Block, Olivia & Kyle Bruckmann

Teem

Label: Either/OAR Country: USA

"Bruckmann and Block's creative relationship dates back to the recording ofBlock's 1999 release Pure Gaze, shortly after both artists entered intoChicago's vibrant experimental music community. Their decision to createa collaborative duo ensued, but remained in the realm of good intentionsuntil shortly before Bruckmann's relocation to the San Francisco Bay Area. They then began playfully stockpiling sounds from a myriad of sources,collecting field material, and recording duo improvisations in variousspaces using hallway intercom systems and unorthodox microphoneplacements, among other processes and techniques. This initial activitywas followed by five years of collaborative editing, processing and mixing,resulting in the emergent expanse that is Teem.

"With a history of conservatory training gone awry, oboist and electronicmusician Kyle Bruckmann combines the rigorous discipline of a classicalfoundation with raucous sensibilities more indebted to punk's aftermath ina dizzying variety of artistic endeavors. He has performed throughout theU.S. and in Europe as a composer, an interpreter, and an improviser andhas appeared on more than 40 albums of various genres.

Long-term affiliations include the electroacoustic duo EKG and theexperimental "rock" monstrosity Lozenge. Bruckmann's quintet Wrackperforms original compositions drawing equally from the traditions ofcontemporary jazz and classical modernism, cultivating an "ability tocombine turned-up flame with clear-headed attention to texture andspace." As a member of the Bay Area new music collective sfSound, hehas performed works by composers including Andriessen, Berio, Braxton,Cage, Carter, Feldman, Ferneyhough, Penderecki, Scelsi, Sciarrino,Stockhausen, Varese, Webern, and Xenakis.

Upon moving to San Francisco in 2003, Bruckmann joined forces withsfSound and the wind quintet Quinteto Latino. He has since performedwith the San Francisco Symphony and regional orchestras throughout theBay Area while becoming firmly enmeshed in the vibrant local improvisedmusic community; current working groups include Shudder (with LanceGrabmiller and Phillip Greenlief) and Pink Mountain (an outrock band withSam Coomes, Gino Robair, Scott Rosenberg, and John Shiurba).

In the course of his travels, Bruckmann has shared the stage repeatedlywith a cast of improvisers including Allesandro Bosetti, Tom Carter, AudreyChen, David Dove, Harris Eisenstadt, Anton Hatwich, Boris Hauf, GuiseppeIelasi, James Ilgenfritz, Greg Kelley, Larry Marotta, Tatsuya Nakatani,Polwechsel, Bhob Rainey, Vic Rawlings, Steve Rush, Sara Schoenbeck,Jason Stein, and Jack Wright.

Apart from and/OAR, Bruckmann has recorded for Hat Art, New World,Musica Genera, 482 Music, Sedimental, Barely Auditable, Archive, LuckyKitchen, Formed, Nine Winds, Another Timbre, Wodger, Rossbin, ToYo,Sickroom, Farrago, and Locust Music.

Olivia Block is a contemporary composer and sound artist whocombines field recordings, scored segments for acoustic instruments, andelectronically generated sound. Block works with recorded media, chamberensembles, video, and site-specific sound installations.

She has performed throughout Europe, America, and Japan in tours andfestivals including Sonic Light, Dissonanze, Archipel, Angelica, Sunoni per ilPopolo, Outer Ear, and many others. Her works have premiered at LaBiennale di Venezia 52nd International Festival of Contemporary Music,and she has completed residencies and premiered works at Mills Collegeof Music and The Berklee College of Music. She has taught master classesat several additional universities.

Block has created sound installations for public sites and exhibition spacesincluding the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the library atWesleyan University in Connecticut, the Lincoln Conservatory Fern Room inChicago, and at the "Echoes Through the Mountains" exhibit at the 2006Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.

Her 2008 DVD release with video artists Sandra Leah Gibson and LuisRecoder, Untitled, on SOS editions, has been screened at the 2008Sundance Film Festival and the Expanded Cinema symposium at the TateModern in London. Her release Mobius Fuse was voted one of the bestalbums of the decade by Pitchfork.

Block has published recordings through Sedimental, and/OAR, and Cut,among other labels.

She is currently teaching part-time in the sound department at the Schoolof the Art Institute of Chicago."-Either/Oar