cede some control of the particulars of their work to the audience, may be judged on new artistic criterion as that audience becomes more sophisticated in its awareness of digital technologies and the programming behind them.