The Squid's Ear Magazine
Squidco Harvest Sale!
Friday through Sunday Save 10%-15% on all new items!



Leap of Faith

Spooky Action at a Distance

Leap of Faith: Spooky Action at a Distance (Evil Clown)

An acoustic septet edition of the Leap of Faith, the core duet of David Peck on clarinets, saxophones, double reeds & flutes, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice, joined by Michael Caglianone on saxophones, flute, clarinet, melodica & water bottle, John Fugarino on trumpet, slide trumpet & flugelhorn, Tom Swafford on violin, Kit Demos on bass, and Eric Rosenthal on drums.
 

Price: $12.95



Quantity:

In Stock

Quantity in Basket: None

Log In to use our Wish List
Shipping Weight: 4.00 units


EU & UK Customers:
Discogs.com can handle your VAT payments
So please order through Discogs

Sample The Album:





product information:

Personnel:



David Peck (PEK)-clarinet & contralto clarinets, alto & tenor saxophones, piccolo oboe, tarota, Tibetan bowl, clave, whistling

Glynis Lomon-cello, aquasonic, voice

Michael Caglianone-soprano, alto & tenor saxophones, flute, clarinet, melodica, water bottle

John Fugarino-trumpet, slide trumpet, flugelhorn

Tom Swafford-violin

Kit Demos-bass

Eric Rosenthal-drums


Click an artist name above to see in-stock items for that artist.




Label: Evil Clown
Catalog ID: 9349
Squidco Product Code: 35301

Format: CDR
Condition: New
Released: 2023
Country: USA
Packaging: Digipack
Recorded at Evil Clown 9349 LilyPad, Cambridge MA on September 19, 2023.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Leap of Faith is the core duet of the Leap of Faith Orchestra (LOFO) comprised of PEK on clarinets, saxophones, double reeds & flutes, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice. The ensemble is based in Boston and dates back to the early 90s. We utilize a huge arsenal of additional Evil Clown instruments to improvise long works featuring transformations across highly varied sonorities. At times, the core unit has been a trio or even a quartet. The longest running core unit was comprised of PEK, Glynis and drummer Yuri Zbitnov, who played for the last couple of years of the archival period and the first 5 years of the reboot starting in 2015. The ensemble has always been highly modular, and our many recordings (now over 150) feature the various core units in dozens of configurations with a huge list of guests and occasionally as only the core unit with no guests. Currently, the core unit is the duet of PEK and Lomon and we are regularly presenting LIVESTREAMs to YouTube from Evil Clown Headquarters with other guest performers.

Alex Lemski is a promoter of improvisational music who arrived on the scene 7 or 8 years back. He gets grants that allow him to rent the LilyPad so that the musicians can keep the door and not pay for the room. People in the scene love his participation here and I am always able to raise a stellar ensemble for one of his shows. For Spooky Action at a Distance, I decided to have an ensemble that is what I call "Balanced on Strings and Winds". A Balanced Ensemble contains an equal number of players each from several different timbre sets. After adding a drummer, that could be a trio, a quintet, a septet, or a larger group. I like the aesthetic problem of larger improvisation ensembles - difficult problems are interesting problems. So, this set addresses two of my fundamental aesthetic concerns...

I decided to do septet. The guest strings are Tom Swafford (violin) and Kit Demos (bass); the guest horns are John Fugarino (trumpet) and Michael Caglianone (woodwinds); the drummer is Eric Rosenthal. Tom, Kit, and Eric have each been on several Leap of Faith sessions over the last few years and John and Michael are currently frequent regulars. All these gifted improvisors have varying amounts of Evil Clown/Leap of Faith participation. A very interesting group dynamic arises when the ensemble contains a mix of players who have very long histories with players who are newer, especially when the full unit is performing for the first time.

Since the pandemic and the significant advances in the Evil Clown Headquarters I have been doing far fewer public performances - we used to do perhaps 20 a year, and now it is a few a year plus many Livestreams. In the old days, I filled my van full of equipment to the roof and I presented as broad a palate as I possibly could in live performance. Nowadays, the broad palate concept is so well represented by the ECH Studio Livestreams that I take the opportunity to go light in Live Performance. I left all the percussion, electronics and auxiliary instruments at home and went with 2 clarinets, 2 saxes and 2 double reeds. So, this performance focuses purely on the Strings, Winds, and drum set."-Evil Clown


Artist Biographies

"PEK (aka David Peck) is a multi-instrument improviser who plays all kinds of instruments including saxophones, clarinets, double reeds, percussion, electronics and auxiliary sound making devices of all kinds.

PEK was born in 1964 and started playing clarinet and piano in elementary school. In 7th grade he started saxophones, first on alto, then switching to tenor in high school. He spent 10 years playing in rock bands and studying classical and jazz saxophone with Kurt Heisig in the San Jose CA area before moving to Boston in 1989 to attend Berklee where he studied performance with George Garzone. While Berklee was an excellent place to study harmony, voice training and other important aspects of a conventional formal music training course of study, it was not a very good environment for learning contemporary (or pure) improvisation (apart from his work with George). PEK did find, however, that Boston had a thriving improvisation scene, and it was here that he developed his mature pure improvisation language.

During the 90s, PEK performed with many notable improvisers including Masashi Harada, Glynis Lomon, William Parker, Laurence Cooke, Eric Zinman, Glenn Spearman, Raqib Hassan, Charlie Kohlhase, Steve Norton, Keith Hedger, Mark McGrain, Sydney Smart, Matt Samolis, Martha Ritchey, Larry Roland, Dennis Warren, Yuri Zbitnov, Craig Schildhauer, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Leslie Ross, Rob Bethel, Wayne Rogers, Eric Rosenthal, Taylor Ho Bynum, Tatsuya Nakatani, James Coleman, B'hob Rainey and George Garzone.

PEK met cellist Glynis Lomon when they played together in the Masashi Harada Sextet which existed between 1990 and 1992. They developed a deep musical connection which they continued following the MHS; first with the Leaping Water Trio for a few years and then with the first version of Leap of Faith in 1994. Leap of Faith was very active in Boston from that time until 2001 and went through a series of several core ensembles which always included both PEK and Glynis. Other key Leap of Faith core members during this period were Mark McGrain (trombone), Craig Schildhauer (double bass), Sydney Smart (drums), Yuri Zbitnov (drums) and James Coleman (theremin). Leap of Faith was always a very modular unit with constantly shifting personnel and many different guests. The early Leap of Faith period concluded in 2001 with a dual bill at an excellent room at MIT called Killian Hall with George Garzone's seminal trio the Fringe.

At this time, PEK changed careers for his day gig, returning to college for a computer science degree and beginning to work in the structural engineering industry at Simpson Gumpertz & Heger. He became far too busy to continue the heavy music schedule, and preferring not to do music casually, he entered a long musically dormant period.

Flash forward to early 2014. PEK was a regular mail order customer of Downtown Music Gallery, the premiere specialty shop in Manhattan for free jazz, contemporary classical and other new music. While in New York on SGH business, he went down to DMG and had a lengthy conversation with proprietor Bruce Lee Gallanter about the early Leap of Faith period. He then sent Bruce a package of about 15 CD titles from the 90s and was pleasantly surprised when Bruce managed to sell nearly all of it. This public interest in the old catalog spurred PEK into getting back into performance. He reformed Leap of Faith with Glynis Lomon (cello, voice, aquasonic), Yuri Zbitnov (drums) and newcomer Steve Norton (clarinets and saxophones) and started to record and perform in early 2015.

Now having access to financial resources always absent in the early period, PEK began to accumulate a huge collection of instruments both for himself and also to expand the palate of Leap of Faith and the other projects soon to follow. He acquired new recording equipment and many new saxophones, clarinets, double reeds, metal and wooden percussion instruments, electronic instruments, signal processing equipment and other sound-making devices from many cultures. He revived his old record label, Evil Clown, and created reissues and new releases for much of the early period work by Leap of Faith and many of his other projects to sell at shows, DMG and the internet (around 100 archival titles).

The Arsenal of equipment has a grand purpose: To establish a large scale aesthetic problem to use the instruments to make long form broad palate improvisations with dramatic transformation and development. The very broad palate enables the long improvisations to evolve with very different movements and pronounced development over their length. PEK started the Leap of Faith Orchestra, a greatly expanded Leap of Faith, to achieve this purpose along with a number of smaller ensembles which are sub-units of the full orchestra including String Theory (focusing on orchestral strings), Metal Chaos Ensemble (focusing on metallic percussion), Turbulence (horn players), Mekaniks (electronics) and Chicxulub (space rock). In all, the Evil Clown roster includes over 40 musicians who contribute to one or more of the various projects, with PEK participating in all of them. Leap of Faith has also had some special guests like Steve Swell (trombone), Thomas Heberer (trumpet), Jeremiah Cymerman (clarinet) and Jim Hobbs (alto sax). The Leap of Faith Orchestra happens whenever several of these groups play together at the same time, or the ensemble exceeds 7 or 8 players. The Full Orchestra is a special case discussed below.

The current roster is comprised in part of: - Core Leap of Faith: PEK, Glynis Lomon, Yuri Zbitnov (Steve Norton has since left to go to Graduate School) - Percussion: Andria Nicodemou (vibes), Kevin Dacey (perc), Joe Hartigan (perc), Syd Smart (drums) - Strings: Jane Wang (cello), Clara Kebabian (violin), Tony Leva (bass), Mimi Rabson (violin), Kirsten Lamb (bass), Brendan Higgins (bass), Silvain Castellano (bass), Rob Bethel (cello), Kit Demos (bass), Matt Scutchfield (violin), Helen Sherrah-Davies (violin) - Piano: Eric Zinman, Peter Cassino, Emilio Gonzales - Horns: Dave Harris (tuba, trombone), Charlie Kohlhase (saxes), Bob Moores (trumpet), Sara Honeywell (trombone), Forbes Graham (trumpet), John Baylies (tuba), Dan O'Brien (woodwinds), Zack Bartolomei (woodwinds), Kat Dobbins (trombone), Steve Provizer (trumpet, baritone horn), Matt Samolis (flute) - Electronics: Greg Grinnell, Jason Adams (electric bass, electronics) - Guitar: Dru Wesely, Grant Beale, Chris Florio - Voice: Dei Xhrist

Evil Clown is documenting the ongoing solutions to this aesthetic challenge by creating limited CD editions and digital download albums of every performance and studio session by this array of ensembles. Interested audience can track the development of the grand scale project over the many releases - over 80 albums recorded and released so far between Jan of 2015 and March of 2017. All of the bands are highly modular, changing personnel and instrumentation with each meeting. The result is an enormous amount of music that shares the same fundamental improvisational language but differs from event to event greatly both in sonority (overall sound) and specific detail.

For the full Leap of Faith Orchestra, PEK composes a graphic notation score to guide the improvisation. The full Orchestra is comprised of roughly 20 players from the roster and performs twice a year. Two performances have occurred to date - The Expanding Universe in June of 2016 and Supernovae in November of 2016. Composition for Possible Universes is completed and the work will be performed on May 28, 2017 with another performance (score not yet begun) scheduled for November.

The scores use a device called Frame Notation where written English descriptions of the overall sonority desired and simple graphic symbols are given durations for each player on their part along with direction on when to play and when not to play. The directions are put in little boxes called frames which are arranged on a timeline and are simple enough to be immediately understood by the performers. Horizontal lines, called Duration Bars, extend across the page indicating when each Event (the Frame + the Duration Bar) begins and ends. An Event can be intended for the full ensemble, a defined group within the ensemble (for example, Metal Chaos Ensemble), a custom group (for example, Tubas), or an individual (for example, Andria Feature).

Parts are the full score annotated with Hiliters so that each player's instructions stand out. They can clearly see their individual instructions, but can also see the big picture, enabling far more knowledge about the pending actions of the rest of the ensemble than typical in pure improvisation. The players track the elapsed time on a very large sports clock. There is no melodic, harmonic or rhythmic information specified. This system allows PEK to compose detailed Ensemble Events without having to notate pitches or rhythms which would require significant rehearsal to accurately achieve."

-All About Jazz (https://musicians.allaboutjazz.com/pek)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Improvising cellist, vocalist and aquasonic player Glynis Lomon graduated from Bennington College in 1975 with a degree in Music/Black Music. At Bennington she studied with musician/composer Bill Dixon and continued to perform and record with his ensembles until his recent death. Glynis has also been privileged to play with Arthur Brooks, Jimmy Lyons, Cecil Taylor, Butch Morris, William Parker, Joe Morris, Greta Buck, Masashi Harada, Lowell Davidson, Raqib Hassan and many others. For almost a decade she and multi reed player PEK performed in the Boston area with their group Leap of Faith."

-Evil Clown Website (http://www.giantevilclown.com/bio-glynis-lomon-.html)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

Michael Anthony Caglianone is an American sax player, producer, recording, mixing & mastering engineer, voice-over actor, co-founder of Studio 7A West. Based out of Boston, MA. He is known for the band Zen Bastards.

-Discogs (https://www.discogs.com/artist/378779-Michael-Caglianone)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"John Fugarino received his Bachelor of Music from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He then attended the New England Conservatory of Music and earned a Masters in Music Composition. John has performed and taught trumpet in both the classical and jazz idioms. Has performed a wide range of music including Orchestral, Jazz, Rhythm and Blues, Free Form Improvisation and Microtonal Music. Currently John can be seen playing his own jazz compositions and lead trumpet with "The Hornzone" an R&B/ Funk band. John is a music teacher at the Butler Middle School where he teaches in the Midi-Music Lab and directs the school Jazz Ensemble. Trumpet recordings are on the Lyra Ohm label and Zoning Records. Orchestral music recorded by the Radio and Television Orchestra of Bratislava."

-Real School Music (https://therealschoolofmusic.com/instructors/john-fugarino/)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Tom Swafford grew up in Seattle, studied composition with Louis Andriessen (Amsterdam), Olly Wilson (U.C. Berkeley) and John McDonald (Tufts U.), and has been active as a violinist and composer in a wide variety of music communities since his arrival in New York in 2007. He has presented concerts of his music at Roulette Intermedium and The Stone. He recorded and toured Europe in the group Kef, with bassist Shanir Ezra Blumenkranz and guitarist Aram Bajakian. In 2015, his 11-piece ensemble String Power released its debut album. His musical theater piece, Bad Actor, was performed at the Tank in 2017. He recently recorded a duo album with bassist Zachary Swanson, and a trio album with Swanson and drummer Dalius Naujo."

-Tom Swafford Website (https://www.tomswafford.com/bio.html)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Chrys 'Kit" Demos: bass, DIY analog microtonal synthesizer, Boston-based, with extensive collaborations across the music spectrum."

-Kit Demos Website (http://www.kitdemos.com/about)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Drummer Eric Rosenthal is based out of the Boston area. The former student of Ed Blackwell has studied and performed more than American jazz drumming; he has also delved into West African traditional and South Indian classical percussion. Rosenthal has performed and improvised with Anthony Braxton, Mat Maneri, Pandelis Karayorgis, Mario Pavone, and the Either/Orchestra. He has performed all over North America and Europe, and appeared in Greece at the Patras Jazz Festival, at Montreal's North Sea Jazz festival, even at Finland's Pori Festival. Besides producing his own improvised music recordings, he also appears on CDs with the Hypnotic Clambake and the Zairean soukous band Freestyle. The late '90s found Rosenthal busy in the group Naftule's Dream. The band has two releases on John Zorn's Tzadik label, Search for the Golden Dreydl and Smash, Clap!"

-Evil Clown (http://www.evilclown.rocks/bio-eric-rosenthal.html)
10/2/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Spooky Action at a Distance 57:50

2. Existing in Multiple States at Once 18:14

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Free Improvisation
Jazz
Collective Free Improvsation
Boston Area Improvisers
Septet recordings
New in Improvised Music
Recent Releases and Best Sellers

Search for other titles on the label:
Evil Clown.


Recommended & Related Releases:
Expanse
Reach
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT PROMO
Evil Clown Shorties
Volume 2 (2023-2024)
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT PROMO
Perturbations
That's Where the Unknown Is
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT ON SLEEVE
Leap Of Faith
Emergent Spacetime
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT ON SLEEVE
Leap Of Faith
Scrying
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT ON SLEEVE
Leap of Faith / Kane Loggia Hypothesis
Interconnected by Testable Relations
(Evil Clown)
CORNER CUT ON SLEEVE
Turbulence Orchestra
Dynamos
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Simulcrum
Meditations on Reality
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Leap Of Faith
Time And Symmetry Entwined
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Simulacrum
Homunculus
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Axioms
Abstract Intensions
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Expanse
Swathe
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Leap Of Faith
Degrees Of Freedom
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Perturbations
Deviations Of A System
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Expanse
Chromatic Spectrum
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Axioms
Meaning And Truth
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Leap Of Faith
Coherent Alternatives
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Simulacrum
Mechatronics
(Evil Clown)
PROMO W/ CUT CORNER
Neurodivergent
Cosmic Collisions
(Evil Clown)
A new ensemble emerging out of the Boston collective band Expanse with David Peck on reeds, percussion and innumerable instruments, Count Robot on voice & tapes, DNA Girl on guitars & mandolin, Tim Mungenast on guitar, and Michael Caglianone on reeds & winds, all adding percussion and electronics from the Evil Clown arsenal, exploring aspects of group improvisation.
Leap of Faith
Resonance Energy
(Evil Clown)
Joining the Boston duo Leap of Faith, the core duet of David Peck on reeds, percussion, the kitchen sink and everything in between, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice, is bassist Scott Samenfeld from Turbulence Orchestra, drummer Jared Seabrook, and brass player John Fugarino, with Joel Simches capturing the recording and manipulating the stream in real time.
Simulacrum
Mechatronics
(Evil Clown)
This ensemble features 3 core Evil Clown members--David Peck on reeds, winds, percussion & electronics; Eric Woods on analog synth; and Bob Moores on space trumpet, guitar & electronics--with guests Michael Caglianone on reeds & percussion, Robin Amos on electric zither and keyboards; Faruq Hassan on samplers & keys; Albey OnBass on bass; and Michael Knoblach on military devices.
Leap of Faith
Quest for Uncertainty
(Evil Clown)
Joining the Boston free improvising duo of David Peck on clarinets, saxophones, clarinets & flutes, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice--the core duo of Leap of Faith Orchestra--are Bonnie Kane on tenor sax, flute & electronics, and John Loggia on drums and percussion, capturing the extended title track and a brief, "possible outcome" as a summation.
Expanse
Extent
(Evil Clown)
Evoking the idea of space and restraint, Extent is a mostly acoustic improvisation project based around the trio of David Peck on clarinet, contralto & contrabass clarinet, saxophones flute, goat horn, synthesizer, theremin and percussion, fellow reedist Michael Caglianone, Michael Knoblach performing on percussion & objects, and joined by NY/Boston improviser Albey onBass on bass.
Leap Of Faith
Emergent Spacetime
(Evil Clown)
The core of the Boston improvising collective Leap of Faith Orchestra are the duo of cellist Glynis Lomon and reedist and multi-instrumentalist David Peck, here joined by Eric Woods on analog synth and new collective member Jared Seabrook on drums & percussion, for two examples of Peck's broad palette concept yielding evolving transformations through free playing
Expanse
Reach
(Evil Clown)
Perhaps the most synthetic of Evil Clown releases, Expanse represents space and restraint, this the 8th album from the Boston improvising collective of David Peck on reeds, winds, synths and percussion, Robin Amos on synths, Michael Knoblach on percussion (including egg beater, humpty dumpty toy, and teething rings) and Joel Simches providing real-time processing; inexplicably interesting.
Simulacrum
Mimesis
(Evil Clown)
Expanding on their 2023 Homunculus, the Boston-based collective ensemble Simulacrum with a core of David Peck on reeds, percussion, keys and direction, Eric Woods on analog synth and Bob Moores on space trumpet & guitar are expanded with Cecil Taylor bassist Albey OnBass, synthesist Eric Zinman, reedist Michael Caglianone and drummer Michael Knoblach.



The Squid's Ear Magazine

The Squid's Ear Magazine

© 2002-, Squidco LLC