Ambient music pioneer Robert Rich is touring Australia to support his new album, Medicine Box. Direct from opening the main stage at the Rainbow Serpent Festival Robert Rich will play one gig in Melbourne on Saturday 11th February 2012.
Drawing from decades of recorded work, his concerts blend composition and improvisation in a fluid continuum, creating a hypnotic atmosphere. Rich’s performance will include live electronics with keyboards and computer, along with his signature hand- made flutes and steel guitar.
Saturday afternoon will also feature an exclusive artist talk and Q & A session with Robert as he demonstrates his tour rig and discusses his process and then opens the floor to questions. This is a must not for just fans of Rich but also for musicians to gain insights from one of the world’s ambient pioneers.
Steve Law (Zen Paradox), Melbourne's own electronic music legend, will provide the single support act for the evening, wielding his new analogue modular synth he will provide the perfect introduction to a memorable night of deep music.The visuals for the evening will be provided by Abre Ojos.
Event Details:
Robert Rich Artist Talk
Date: Saturday 11th February 2012
Time: 2.00pm
Location: Northcote Uniting Church, 251 High Street, Northcote
Cost: $20.00 + booking fee
Evening Performance
Date: Saturday 11th February 2012
Time: 8.00pm Doors open
Location: Northcote Uniting Church, 251 High Street, Northcote
Cost: $30.00 + booking fee
Special combo ticket deal - Artist’s Talk + Evening Performance: $40.00 + booking fee
Purchase Tickets: http://
Robert Rich Biography
Across three decades and over three dozen albums, Robert Rich has pushed the boundaries of ambient and electronic music, merging new technology with ethnic and electro-acousic sources, linking old-school spacemusic to gamelan and raga, cyclic minimalism, psychedelia and trance. Rich began building his own analog synthesizers in 1976, when he was 13 years old. He later studied for a year at Stanford’s prestigious CCRMA while earning a degree in psychology and developing tools for lucid dreaming research.
Rich released his first album Sunyata in 1982. Most of his subsequent recordings came out in Europe until 1989. Among these early releases, the 1986 Swedish LP Numena entered early London chill rooms through DJs like Jonah Sharp and Mixmaster Morris. Rich began a string of critically acclaimed releases for Hearts of Space with his best selling album Rainforest (1989). His two collaborations with Steve Roach, Strata (1990) and Soma (1992), laid groundwork for new “tribal” fusions. His collaboration Stalker (1995) with Lustmord became a defining landmark of dark ambient.
Rich has performed in planetariums, cathedrals, caves, art museums and recital halls throughout Europe and North America. His all-night Sleep Concerts, first performed in 1982, became legendary. He has since broadened Sleep Concert audiences with live nocturnal radio broadcasts. In 2001 Rich released the 7 hour DVD Somnium, a studio distillation of the Sleep Concert idea, one of the longest continuous pieces of music ever released on a disc.
Robert Rich has designed sounds for films, including Pitch Black, Crazy Beautiful, Behind Enemy Lines, Dead Girl and others. He has scored documentaries and ads, collaborated with artist Daniel Colvin on the DVD Atlas Dei (2007), and created music for Michael Somoroff’s video installation Illumination (2007). Rich’s sound design has graced preset libraries for Emu, Seer Systems, Camel Audio, WayOutWare, Sony, Big Fish and Izotope. He wrote software for composers who work in just intonation, and helped develop the MIDI microtuning specification. As mastering engineer, he has applied his ear to hundreds of albums in all styles, from classical to noise, pop to hip hop and in-between.
http://robertrich.com/
“The deep, ethereal soundscapes that Robert Rich creates don’t engage you as much as they engulf you. Shimmering waves of sound pour from the speakers, transforming both space and time.”
KEYBOARD MAGAZINE
“A music-scape that oozes with primitive life, as if pulsing from the swamp itself. . . A time traveller searching for the aperture that looks back to Eden.”
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
“Robert Rich’s recordings are fast becoming recognized as pioneering works, having taken electronic music to previously unrealized levels of innovation.”
I/E MAGAZINE
“Countless, beautiful, diverse, intense, evocative, innovative, lavish, awesome soundscapes.”
INTERFACE MAGAZINE
Steve Law/Zen Paradox Biography
Steve Law has been producing electronic music in Australia since the early 1980's. During that time he has gained a reputation as one of Australia's foremost electronic artists.
After exploring many areas of electronic experimentation with the groups Guild of Fire, Foil and various solo projects, Steve formed the techno project Zen Paradox in 1992. The debut album "Eternal Brainwave" was immediately signed to Ollie Olsen's new Psy-Harmonics label, and licensed to KK/Nova Zembla in Europe and Restless in the U.S.. Steve went on to release further material under the Zen Paradox banner during the nineties, backed up with extensive overseas tours. He was named best live electronic act at the 2000 Australian Live Music Awards.
In the meantime, Steve Law continued to explore other areas of cutting edge music, and was awarded the inaugral ABC classic FM computer music award in 1996 for his electro-acoustic composition "Urbania". He has composed music for film, dance and various multi-media works, and has contributed to the Fringe, Next Wave, Experimenta, Electrofringe, Liquid Architecture, Articulating Space, Make it Up Club and Melbourne International Animation festivals amongst others.
Steve has collaborated with many other local and international artists, both live and in the studio, and has continued to release music on various labels around the world. He is an inspired live performer, regularly doing impromptu live improvisations with many of Melbourne's underground musicians. He is also a member of the Melbourne band Black Cab.
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