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Contents : commissioned by the Randy Hostetler Living Room Music Project 99 Events for the Found the Made and the Natural in Memory of Randy Hostetler This is a collection of performance events ranging from the purely musical through the conceptual. Pianist and performance artist Randy Hostetler left a legacy of imagination and truth and this collection attempts to consider how continuing the performance art experiment may be a reminder of that imagination. There are thirteen types of events created for this collection regarding balls electro-mechanical devices animals wind general participation long-term occurrences nature fire distances bodies kitchens crowds voices and miscellany. They are repetitive events sequential events chance events and coerced events all can be documented and reused to build new events or combinatorial events. Each is informed by my life here in rural Vermont where time can be taken to explore the long-term the quiet and the awkward. Fifty years ago when performance art was born it was both urban and confrontational by its very existence. Taking a new approach to sources and their presentation was confounding and infuriating to audiences and resisted by traditional artists and performers. In the times since performance art has shown its meaning as a river of new ideas that re-invigorate music and the associated arts--but it remains both confrontational and confounding. Those who feel it is frivolous will not be convinced by it those who are always in search of a sideways view or who reject functional fixedness will be intrigued. Some of these performance events are nearly imaginary where the likelihood of performance is so small that they are conceptual at best. Some seem wasteful intrusive or empty of emotion. Others bring more meaning to their organization and preparation than the resulting event itself. Most are open-ended and leave the responsibility on the performers to create art from instructions. So for each event--even should it seem tongue-in-cheek--a commitment is required. It may cost time or money or cast the performer in a frivolous light to colleagues and friends. Though some of the events themselves may be light their presentation cannot be taken lightly because they may involve dangers or expense or even cost to career. Some may be illegal and physically dangerous. At this time in artistic history the disclaimers above may seem necessary. When the Fluxus artists first commandeered their audiences with mysterious and confusing events society was more innocent and less litigious. One could dive into the first row without fear. And so dive into these events. The numbers are simply a random organization of events determined by shaking them up in a paper bag. Pick a few organize them refine them and expand the consideration of sound and space and the act of performance itself. Document them. Rework them. Create new events from the detritus of the old. Creation and performance are the acts of birth and rebirth of the imagination and the concrete of darkness and light. Northfield Falls Vermont December 28 2007 Dennis B thory-Kitsz 1 A Kitchen Event Grand Symphony of Appliances: Set up appliances capable of continuous or continuously variable sounds among them a hand mixer bread machine food processor blender coffee grinder whistling tea kettle Senseo coffee maker water sprayer cappuccino machine whip-o-matic electric knife dishwasher juicer can opener and microwave oven. Make sure enough food and water are available and that there are sufficient performers. This event should be recorded for later mixing with Participation Event "Power Me Up." One by one all appliances are switched on and the performers add food first improvising slow pitchshifting gradually increasing the pace of activity until a counterpoint of actions is taking place. The event continues until all the materials are mashed mixed strained pur ed cut whipped processed ground boiled sprayed juiced opened and cooked and then used as ingredients for soft foods that the performers eat. The event is over when all the food has been consumed. 2 An Electro-Mechanical Event Glass Reflections: Mirror gardens (see Participation Event "Mirror Garden") are set up as a curved southfacing wall to reflect light into sensors. The sensors respond with simple pure tones. This is a permanent installation. 3 A Participation Event Night Tremors: The is a car radio event done at night requiring upwards of twenty vehicles. Drive very quietly to a populated location turn off lights park and turn the engines off. Turn each radio on to a different station. Over the course of a half-hour slowly raise the volume level of the radios while equally slowly lowering all the car windows. During the subsequent half-hour lower the volume level of the radios while equally slowly raising all the car windows. Start engines begin to drive away turn on lights and leave. 4 A Wind Event Call Me: Embed bird calls in the ends of plastic bags (durable trash bags). Hang the bags on poles in a windy area so that the wind can catch them fill them and play the bird calls. A flight of Canada geese goes by without going by. This is a permanent installation. 5 A Participation Event Thock: This is a scrap wood event for which a good quantity of milled dry hardwood is required along with various saws and hammers cord pegs and mallets. Several performers participate. Dump the wood on a table in the center of the performance area and assure that the tools (and protective gear) are available as well as mallets for the completed instruments. The performers work quickly selecting wood for pitch and resonance creating a frame lined with cord and held together with pegs and trimming the selected wood to pitch. When enough wood has been cut and trimmed to form a xylophone the performers turn off the tools remove the protective gear and improvise a minimalist composition at least as long as the time it took to build the instruments. At the end of the improvisation the wood is dismantled and returned to the pile in the center of the performance area. The wood is kept for the performance of the Fire Events. 6 An Animal Event Cat Chow: Place microphones on wet-food bowls kibble bowls and water bowls for cats. This event can take place in real time or delayed time but the latter is more effective. The recorded results of the daily feedings are mixed and diffused in a nearby restaurant. 7 A Fire Event Skymin(e)d: The usual safety cautions and legal warnings apply as well as proper training. Prepare fireworks such as firecracker sheets (strings) small Class B composite displays ground displays such as Catherine wheels screaming geese bottle rockets spinners cakes mines Roman candles and if possible individual larger Class B fireworks including multiple-break shells with fish screamers and reports. The firecracker sheets are placed in five metal barrels with the open ends pointed outward in a star. Around these is a ring of smaller displays and bottle rockets behind them a row of ground displays with Roman candles cakes and mines. At a safe distance are composite displays and at the back relatively far from the manual work area are the large shells. Place dozens of binaural microphones around the display area assuring that the microphones are capable of frequency response down to near DC as the launching of shells is an impact wave below the range of hearing. Fuse all the fireworks so the order of display is bottle rockets firecrackers ground displays and Roman candles cakes and mines spinners composite displays and multiple-break shells. The entire display should be completed in sixty seconds. The microphones feed the event live to a certain mixing desk or website where it is looped and transformed through pitch shifting and low-damped reverb into an all-encompassing roar. The event ends when the sound finally trails off (approximately thirty minutes). 8 A Wind Event Iron Maiden: Obtain steel rods 1/8 to 1/4 inch in diameter approximately four feet long. Place one set vertically in a two-foot by four-foot bed of concrete spaced about one inch apart and let the concrete harden this can be done on site. Glue together and weather-seal two pieces of 5/4 hardwood four feet long to make one two-foot by four-foot piece. Drill holes and pound the other steel rods into the wood with the same spacing as the concrete. Seal the area around the drilled holes to create a full weatherproof assembly. With V-ropes hang this set upside down from a tree above the concrete set so that they overlap about 1/2 inch. Affix a small canvas sail between the ropes. This is a permanent installation. 9 A Ball Event Roof Roll: This is a sound sculpture. Wind-powered wheels bring ping-pong balls on ramps to the top of a metal roof where they are released and roll down the seams into gutters returning to the bottom where the wheels raise them again. In the northland the event is over when the balls cannot fall due to snow. Otherwise the event is ongoing. 10 An Animal Event Psychological Choking Event: Place a stereo microphone and transmitter on the collar of a goat and provide the animal with plenty of food. Diffuse the unmodified sound through headphones for patrons eating at a local restaurant. 11 An Electro-Mechanical Event Barlow Cell: Perform a version of Barlow's Textmusik via cell phone text messaging. A row of cell phones is mounted on the piano's music stand and audience members message the phones from their seats or mattresses and the performer improvises according to the composition's rules. 12 A Wind Event Sailichord: Create a sail held by grommetted pins and many harpsichord wires to a bridge in a quiet area. Attach tangent-style strikers and allow the installation to be encountered only in acoustic space. This is a permanent installation. 13 An Electro-Mechanical Event Multi-Solitaire: Record the mouse clicking during the playing of solitaire. Use the clicking to trigger percussive instruments and the double-clicking to trigger strobe flashes. As the score gets higher the sound gets louder as the score gets lower the flashes double up with each click. This event is best performed with multiple people playing solitaire and the event is over when madness ensues. 14 A Ball Event Herding the Globes: Obtain globes of every size old and new and fill a skating rink with them too many to avoid. Have crowds skate through with mallets on the front of their calves and strike them toward the center of the rink. The globes will be struck at low and high energy enough to bring them to the center of the rink and become still. The event is over when every globe has been herded into the center of the rink and is still and the skaters are circling the globes. 15 A Kitchen Event Canned: Gather and set out the following each category in different sizes: Five metal cans (#1 2 3 5 and 10) three glass jars (small medium large) three plastic milk jugs (quart half-gallon gallon). Soft mallets (felt) are used and the three players perform continuous rolls on the instruments moving smoothly from one to another so the roll is unbroken. The piece should last about fifteen minutes. 16 A Wind Event Attention Please: Create a screen of small plastic whistles (of different pitches) by mounting them on a sheet of treated canvas banner material. Seal the mount point with half the whistles pointing through and facing forward the other half facing backward. Place the banner in a windy area. This is a permanent installation. 17 An Electro-Mechanical Event Wii Four. This is a Wii controller (Wiimote) event. Place Wii controllers (or their technological successors) on small wooden rafts (with sides and stabilizers) and float them down a river that includes rapids. Along with the Wiimotes the rafts include a stereo or 5.1 microphone and transmitter with small rattles four sets of symmetrically placed wind chimes and several marbles. The controller information is routed to a scoregeneration program using direction angle and lift to produce pitches and rhythms. The output is played in real time by a soloist (bass clarinet preferred) and the audio from the raft is diffused around the audience. The event is over when the raft comes to rest.

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