Poster by Fran Lyons @circlechangeup
Saturday July 9 * 2pm * MASKS, VAX REQUIRED * TICKETS
“What is the shape of my body? A shape wavering slowly, small tremble in slow motion. Sometimes the edges dissolve into the background of the air. The air is a grey whisper of a day, the clouds are gathering and filling up with the rain to come. No rapid movement. Movement before you realize it has moved.”
Small Tremble In Slow Motion opens as a guided meditation. Through monologue, two storytellers emerge in a non-linear daydream, drifting between poetic cadence and plain spoken narrative. Together they tell a story of grief that shows up in the body before the mind, and engage in the revelation of new aspects of self that are exposed and activated in experiences of loss. These dreamscapes follow the grasping rhythms of the subconscious; words become texture within layers of self-study and self-tending. The final and title track, an improvised performance, offers resolution through a striking shift in tone. In opposition to the reflective, wandering pace of the composed material, the two voices engage in immediate mutual expression. Small Tremble In Slow Motion explores the expansive possibilities of being present with oneself within experiences of deep emotional contraction such as grief and loss.
Sally Decker is a composer & performer working with feedback systems, synthesizers, text and voice. She is interested in mind-body connectivity, healing processes, and sound as a vessel for practicing presence. She has performed at venues such as The Lab, SFMOMA, Indexical, Pioneer Works, and has been featured by The Quarterless Review, WFMU, and Bandcamp Daily. Her full-length album In The Tender Dream was released in 2021 on NNA Tapes.
Briana Marela Lizárraga is a mixed race Peruvian American composer, performer, and vocalist currently based in Oakland, CA. Her voice is a frequent focal point and ambient texture in compositions, exploring minimal lyrics and text in combination with gestural performance. She is an Allied Arts Foundation Grant recipient as well as an AAUW Career Development Grant recipient. She has toured with artists such as Jenny Hval, Waxahatchee and Emel Mathlouthi and has toured across the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Europe. She has played such festivals as Sasquatch, Decibel, and Green Man (UK). She has been interviewed by Vogue, Interview Magazine, and Billboard. In 2018 she received a commission from Radiolab's More Perfect Podcast to write a song about the 4th amendment for their album celebrating the constitutional amendments.
Sally and Briana both attended the Electronic Music & Recording Media Masters program at Mills College, and studied with Laetitia Sonami, Zeena Parkins, James Fei, and John Bischoff. They started collaborating while at Mills, and worked remotely on this piece. Using a shared drive and frequent video calls from opposite coasts, this piece was able to emerge intimately despite physical distance.
Harleen Seventy (Richmond) is a writer caught in the sick machinations of the Muse. Their life consists of little else, and they live in the South of the so-called USA.
The work of ambient composer Jason Calhoun (Philadelphia) speaks for him. Gentle and soft-spoken, it’s no wonder that the Ithaca-born artist has found such a defining yet evolving voice over the course of the past 12 years. With more than 20 releases in their catalogue (via Patient Sounds, Bridgetown Records, Florabelle, Gertrude Tapes, Lily Tapes and Discs, and Dear Life Records), it is clear that Calhoun is not merely a fair-weather ambient dilettante, but a dedicated pillar of the experimental arts scene in both Philadelphia and New York. He is a founding member of the Philadelphia-based instrumental collective Hour, as well as having played in projects such as ylayali and Obody.
With a penchant for humming tones and chittering clicks, Calhoun makes deliberate sonic choices that somehow perfectly encapsulate how it feels to be human.