Ulverston Sound Artist and Musician Dan Fox visists the Park for a special FON AIR show on Feb 27. Dan will be bringing his magnificent Boom Bike ( left) , through which you can play your own music via your mobile or usb stick, and his Woosh Directional Speaker, which…well, come and listen.
1pm Sunday Feb 27, and its free of charge.
We have better pictures somewhere, but for now enjoy the sunlight on the paper fibres in this uninformative snap of our Merch Stall at a pre Christmas Grizedale Arts event at Coniston Institute. As a fundraiser for the Institute we were selling work by Paul Rooney, Binural Media and ourselves alongside local artists and butchers, and several Grizedale alumni including Marcus Coates, Ryan Gander and Nat Mellors. A nice day all round. We ate well and Moved Some Units.
Alys emerges from Tech duties and helps Sue handle the visuals.
Contrasting appreciative responses to the sound of Klaus Wunderlich scurrying around beneath your feet during Mark Vernon’s ”Christmas Re-wind.” “…very seasonal, and not a cliche in sight.”..”cakes, drinks…mad tunes.”
Andrew, Alys and Wiliam Deakin brave the cobwebs to install Powered Speakers in the crawlspace beneath the Bandstand. William (right) found 52p, which covered the cost of his safety gear.
Mark Vernon is a sound artist, musician and radio producer based in Glasgow. He was a founding member of the art radio collective, ‘Radio Tuesday’ and has produced programmes and features for stations including WFMU, RADIA, Resonance FM, CKUT, Radio 101, VPRO and the BBC. His radio productions range from documentaries and radio plays to more experimental audio collage and soundscape pieces. On December the 12th he presented “Christmas Rewind” a multi channel assemblage of Christmas recordings made in the 60′s by the Derby Tape Recording Club These include oddly moving audio letters, kids singing and talking,and snatches of christmas music seeded with Marks own additions.
Gary plays the beautiful trumpet parts that attracted so many visitors to Paul’s “Spit Valve” installation in the park. Based in Barrow, Gary plays with the Barrow Steelworks band, and was recommended to us by everyone we contacted in our search for an accompanist for Paul’s piece. Andrew, (Octopus Director) is a Brass player himself, and has copies of the LPS Gary made with the Shipyard Band a few years ago. Thanks again Gary for all your help.
Paul Rooney’s “Spit Valve” text, in which a pool of spittle in a Trumpet valve muses on the nature of its existence. Available from us for £5 and with a cd of Gary Abbott’s trumpet soundtrack, this is the first in our series of Octopus Editions. (“Editions Octopus”?) There’s also a version for our FON AIR radio PROJECT , with Paul reading the piece in our studio at Piel View House.
BBC R4′s Bob Dickinson (left) records the “Spit Valve” tech run during a visit to Octopus HQ in november. Bob is a smashing feller with family in Barrow and is putting together a programme looking at the impact of THE CUTS on Barrow’s arts organisations. We are more optimistic than we look. Good thing it’s radio.
Nov 28th, and Paul Rooney and Octopods meet their audience on a bright and chilly afternoon in Barrow Park for the launch of Paul’s” Spit Valve” installation. Kicking off at 1pm Paul and Gary Abbott’s music was looped at a sociable voliume for 3 hours, and visitors were given a copy of the the accompanying text to read while they listened. We met some nice people, had some good chats and heard some interesting comments…”very tranquil..” ” The fountain in the park lake looking down from the cenotaph made a deep connection with the music and seemed framed by the bandstand..”
