X AVANT New Music Festival
Friday Oct. 23

WORKSHOP with PHANTOM ORCHARD
Ikue Mori, electronics
Zeena Parkins, harp

Music Gallery Fellowship Room, 197 John St.
Workshop at Noon
FREE admission!

Come out and take part in this exclusive, interactive workshop with two of the world's most renowed improvised and experimental musicians as they discuss and display their unique instrumental techniques in an intimate setting. Musicians are encouraged to bring instruments and get involved!

Friends and colleagues since 1988, Ikue Mori and Zeena Parkins are two of the strongest musical voices out of the Downtown New York scene. Lynchpins of bands as diverse as DNA, Skeleton Crew, Electric Masada, Hemophiliac and Björk, their duo project Phantom Orchard is the perfect outlet for their unique and personal musical languages and their rapport is evident in each and every piece. Mystery, lyricism and electronic soundscapes from this most dynamic of all dynamic duos.

And as long-time supporters of Toronto’s local music scene, and specifically our town’s rich improvised music community, we are pleased to present the CD release concert for Ken Aldcroft’s Convergence Enemble as part of the X Avant Festival.

Phantom Orchard: Biography
Ikue Mori moved from her native city of Tokyo to New York in 1977. She started playing drums and soon formed the seminal No Wave band DNA, with fellow noise pioneers Arto Lindsay and Tim Wright. DNA enjoyed legendary cult status, while creating a new brand of radical rhythms and dissonant sounds, forever altering the face of rock music.

In the mid '80s, Ikue started to employ drum machines in the unlikely context of improvised music. She subsequently collaborated with numerous improvisors throughout the US, Europe, and Asia, while continuing to produce and record her own music. In 1998, she was invited to perform with Ensemble Modern as a soloist along with Zeena Parkins, and composer Fred Frith.

In 2000, Ikue started using the laptop to expand on her signature sound, thus broadening her scope of musical expression. The Tate Modern commissioned her to create the live soundtrack for Maya Deren's silent films, which premiered in 2007. In 2008, she celebrated her 30th year in music, presenting five ongoing projects at Japan Society in NYC.

Zeena Parkins, multi-instrumentalist, composer, improvisor, and pioneer of the electric harp, has also extended the language of the acoustic harp with the inventive use of unusual playing techniques, preparations, and layers of digital and analog processing. Parkins makes use of anything within reach as a possible tool with which she can enhance the sonic capabilities of her harps. She accurately describes her harp as a "sound machine of limitless capacity" and has used household objects and hardware store finds, including: alligator clips, nails, rubber erasers, rubber tubing, felt, bows, metal candy lids, oversized metal bolts, hair clips, glass jars, discarded strings, as well as more conventional devices such as Leslie cabinets, guitar pedals, and numerous other digital processing hardware and assorted and varied software.

Parkins has appeared on over 70 CDs and in hundreds of concerts in both large and small spaces all over the world. A lightning bolt of a performer, Parkins is a sought-after collaborator, performing with Jim O'Rourke, Nels Cline, Lee Ranaldo, Thurston Moore, Björk, Kaffe Matthews, Pauline Oliveros and many others.

“Tension abounds, and a strange beauty too... This is experimental music, yet focused on the emotional expressiveness of music... some of the pieces are of wonderful beauty, sweet and dark and the same time.” — Stef Gijssels, Free Jazz