The Eulipia Series is a monthly exploration of collaborative performance art that interweaves musical improvisation and the recitation of poetry and prose. Hosted by Douglas “D. Scot” Miller at the Luggage Store Gallery (1021 Market St, SF) and starting at 7:30PM the first Tuesday of each month, this event features a unique “salon-style” forum for comment and participation. On June 6, 2007 a multicultural audience of approximately 50 enjoyed the work of Kosmic Renaissance.
Kosmic Renaissance represents the combined musical talent of David Boyce, Sameer Gupta and Shingo Annen. Their sound is jazz-meets-electronic-and-world music, created through saxophone/looping pedal, tabla/drumset and a unique musical invention called the Vestax Faderboard. Rhythms and melodies change, crash and settle in a freeform choreography that showcases the advanced musicianship at work.
David Boyce (aka Osiris Black Edgar Kenyatta) is a saxophone virtuoso. When he starts stomping on his array of effects pedals (aptly named Black Edgar’s Musicbox), put your preconceptions aside and open your ears to the melodic agony of convulsing jazz. Dressed simply in blue jeans and sweater, sporting glasses and a soul patch, the sound of the tenor sax is bright and shimmering, full of rippling tremolo. On the baritone sax he’s soulful, blowing through all the registers.
Sameer Gupta (seated at tablas) hammers out intricate rhythms that change and accelerate at mind boggling speeds. When he switches to the drum set (still in his socks), the familiar bass drum and cymbals comes out fast and funky, alternating between tabla-style rhythms and standard 4/4 time. His sounds are the structure and it’s a bridge between East and West, expanding the mind and challenging expectations.
Shingo Annen creates sounds that soar and crash. He sounds like the wind, like electric water cascading. And he plays his Chaospad and Faderboard like keys, feverishly manipulating the dials and knobs to create soundscapes in which you’ll hear the electric whirring of lazers and spaceship take-offs, pulsing static, sirens, spin and echo. With his long hair and black hoodie, headphones and head knocking, he squeezes like an accordion and pulses like an organ.
The music constantly changes, expands and re-simplifies, achieving complexity, peak and plateau. Behind the musicians the sun was setting, the trees shook in the windows as the wind picked up.
Douglas “D. Scot” Miller took the stage and shared more of his work in progress – a science-fiction novel that looks through the windows of race and politics to get gritty and defiant with it’s depictions of urban life and street culture. He presents a view of life at the margins that is both memorable and familiar, exploring historical roots and future possibilities. His baritone narration brings the characters and conversations to life with an engaged manner of storytelling that calls for unity (“Don’t riot – rebel”).
