Juno 3 (RAM-163CD)

disc art (copyright 2023 Ramble Records)
Art by Han-earl Park. Design by Atharwa Deshingkar. © 2023 Ramble Records.

Juno 3 (RAM-163CD), the debut album by the trio of Han-earl Park, Lara Jones and Pat Thomas, is out now on Ramble Records!

The music on this album transports me to scenes from retro-scifi stories to those of present-day mass transit. It is, to my ears, the sounds of junction crossings, signals from space, and mysterious telegraphy; sometimes evoking impressions of walking by streams under footbridges, at others, of rushing through Manhattan Chinatown. Recorded live at Cafe OTO during the trio’s first meeting, we knew then that we had something special.

I think the sounds and the performances on this disc are all ’round captivating, gripping and fascinating, and the production work, exceptional. Take the journey with us: I’m super proud of the music, and I am thrilled to finally share this with you!

[Get the CD/download from Ramble (Bandcamp)…]

CD: $18 AUD plus shipping. Download: $8 AUD.

description

Get ready for the latest release of challenging and imaginative music from Ramble Records with Juno 3, the debut album from the trio of Han-earl Park, Lara Jones and Pat Thomas. Recorded by Shaun Crook live at Cafe OTO, London, and mixed (refracted and rephrased) by Han-earl Park, the album is a particle sim of sounds which spelunks from derelict urban ravines to cybernetic rainforests, while catching auditory glimpses of crashing robotic waves, and strange telegraphic messages from space.

Nautiloid capsule tumbles
across field lines.
An impracticably agile,
graceful derailment.

Juno 3 is Han-earl Park (guitar), Lara Jones (saxophone and electronics) and Pat Thomas (electronics). The eponymous album document the first meeting—interactive, relational—by this trio as it takes a journey: launching from the familiar of the Hackney club space into future imagined By Others. We coax it into our space.

Motion and motifs. (Switching gears, shedding engines.) Modes of transport change from first principles: future-past transit networks give way to bioengineered surfboards.

Bodies collide, unwind, and we’re up again. Reaching crossings; navigating junctions.

Intermodal is the only game we know. Networks (and bodies and vessels) weave, twist, cross then interweave, intertwist and intercross. (We, nocturnal monstrous shapes, turn and return to the deep.)

And, as the album comes to a close (thump’n’snap—bodies unwind), we find ourselves awakened back in the familiar club space. Or: half familiar. The same chairs, the same tables, the same staff. But not the same chair, not the same table, not the same staff.

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar), Lara Jones (saxophone and electronics) and Pat Thomas (electronics).

track listing

Orbital Dusk I (6:04), Orbital Dusk II (4:20), Orbital Dusk III (2:29), Orbital Dusk IV (6:03), Diel Vertical Migration I (6:31), Diel Vertical Migration II (4:38), Diel Vertical Migration III (4:33), Diel Vertical Migration IV (7:36), Metastability (7:24). Total duration: 49:36.

recording details

Music by Han-earl Park, Lara Jones and Pat Thomas.

Recorded live March 20, 2022, Cafe OTO, London.
Recorded by Shaun Crook.
Mixed by Han-earl Park. Mastered by Chris Sharkey.

Art by Han-earl Park. Design by Atharwa Deshingkar.

Thanks to Richard Barrett, Heather Frasch and Richard Scott; to Fielding Hope and everyone at Cafe OTO, Laura Cole and everyone at Fusebox, Wesley Stephenson of Jazz North East, and Peter O’Doherty of Northern Lights Project. Shoutouts to Corey Mwamba, Graeme Wilson, rit. and Una Lee. The performance was presented with funding from the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe.

© and ℗ 2023 Ramble Records.

Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe

Funded by Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe.

Of Life, Recombinant (NEWJAiM9)

cover art (copyright 2021 NEWJAiM)
Graphic design by Andrew Delanoy. © 2021 NEWJAiM Recordings.

November 26, 2021: Of Life, Recombinant (NEWJAiM9), Han-earl Park’s latest album, is out now on New Jazz and Improvised Music Recordings!

Of Life, Recombinant is unlike anything I’ve done before, and the music goes to some strange and unexpected places (are those sounds of a networked biome, or the echos of, and through, an urban maze?). The album is a single improvisative suite that takes the guitar, and the solo form, as the starting point to fabricate a composition in the studio. The piece is the result of over a year of work, and I’m so very much looking forward to finally sharing this music with you!

[Get the CD/download from NEWJAiM (Bandcamp)…]

CD: £12 plus shipping. Download: £6.

news and updates

February 20, 2024: Mixing noisy, pretty, gentle and disorderly peculiar music

https://soundcloud.com/hanearlpark/mix-engineer-works Wondering what mixing strategy could possibly work for your recording of noisy, pretty, gentle and disorderly peculiar music? Hit me up if your left-of-field recording is in need of some…

January 29, 2024: The unknowability of connection, and a little science fiction (Free Jazz: Sunday Interview)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jewNzu1KL1Q Violence and cruelty? Fantastical, twisted, dark, deeply affectionate humanism? Improvisation as embodiment and personification? Place, subjectivity and interiority? As part of the Free Jazz: Sunday Interview, in response to a…

[All articles on Of Life, Recombinant (NEWJAiM9)…]

description

Of Life, Recombinant tells multiple stories at once, opening up a wide aperture and displaying stunningly drawn vistas…. Leading listeners down long corridors of chilly anticipation… playing up the subtle intimacy of quiet tones…. And unmistakably, Park’s guitar is itself a treasure chest of delights—long, thrilling sections of beauty fold into chilly, dread-inducing dreamscapes….

— Lee Rice Epstein (Free Jazz)

We listen, we wait. Breathing deeply, relaxed enough yet ready to be sucked in by some vortex of illusion. We absorb the blows of sudden mutations connected by threads of metallic (in)coherence…. Each spin adds further layers of interpretation, not to mention the sheer aural thrill.

— Massimo Ricci (Touching Extremes)

Along with what’s kept there is always something left and something new. The country twang tune with popping harmonics from ‘Naught Opportune.’ The unsettling mandolinesque trill or quivering sustain in hazy delay from ‘Are Variant.’ The distorted suck, psychedelic and ecstatic, in slow crescendo from ‘Of Life, Recombinant’…. In between chaos and composure, it is something closer to the complexity of life.

— Keith Prosk (harmonic series)

[More reviews…]

On NEWJAiM’s ninth disc of adventurous music, guitarist and improviser Han-earl Park takes the solo form, and, refracting improvisations through studio-based techniques, flips the form on its head.

Walls rusted lichen curve into a canopy.
Concrete weaves of roots.
Dew-covered moss memory foam.

Rather than attempting to ‘reinvent’ the guitar, Park navigates the gaps and borders of the instrument, and what it means to be a guitarist. Park creates a music that alternately embraces and short-circuits genre tropes and expectations. Of Life, Recombinant doesn’t shy away from the solitude of the solo form; instead it tightly hugs aloneness—its joys and fears.

Of Life, Recombinant explores the ways in which studio-based techniques can be used as a fluid compositional strategy in the context of improvisative play; how techniques such as montage, collage, and the language of dissolves, cross cuts and match cuts might be enrolled to explore improvisative counterpoint and juxtapositions, the pleasures of discord, parallelism and linearity, and the repurposing of gestures and their meanings.

Conceived as a single improvisative suite, the techniques and strategies used to build Of Life, Recombinant were developed over a year during periods of lockdown. The bulk of the suite was recorded in a single contiguous take, a single improvisation, in June of 2021. That recording remains, more-or-less-intact-but-broken, as the title track, while fragments of it litter, as improvisative detritus, through the rest of the album.

Han-earl Park (copyright 2021 Nella Aguessy)
Photo © 2021 Nella Aguessy
Han-earl Park

Improviser, guitarist and constructor Han-earl Park has been crossing borders and performing fuzzily idiomatic, on occasion experimental, always traditional, open improvised musics for twenty years. He has performed in clubs, theaters, art galleries, concert halls, and (ad-hoc) alternative spaces across Europe, Korea and the USA.

Park is the mastermind behind ensembles including Eris 136199 with Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky; and Sirene 1009 with Dominic Lash, Mark Sanders and rit.; and has a duo with Richard Barrett. He is the constructor of the machine improviser io 0.0.1 beta++, and instigator of Metis 9, a playbook of improvisative tactics. He has performed with Wadada Leo Smith, Paul Dunmall, Evan Parker, Lol Coxhill, Pauline Oliveros, Josh Sinton, Louise Dam Eckardt Jensen, Gino Robair, Tim Perkis, Andrew Drury, Pat Thomas and Franziska Schroeder.

His ensembles have appeared at festivals including Jazz em Agosto (Lisbon), Freedom of the City (London), Brilliant Corners (Belfast), ISIM (New York), dialogues festival (Edinburgh) and Sonic Acts (Amsterdam). His recordings have been released by labels including SLAM Productions and DUNS Limited Edition. Park taught improvisation at University College Cork, and founded and curated Stet Lab, a space for improvised music in Cork.

New Jazz and Improvised Music Recordings

The New Jazz and Improvised Music Recordings project was established during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, offering a creative output for musicians when live performance opportunities were unavailable and encouraging artist independence.

Emphasising sustainability for artists and music studios, the ethos of sustainability also carries through the production process by employing a carbon neutral manufacturing plant and distributors, using recycled and biodegradable materials whenever possible.

The New Jazz and Improvised Music Recordings project is brought to you from the director of Newcastle Festival of Jazz and Improvised Music.

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar) with Anne Wellmer (voice on track 4).

track listing

Game: Mutation (5:38); Naught Opportune (≥ 10:42); Are Variant (≥ 8:06); Of Life, Recombinant (≥ 29:22). Total duration ≥ 53:48.

recording details

Music by Han-earl Park.

Recorded by Han-earl Park, June 2, 2021.
Additional recording by Han-earl Park, April 3, 2021, and by Anne Wellmer June 27, 2021.

Mixed by Han-earl Park.
Mastered by Chris Sharkey.

Graphic design by Andrew Delanoy.
Portrait photography by Nella Aguessy.

Project director: Wesley Stephenson.

“Many thanks to everyone that contributed and supported our Crowdfunder campaign for the New Jazz and Improvised Music Recordings project. This release was made possible with additional support from Arts Council Ireland, Arts Council England and North East Local Enterprise Partnership. Additional thanks to Chris Sharkey for mastering and Andrew Delanoy for graphic design. Very special thanks to Nella Aguessy for the portrait photograph of Han-earl Park, you can find some really great work on her website.” — NEWJAiM Recordings.

“Thanks to Annette Krebs, Richard Barrett, and Anne Wellmer, and hugs for Asha and Melanie. The construction of this piece was made possible by funding from the Arts Council of Ireland” — Han-earl Park.

© 2021 NEWJAiM Recordings.
℗ 2021 Han-earl Park.

Also from Han-earl Park

cover art (copyright 2020 Han-earl Park)

Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone) and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

Track listing: Ballad of Tensegrity I (≥ 5:12), Ballad of Tensegrity II (2:28), Peculiar Velocities I (3:46), Peculiar Velocities II (3:36), Sleeping Dragon (5:22), D-Loop I (≥ 6:16), D-Loop II (5:13), Polytely I (≥ 5:01), Polytely II: Breakdown (5:33), Anagnorisis I (2:09), Anagnorisis II (2:19). Total duration ≥ 46:54.

© + ℗ 2020 Han-earl Park.

Cover of ‘ Two+ Bagatelles’ by Han-earl Park (photo copyright Jazz em Agosto / Petra Cvelbar)

Two+ Bagatelles [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar).

Track listing: Zero (01:03), One (10:27), Two (05:28). Total duration: 16:59.

© + ℗ 2019 The Vortex / Han-earl Park.

updates

11-26-21: released!
06-26-22: add review quotes.

New improvisative pieces for solo guitar

guitar

Awesome news! I am excited to announce that I am a recipient of the Arts Council of Ireland Music Bursary Award, and that I will be creating a suite of improvisative, obliquely narrative, pieces for solo guitar, working with mentors Richard Barrett and Annette Krebs, and consultant Han-Ter Park to build a new compositional approach, and create companion pieces to my teaching work. As wrote in my proposal:

I will create a suite of new improvisative, obliquely narrative, experimental pieces for the solo guitarist. The bursary award will grant me time to research ways in which to effectively incorporate elements transposed from narrative forms (e.g. the manipulation of genre expectations) into my solo practice with its physical techniques and interactive tactics that I have developed systematically over twenty years. In addition, I will explore the ways in which studio-based techniques (editing, montage, etc.) may be used as a fluid compositional strategy in the context of improvisative work….

My solo practice was built on my studies with improviser-composers such as Wadada Leo Smith, and periods of independent study in 2003 during which I transposed to the guitar improvisative techniques of pianists such as Marilyn Crispell and Keith Tippett, and in 2008 during which I incorporated techniques from drummers such as Rashied Ali and Tony Oxley. I aim to expand on this practice by transposing to the musical domain, elements of genre manipulation found in works by writers such as Jeff VanderMeer and film-makers such as Bong Joon-ho. In addition, I aim to amplify these possibilities via the interactions between improvisation and studio-based compositional strategies.

To this end, in addition to my independent studies, I will consult with film-maker Han-Ter Park to explore aspects of cinematic techniques relevant to this project, and work closely with mentors improviser and composer Richard Barrett, and composer and sound artist Annette Krebs. Barrett and Krebs have unique insights into the intersection of improvisation and composition, the incorporation of programmatic and/or narrative elements, and studio-based techniques.

I am very, very grateful for the support of the Arts Council, and my collaborators. I feel privileged to be given the opportunity to work on this project, and I am very much looking forward to sharing this work with you. Please stay tuned: I will be announcing soon ways you can follow this work-in-progress.

Arts Council of Ireland

This project is funded by the Arts Council of Ireland.

Improvising guitar, writing about

Studies for Guitar
© 2013 and 2020 Han-earl Park

I am very happy to announce that I will begin writing on the practice of improvisation and, and for, the adventurous guitarist. I aim to create a resource for both educators and practitioners, and the Cork City Council Arts Office has awarded me an Individual Artists’ Bursary to begin this work. As I wrote in my proposal:

A technical and practical text, it [the monograph] will be a unique and much needed contribution to the literature for, and about, the improviser and the experimental guitarist. My goal is to create a work for broad circulation that becomes a teaching, learning and theoretical resource for practitioners generally.

I aim to create a work that is part technical instruction for the guitarist with a working knowledge of musical improvisation, and a broader exploration of creative possibilities in the context of real-time, interactive performance. As a practitioner’s report, the work will not only be a reflection on the evolution of my practice and personal pedagogy, but will also be an invitation to the reader to similarly engage with their practice.

I will also be working with mentor-collaborators, and I am grateful to guitarist, improviser and composer Nick Didkovsky, improviser, composer and researcher Owen Green, and composer-improviser, researcher and mentor Richard Barrett for agreeing to read and comment on my work.

Please stay tuned: there are more parts of this project to be announced, and I will share parts of this project as they become ready.

Cork City Council Arts Office

This project was made possible with funding by the Cork City Council Arts Office.

Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park at the Institute of Sonology, The Hague

Sonology
© 2002, 2018 Han-earl Park

Wednesday, December 12, 2018, at 7:30pm: Richard Barrett (electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar) (a.k.a. Numbers) perform as part of the Sonology Discussion Concert. Event takes place at the Arnold Schoenbergzaal, Instituut voor Sonologie/Koninklijk Conservatorium (Juliana van Stolberglaan 1, 2595 CA The Hague, The Netherlands). Free entrance.

See the performance diary for up-to-date info. [Facebook event…]

Plus, on the previous day (Tuesday, December 11), at 3:30pm, Han-earl Park will also be giving a presentation at the Colloquium at the Varèsezaal, Instituut voor Sonologie. He may be talking about:

Improvising automata, and improvising cyborgs; performing stories of salvation through technology, and amplifying the voices of everyday artifacts. Cautionary tales, and small triumphs, from the practice of an institutionally unaffiliated artist-engineer, as he attempts to evolve techniques and approaches while riding the lines between ambiguity, didacticism, the improvisative, virtuosity, and neo-Ludditism.

By Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park

‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd)

Numbers (CS 201 cd) [details…]

Personnel: Richard Barrett (electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar).

Track listing: tolur (15:38), tricav (10:42), ankpla (10:46), uettet (5:17), creens (6:03), ll……. (11:42). Total duration: 60:00.

© + ℗ 2012 Creative Sources Recordings.

performance diary (Berlin, The Hague) 090718

upcoming performances
date venue time details
September 30, 2018 sonic krause
[Contact me for address…]
Berlin, Germany
8:30pm (doors: 8pm) Audrey Chen (’cello and voice and electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar).
[Details…]
December 12, 2018 Arnold Schoenbergzaal
Instituut voor Sonologie
Koninklijk Conservatorium
The Hague, The Netherlands
7:30pm Numbers (Richard Barrett: electronics; and Han-earl Park: guitar) presented by the Instituut voor Sonologie
Free entrance.
[Details…]
[Facebook event…]

Continue reading “performance diary (Berlin, The Hague) 090718”

Eris 136199 (BAF001)

Cover of ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)
‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) © 2018 Han-earl Park

October 9, 2018: Eris 136199’s eponymous album is out now (compact disc and digital download)! Eris 136199 is the quick-reacting cyborg virtuosity of Han-earl Park, the mighty melodic imagination and big tenor sound of Catherine Sikora, and the diamond-cut precision and grind-meets-experimentalism of Nick Didkovsky.

[Get the CD/download (Bandcamp)…]

CD: €11 minimum (‘name your price’) plus shipping.*†
Download: €8 minimum (‘name your price’).†

CD photo: ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)CD photo: ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)CD photo: ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)CD photo: ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)CD photo: ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)

* Limited edition glass-mastered CD. CD includes additional material (liner notes, artwork, etc.) not included in the download version of the album.

† Both digital and physical purchases give you streaming via the free Bandcamp app, and option to download the recording in multiple formats including lossless.

news and updates

June 14, 2021: Lumbering 30 kilogram box of wood, metal, glass, paper, fabric, plastic and 1960s over-engineering

In case you missed it, I wrote a short piece for the June edition of The Wire (issue 448) in which I muse about speaker cabinets, cyborgs, simulations, rooms-within-rooms, and…

October 15, 2020: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002)

November 17, 2020: Eris 136199’s latest album is out now (compact disc and digital download)! Eris 136199 is the chaotic snap’n’pop of Han-earl Park’s cyborg virtuosity, the symphonies of power…

[All articles on Eris 136199 (BAF001)…]

description

Kaleidoscopic, thuggish, optical retina-effect astringent free jazz…. [More…]

— Paul Khimasia Morgan (The Sound Projector)

In a field of experimentation and free music, Eris 136199 stands as singular. [More…]

— John Pietaro (The New York City Jazz Record)

Exquisitely constructed, spontaneously messed-up, endless depth, kind of like letting an insane brain surgeon in through your ear. [More…]

— Dave Foxall (a Jazz Noise, Best of 2018)

“Yo man, you ever been hit by a car?” “Yeah, but maybe we should listen to this album I just picked up before I tell you about it.” [More…]

— Gabriel Jermaine Vanlandingham-Dunn (Jazz Right Now, Best of 2018)

[More reviews…]

Formed in New York in 2012, Eris 136199 is the quick-reacting cyborg virtuosity of Han-earl Park (Sirene 1009), the mighty melodic imagination and big tenor sound of Catherine Sikora (Clockwork Mercury), and the diamond-cut precision and grind-meets-experimentalism of Nick Didkovsky (Doctor Nerve). Recorded during the 2017 European tour, Eris 136199’s eponymous album is the trio’s followup to their debut recording Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559, 2015) which was described as “a beautiful noise” (KFJC 89.7 FM) and “atmospheric as to become almost frightening” (The New York City Jazz Record).

Noise multiplies via telephone futz, riding the transcontinental signal; a clockwork tight-rope walker dances, navigating (gears shift and gear grind) tension; and, above all, rises the Big Note around which we all fall to orbit.

Han-earl Park variously occupies the role of Eris 136199’s drummer, bassist, and second horn-player. He is the instigator and mastermind behind Eris 136199, as well as groups like Sirene 1009 (with Dominic Lash, Mark Sanders and Caroline Pugh), and co-conspirator in projects with Richard Barrett and others. Park is navigator-engineer of the interactive, with playing that is by turns accommodating and interventionist. Changing direction and turning on a dime, Park demonstrates, with little more than a guitar, volume pedal and amplifier, a mutable, physical virtuosity.

In contrast, Nick Didkovsky creates anthems of glitch and distortion, playing the (analog and digital) signal chain from vibrating string to vibrating speaker via pedals and tube saturation. Demonstrating a deep understanding of rock, noise and experimentalism, Didkovsky rides the line between process-based mutations and heavy-rock riffage. Best known for his avant-metal big band Doctor Nerve, Didkovsky is also an active composer, working with ensembles such as Bang On A Can All Stars, ETHEL, and the Meridian Arts Ensemble, and the author of Java Music Specification Language, a system for algorithmic composition and real-time computer music.

Completing the trio is improviser, composer, saxophonist Catherine Sikora. Seated stage-center, Sikora brings a deep melodic and harmonic intelligence to the performances. In addition to long-standing collaborations with Eric Mingus, Christopher Culpo, Stanley Zappa, and Brian Chase, Sikora’s big, bold sound, and extraordinary melodic sense, has been in demand with artists such as Enrique Haneine, Elliott Sharp, and Ross Hammond. That same sound and technique grounds Eris, simultaneously rooting it in tradition while continually stepping beyond its borders.

Recorded with clarity and punch by Troels Bech and Charlie McGovern, and beautifully mastered by the amazing Richard Scott, the album presents two near-complete sets; from earlier in the tour (Copenhagen), and from the final date of the tour (Newcastle).

Update: thanks to everyone who pre-ordered! The pre-order period is now over, and the bonus album, Cryptogenic Animals, is no longer available to download. And free and exclusive to pre-orders of the album: the download-only Cryptogenic Animals. Recorded live in Cheltenham a day after Copenhagen, two days before Newcastle, Cryptogenic Animals, offers a unique opportunity to track the evolution of this improvising trio during the 2017 European tour, showcasing the trio’s adaptability to context, and creativity born from the contingent. [Listen/about Cryptogenic Animals…]

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone), and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

track listing

Therianthropy I (≥ 3:43), Therianthropy II (8:56), Therianthropy III (3:55), Therianthropy IV (6:30), Adaptive Radiation I (6:44), Adaptive Radiation II (8:48), Adaptive Radiation III (5:54), Universal Greebly (10:58), Hypnagogia I (8:03), Hypnagogia II (4:45). Total duration ≥ 68:25.

recording details

Music by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky.

Tracks 1–4, 9 and 10 recorded live November 2, 2017, Bryggekælderen, Copenhagen.
Live-mix by Troels Bech. Recorded by Troels Bech.

Tracks 5–8 recorded live November 5, 2017, The Bridge Hotel, Newcastle.
Recorded by Charlie McGovern. Mixed by Han-earl Park.

Mastered by Richard Scott.
Design and artwork by Han-earl Park.

Copenhagen performance presented by Jazz Club Loco and Jvtlandt.
Newcastle performance presented by Jazz North East.

Thanks to Troels, Charlie, Richard, and Chris Trent; to Melanie L Marshall, Josh Sinton, Cath Roberts, Franziska Schroeder, Richard Barrett, Caroline Pugh, Alex Fiennes, John Pope, Don Mount, Scott Friedlander and Kevin Reilly; to Jakob Drong Jensen and everyone at Jazz Club Loco; Jonas Vognsen of Jvtlandt; Wesley Stephenson, Paul Bream and everyone at Jazz North East; Corey Mwamba of OUT FRONT!; Stuart Wilding, Mark Unsworth, Anthea Millier, Jamie Dawson and everyone at Xposed Club; Verband für aktuelle Musik Hamburg; Rica Zinn and the crew of MS Stubnitz; Mike Borella of Avant Music News; and Cisco Bradley of Jazz Right Now.

And a big, big thanks to the backers of our Kickstarter project for their awe-inspiring generosity!

© + ℗ 2018 Han-earl Park.

Also available as part of…

The Complete Eris 136199 on CD

The Complete Eris 136199 on CD

Limited number of Eris 136199’s two CDs at a special price.

• Eris 136199 (BAF001, 2018).
Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559, 2015) with Josh Sinton.

[Get the set…]

Included with pre-orders of Eris 136199

Cover of ‘Cryptogenic Animals’ by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)

Cryptogenic Animals [details…]

Performers: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone), and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

Track listing: Cryptogenic Animals I (5:26), Cryptogenic Animals II (6:46), Cryptogenic Animals III (5:01), Monkey Wrench I (6:09), Monkey Wrench II (7:59), Spherical Cow I (7:30), Spherical Cow II (3:05), Dendrobranchiata Murmurationis I (3:18), Dendrobranchiata Murmurationis II (5:10). Total duration: 50:23.

© + ℗ 2018 Han-earl Park.

Update: the pre-order period is now over, and Cryptogenic Animals is no longer available to download. Thanks to everyone who pre-ordered!

about the trio

Eris 136199: Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (Hamburg, 11-01-17). Copyright 2017 Steffen Schindler
MS Stubnitz, Hamburg, November 1, 2017. © 2017 Steffen Schindler. [More images…]

Eris 136199 plays on the crossroads of noise, melody, rhythm, space, density, contrast, synchronicity, asymmetry, serendipity and contradiction. Eris 136199 is the corporeal, cyborg virtuosity of constructor and guitarist Han-earl Park; the noisy, unruly complexity of composer, computer artist and guitarist Nick Didkovsky; and the no-nonsense melodic logic of composer and saxophonist Catherine Sikora.

Together, Park, Didkovsky and Sikora forge an improvisative space where melody can be melody, noise can be noise, meter can be meter, metal becomes metal, bluegrass turns to bluegrass, jazz transforms into jazz, all there, all necessary without imploding under idiomatic pressures. [More about the trio…]

about the performers

Improviser, guitarist and constructor Han-earl Park (박한얼) has been crossing borders and performing fuzzily idiomatic, on occasion experimental, always traditional, open improvised musics for twenty years. He has performed in clubs, theaters, art galleries, concert halls, and (ad-hoc) alternative spaces across Europe and the USA.

Park engages a radical, liminal, cyborg virtuosity in which mind, body and artifact collide. He is driven by the social and revolutionary potential of real-time interactive performance in which tradition and practice become creative problematics. As a constructor of musical automata, he is interested in partial, and partially frustrating, context-specific artifacts; artifacts that amplify social relations and corporeal identities and agencies.

Ensembles include Sirene 1009 with Dominic Lash, Mark Sanders and Caroline Pugh, Mathilde 253 with Charles Hayward and Ian Smith, Eris 136199 with Nick Didkovsky and Catherine Sikora, and Numbers with Richard Barrett. Park is the constructor of the machine improviser io 0.0.1 beta++, and instigator of Metis 9, a playbook of improvisative tactics. He has performed with Wadada Leo Smith, Paul Dunmall, Evan Parker, Lol Coxhill, Josh Sinton, Louise Dam Eckardt Jensen, Gino Robair, Tim Perkis, Andrew Drury, Pat Thomas and Franziska Schroeder, and as part of large ensembles led by Wadada Leo Smith, Evan Parker and Pauline Oliveros.

Festival appearances include Freedom of the City (London), Brilliant Corners (Belfast), ISIM (New York), dialogues festival (Edinburgh), CEAIT (Los Angeles) and Sonic Acts (Amsterdam). His recordings have been released by labels including SLAM Productions, Creative Sources and DUNS Limited Edition.

Park teaches improvisation at University College Cork, and founded and curated Stet Lab, a space for improvised music in Cork.

“Guitarist Han-earl Park is a musical philosopher…. Expect unexpected things from Park, who is a delightful shape-shifter….”

Brian Morton (Point of Departure)

Saxophonist, improviser and composer Catherine Sikora was born and raised in West Cork, Ireland. Self taught to begin with, she moved to New York City to study and play with great improvisers.

Sikora works in a broad range of settings, from highly complex composed music, to folk songs, to free improvisation. She works regularly with Eric Mingus, Enrique Haneine, Brian Chase, Han-earl Park, Stanley Zappa, Christopher Culpo and Ross Hammond, as well as actively pursuing solo performance.

In the past few years Sikora has toured in Canada, the United States, Europe and Australia. She was a featured soloist in Eric Mingus’ radical reimagining of Tommy by the Who (Adelaide Festival 2015), and was artist in residence at the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris for the fall of 2014, working on a project inspired by stories from her female ancestors. Catherine’s first solo album Jersey was released on Relative Pitch Records in July 2016.

“Sikora has invited us into her musical world, and like the neighbor from Queens, it is our good fortune to be in its midsts.”

— Paul Acquaro (Free Jazz)

“Sikora resembles [Evan] Parker on tenor saxophone in that she has created a personal language in which she sublimates technique according to what she wants to achieve and maintains a discernible relationship to the free jazz tradition in her syntax; she recalls another English saxophonist, John Butcher, in her absolute control and deployment of overtones. Where she remains distinct from both Butcher and Parker is in how she incorporates such dissonance into a stream of delicate abstract lyricism. -John Sharpe, New York City Jazz Record”

— John Sharpe (New York City Jazz Record)

Nick Didkovsky is a guitarist, composer, and computer music programmer. His non-didactic approach to combining human and machine creativity is a unique musical fingerprint. Didkovsky has composed new music for Kathleen Supove, Ethel, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Meridian Arts Ensemble, New Century Players, ARTE Quartett, his own bands Doctor Nerve, Vomit Fist, Häßliche Luftmasken, and others. His compositions and guitar performances appear on more than 50 records.

For over 30 years, Doctor Nerve has fueled Didkovsky’s intricate compositions with the energy of rock, often challenging the boundaries between heavy metal, contemporary music, and improvisation. Doctor Nerve has released nine albums of more than 50 of his compositions. The band has performed at numerous festivals including FIMAV, the Moers Festival, Musique Action, Creative Time, MIMI Festival, and ‘Whitney Live’ at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

As a guitarist and composer, Didkovsky was a member of the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet, contributing twelve compositions to its repertoire. Didkovsky’s electric guitar compositions continue to be performed by newer ensembles such as Dither Quartet, E-Werk, and Fracture Guitar Quartet, and by soloists such as Kevin Gallagher, Marco Cappelli, and Wiek Hijmans. As a soloist, he has performed at numerous events such as Bang On A Can festival, Guitarévolutions in Montreal, New Ballet festival at the Miller Theatre, and John Zorn’s East Asian Bar Bands. His 2015 Residency at The Stone in NYC resulted in numerous premiere performances of new works.

Collaborating with computer music pioneer Phil Burk, Didkovsky began developing Java Music Specification Language in 1997.

“Musicians (and listeners) who approach Didkovsky’s work find that part of the challenge derives from his mastery of unpredictability.”

— Linda Leseman (The Village Voice)

Also from Eris 136199

Cover of ‘Peculiar Velocities’ (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)

Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone) and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

Track listing: Ballad of Tensegrity I (≥ 5:12), Ballad of Tensegrity II (2:28), Peculiar Velocities I (3:46), Peculiar Velocities II (3:36), Sleeping Dragon (5:22), D-Loop I (≥ 6:16), D-Loop II (5:13), Polytely I (≥ 5:01), Polytely II: Breakdown (5:33), Anagnorisis I (2:09), Anagnorisis II (2:19). Total duration ≥ 46:54.

© + ℗ 2020 Han-earl Park.

CD cover of ‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) with Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky and Josh Sinton (artwork copyright 2015, Han-earl Park)

Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (tenor and soprano saxophones), Nick Didkovsky (guitar; tracks 1 and 5), and Josh Sinton (baritone saxophone and bass clarinet; tracks 2–4).

Track listing: Monopod (27:19), Pleonasm (Metis 9) (17:08), Flying Rods (Metis 9) (7:41), Hydraphon (7:34), StopCock (10:54). Total duration: 70:33.

© 2015 Han-earl Park. ℗ 2015 SLAM Productions.

Eris 136199 T shirt

Eris 136199 T-shirt (limited edition) [details…]

100% heavy cotton, preshrunk jersey.
Screen printed with PVC-free, solvent-free ink.

Choice of ladies’ and unisex/men’s fit.
Available in S, M, L, XL, XXL.

100% for the perfect noise-night-out.
Celebrate your love of skonkin’ improvised goodness by wearing the noisily official Eris tee.

updates

02-19-20: added reviews.
10-09-18: released!
03-04-19: add T-shirt.
03-24-19: add The Complete Eris 136199.
11-02-20: update discography with the addition of Peculiar Velocities.

performance diary (Cork, The Hague) 062018

upcoming performances
date venue time details
July 12, 2018 plugd
Upstairs @ The Roundy
Castle Street
Cork, Ireland
9:30pm (doors: 9:00pm) Han-earl Park (guitar) presented by CIMC.
€5 at the door.
[Details…]
December 12, 2018 Instituut voor Sonologie
Koninklijk Conservatorium
The Hague, The Netherlands
TBC. Numbers (Richard Barrett: electronics; and Han-earl Park: guitar).
Details to follow…

Continue reading “performance diary (Cork, The Hague) 062018”

The (Near) Complete Han-earl Park

The (Near) Complete Han-earl Park (covers art and design copyright 2013 Clockwork Mercury Press; copyright 2012 Creative Sources Recordings; and copyright 2010, 2011 and 2015 Han-earl Park)
© 2013 Clockwork Mercury Press; © 2012 Creative Sources Recordings; and © 2010, 2011 and 2015 Han-earl Park.

Update: last I checked, only two sets left. If you want to get one….

Get Han-earl Park’s (near) complete discography! (And help fund Sirene 1009’s debut album.)

Limited in number, my (near) complete discography is for sale at a special price. The set comprises of four glass-mastered CDs, and one limited edition CD-R (plus, for the first two lucky listeners, another limited edition CD-R). Available for €25 plus shipping, you can consider it €5 per disc (and a bonus CD-R for the first two customers).

Musicians featured on these albums include: Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky, Josh Sinton, Richard Barrett, Franziska Schroeder, Bruce Coates, Charles Hayward, Ian Smith, François Grillot and Lol Coxhill (plus Paul Dunmall, Jamie Smith and Mark Sanders for the first two customers).

In addition to offering many, many hours of stupendous listening, as I’m furiously raising funds for the upcoming release by Sirene 1009, you’ll also be helping the production of more.

[Buy now…]

Included are…

four glass mastered CDs

CD cover of ‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) with Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky and Josh Sinton (artwork copyright 2015, Han-earl Park)

Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559) [details…]

Performers: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (tenor and soprano saxophones), Nick Didkovsky (guitar), and Josh Sinton (baritone saxophone and bass clarinet). [About Eris 136199…] [Metis 9…]

© 2015 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2015 SLAM Productions.

CD cover of ‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) with Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park (copyright 2012, Creative Sources Recordings)

‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) [details…]

Performers: Richard Barrett (electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar). [About this duo…]

© + ℗ 2012 Creative Sources Recordings.

‘io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) CD cover (copyright 2011, Han-earl Park)

io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) [details…]

Performers: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone). [About this project…]

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

‘Mathilde 253’ (SLAMCD 528) CD cover (copyright 2010, Han-earl Park)

Mathilde 253 (SLAMCD 528) [details…]

Performers: Charles Hayward (drums, percussion and melodica), Han-earl Park (guitar) and Ian Smith (trumpet and flugelhorn) plus Lol Coxhill (saxophone). [About this ensemble…]

© 2010 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2010 SLAM Productions.

plus a CD-R

Catherine Sikora, Han-earl Park and François Grillot, ‘Tracks in the dirt’ (copyright 2013, Clockwork Mercury Press)

Tracks in the dirt (Clockwork Mercury Press 003) [details…]

Performers: Catherine Sikora (saxophone), Han-earl Park (guitar) and François Grillot (double bass).

© + ℗ 2013 Clockwork Mercury Press.

and, for the first two customers, another CD-R

Han-earl Park, Paul Dunmall, Mark Sanders and Jamie Smith: Live at the Glucksman gallery, Cork (owlcd002) CD cover (copyright 2012, Owlhouse Recordings)

Live at the Glucksman gallery, Cork (owlcd002) [details…]

Performers: Han-earl Park (guitar), Paul Dunmall (saxophone), Mark Sanders (drums) and Jamie Smith (guitar).

© 2009 by Owlhouse Recordings.
℗ 2009 Han-earl Park/Paul Dunmall/Mark Sanders/Jamie Smith.

Live at the Glucksman is only available to the first two customers: I only have two copies left! (btw, I had been hoping to include the duo CD with Paul Dunmall, but it looks like I am completely out of those. For those who still have copies, consider yourself one of the lucky few 😉 )

trailers

small print

Glass-mastered CDs in shrink-wrapped jewel cases. CD-Rs in sleeves.

Live at the Glucksman is only available to the first two customers.

Thanks to all the musicians who’re represented here, and special thanks to George Haslam and SLAM Productions.

Return policy

It is vital that you contact me before returning items (click “contact Han-earl Park” on this page). I will do my absolute best to address any concerns and damaged (unplayable) items, but please note that some of these discs are limited in number, so replacements (unlike refunds) may be a non-trivial issue.

Shipping

Physical items shipped by standard post. Please contact me (click “contact Han-earl Park” on this page) before making your order for special delivery instructions and/or alternative shipping methods.

updates

07-14-16: only two sets left.

support Downtown Music Gallery!

In addition to being an awesome record store, Downtown Music Gallery is an institution that supports left-field, creative music. Part archive of sound recordings and folk knowledge, part performance space, NY Times described DMG as “one of the last remaining Manhattan outposts of Downtown music, defined by a melting-pot aesthetic inspired by the stew of cultures.” Over the years, DMG has been a tireless champion of creative people, communities and culture in an oftentimes indifferent world, but The Best Record Store in the World now needs our support:

This is has been a very difficult year for us financially speaking. Our Used & Sale CD lists get little response no matter what we do. We are selling a bit more Used vinyl through Discogs and here in the store but not enough. What can you do to help us survive? Donate money if you can afford it, order something from us, get someone you know to subscribe to the DMG weekly newsletter or come visit us when you can. Currently some 6,000 folks get our newsletter but only a hundred or so actually order from us with any regularity. If nearly everyone who does get the newsletter just contributed $5 or $10 each, this would help to make it to the end of the year and maybe beyond….

If you still care about DMG and enjoy reading our newsletter than please help us in any way that you can. Tell those you know who still care about our future as well. [Read the rest…]

I am privileged to have had DMG’s support over the years (they gave me one of my first gigs after I arrived in New York). Please help them offer that support to many others in the years to come.

See below for my CDs available from DMG.

Above video from a performance with Michael Evans and Louise Dam Eckardt Jensen hosted by the Downtown Music Gallery.

available from Downtown Music Gallery

CD cover of ‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) with Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park (copyright 2012, Creative Sources Recordings)

‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) [details…] [Get it from DMG…]

Performers: Richard Barrett (electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar). [About this duo…]

© + ℗ 2012 Creative Sources Recordings.

‘io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) CD cover (copyright 2011, Han-earl Park)

io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) [details…] [Get it from DMG…]

Performers: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone).

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

‘Mathilde 253’ (SLAMCD 528) CD cover (copyright 2010, Han-earl Park)

Mathilde 253 (SLAMCD 528) [details…] [Get it from DMG…]

Performers: Charles Hayward (drums, percussion and melodica), Han-earl Park (guitar) and Ian Smith (trumpet and flugelhorn) plus Lol Coxhill (saxophone).

© 2010 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2010 SLAM Productions.

Paul Dunmall and Han-earl Park: Boolean Transforms (DLE-067) CD cover (copyright 2010, DUNS Limited Edition)

Boolean Transforms (DLE-067) [details…] [Get it from DMG…]

Performers: Paul Dunmall (saxophone and bagpipes) and Han-earl Park (guitar).

© 2010 DUNS Limited Edition.
℗ 2010 Paul Dunmall/Han-earl Park.

Han-earl Park, Paul Dunmall, Mark Sanders and Jamie Smith: Live at the Glucksman gallery, Cork (owlcd002) CD cover (copyright 2012, Owlhouse Recordings)

Live at the Glucksman gallery, Cork (owlcd002) [details…] [Get it from DMG…]

Performers: Han-earl Park (guitar), Paul Dunmall (saxophone), Mark Sanders (drums) and Jamie Smith (guitar).

© 2009 by Owlhouse Recordings.
℗ 2009 Han-earl Park/Paul Dunmall/Mark Sanders/Jamie Smith.

Anomic Aphasia

CD cover of ‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) with Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky and Josh Sinton (artwork copyright 2015, Han-earl Park)
‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) © 2015 Han-earl Park

February 23, 2015: SLAM Productions releases ‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) featuring the ensemble Eris 136199 (Nick Didkovsky, Han-earl Park and Catherine Sikora), and rendering of improvisative tactics Metis 9 by Park, Sikora and Josh Sinton. [SLAM Productions catalog page…] [Discography entry…]

The CD is available from Downtown Music Gallery, Wayside Music, Disk Union… and all AWESOME record stores.

[Get the CD from SLAM Productions…]
[Downtown Music Gallery…] [Wayside Music…] [Disk Union…] [Improjazz…] [Crazy Jazz…] [Jazzcds…] [Proper Music (distributor)…] [More stores…]

[Download from iTunes…]* [eMusic…]*

* Downloads, in contrast to the physical CDs, do not include the liner notes.

news and updates

October 15, 2020: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002)

November 17, 2020: Eris 136199’s latest album is out now (compact disc and digital download)! Eris 136199 is the chaotic snap’n’pop of Han-earl Park’s cyborg virtuosity, the symphonies of power…

September 4, 2018: Eris 136199 (BAF001)

October 9, 2018: Eris 136199’s eponymous album is out now (compact disc and digital download)! Eris 136199 is the quick-reacting cyborg virtuosity of Han-earl Park, the mighty melodic imagination and…

[All articles on Anomic Aphasia…]

description

Challenging and phenomenal works with the musicians playing off of each others ideas…. A beautiful noise. [More…]

KFJC 89.7 FM

Putting this unlikely lineup together was almost as brilliant as the recording they have produced…. ‘Free’ is a barely sufficient to describe this approach, as the trios explore various angular constructs and effects. The vocabulary of sounds here is as broad as it is unconventional. [More…]

— Mike Borella (Avant Music News)

Impressive in scale, overwhelming in execution, it’s a cyclic frenzy of fragmented sounds without an ounce of entropy, yet somehow with a sense of clear movement and progression. Warning: close listening can produce altered states…. [More…]

— Dave Foxall (a Jazz Noise)

彼らは一緒になって、描き上げたばかりの集合肖像画に点を穿ち、所々に飛沫を散らし、時には引き裂く。そして切り取り、並べ替え、分割する。 [More…]

— Cisco Bradley (JazzTokyo)

Atmospheric as to become almost frightening [More…]

— Ken Waxman (The New York City Jazz Record)

Ein glorioser Bastard aus Noise und süßer Träumerei. [More…]

— Rigobert Dittmann (Bad Alchemy)

[More reviews…]

Anomic Aphasia documents two New York-based projects: the noisy, unruly complexity of the ensemble Eris 136199; and the interactive playbook Metis 9, a collection of improvisative tactics. Guitarists Han-earl Park (Mathilde 253) and Nick Didkovsky (Doctor Nerve), and reedists Catherine Sikora (Clockwork Mercury) and Josh Sinton (Ideal Bread) render a space of unexpected collisions, weaving orbital paths, and playful discord.

Eris 136199 plays on the crossroads of noise, melody, rhythm, space, density, contrast, synchronicity, asymmetry, serendipity and contradiction. Eris 136199 is the noisy, unruly complexity of composer, computer artist and guitarist Nick Didkovsky, the corporeal, cyborg virtuosity of constructor and guitarist Han-earl Park, and the no-nonsense melodic logic of composer and saxophonist Catherine Sikora.

Together, Didkovsky, Park and Sikora forges an improvisative space where melody can be melody, noise can be noise, meter can be meter, metal becomes metal, bluegrass turns to bluegrass, jazz transforms into jazz, all there, all necessary without imploding under idiomatic pressures.

Metis 9 is a collection of improvisative tactics, and higher-level interactive macros for ensemble performance designed, designated and specified by Han-earl Park in collaboration with Josh Sinton and Catherine Sikora.

Metis 9 has ‘glorious noise’ or ‘frenzy’ at its root, yet it is not so much structuring the noise as it is a meta-layer of complexity that performers can introduce at will. Metis 9 does not tell the performer what to play, or provide all the details of how to interact, but it is an additional network protocol for interactive possibilities. Group improvisation is always the primary protocol; Metis 9 provides secondary or tertiary tactics that create an additional focused complexity. The decision for each bloop and bleep is still retained by the ensemble. These macros enable specific interactionist schemes to be expressed in an open improvisative context; it is improvisative play channeled by group consent.

trailer

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (tenor and soprano saxophones), Nick Didkovsky (guitar; tracks 1 and 5), and Josh Sinton (baritone saxophone and bass clarinet; tracks 2–4).

track listing

Monopod (27:19), Pleonasm (Metis 9) (17:08), Flying Rods (Metis 9) (7:41), Hydraphon (7:34), StopCock (10:54). Total duration: 70:33.

recording details

Tracks 1 and 5: music by Eris 136199 (Nick Didkovsky, Han-earl Park and Catherine Sikora). Tracks 2–4: music by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Josh Sinton. Tracks 2–3: tactical macros (‘Metis 9’) devised and specified by Han-earl Park.

Tracks 1 and 5 recorded live at Douglass Street Music Collective, Brooklyn on June 5, 2013. Recording engineered by Scott Friedlander.
Tracks 2–4 recorded live at Harvestworks, New York City on October 29, 2013. Recording engineered by Kevin Ramsay. Mixed by Han-earl Park.
Design and artwork by Han-earl Park.

Thanks to Scott Friedlander, Kevin Ramsay, Carol Parkinson, Hans Tammen, Melanie L Marshall, Caroline Pugh, Richard Barrett, Ras Moshe, John Pietaro, Shayna Dulberger and Emilio Vavarella.

© 2015 Han-earl Park. ℗ 2015 SLAM Productions.

about the performers

Improviser, guitarist and constructor Han-earl Park (박한얼) has been crossing borders and performing fuzzily idiomatic, on occasion experimental, always traditional, open improvised musics for twenty years. He has performed in clubs, theaters, art galleries, concert halls, and (ad-hoc) alternative spaces across Europe and the USA.

Park engages a radical, liminal, cyborg virtuosity in which mind, body and artifact collide. He is driven by the social and revolutionary potential of real-time interactive performance in which tradition and practice become creative problematics. As a constructor of musical automata, he is interested in partial, and partially frustrating, context-specific artifacts; artifacts that amplify social relations and corporeal identities and agencies.

Ensembles include Mathilde 253 with Charles Hayward and Ian Smith, Eris 136199 with Nick Didkovsky and Catherine Sikora, and Numbers with Richard Barrett. Park is the constructor of the machine improviser io 0.0.1 beta++, and instigator of Metis 9, a playbook of improvisative tactics. He has performed with Wadada Leo Smith, Paul Dunmall, Evan Parker, Lol Coxhill, Mark Sanders, Josh Sinton, Louise Dam Eckardt Jensen, Gino Robair, Tim Perkis, Andrew Drury, Pat Thomas and Franziska Schroeder, and as part of large ensembles led by Wadada Leo Smith, Evan Parker and Pauline Oliveros.

Festival appearances include Freedom of the City (London), Sonorities (Belfast), ISIM (New York), dialogues festival (Edinburgh), CEAIT (Los Angeles) and Sonic Acts (Amsterdam). His recordings have been released by labels including Slam Productions, Creative Sources and DUNS Limited Edition.

Park taught improvisation at University College Cork, and founded and curated Stet Lab, a space for improvised music in Cork.

Since making her way to New York City from West Cork, Ireland to study abstract improvisation, Catherine Sikora has become a well-known face and sound in New York creative music circles. She has worked with Elliott Sharp, Eric Mingus, Michael Evans, Enrique Haneine, Karl Berger, Matt Lavelle, Jeremy Bacon, François Grillot and Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber, among many others. Her undeniably unique approach sets her apart from everyone else, even when surrounded by the most original and creative voices in New York City. Sikora is a contributing writer to the book “Silent Solos-Improvisers Speak” (Buddy’s Knife Publishing, Köln, DE).

Current working projects include Clockwork Mercury (duo with Eric Mingus) and an improvising duo with drummer Brian Chase; Sikora’s first solo recording will be released in fall 2015.

“Sikora is a free-blowing player’s player with a spectacular harmonic imagination and an evolved understanding of the tonal palette of the saxophone.”

— Chris Elliot (Seacoast Online)

With a musical career spanning 30 years, Nick Didkovsky is a guitarist, composer, and music software programmer. He founded the rock band Doctor Nerve in 1983 and is a member of the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet. He has composed for Bang On A Can All-Stars, Meridian Arts Ensemble, ETHEL, and others. His compositions and guitar work appear on over 50 records.

His Black Sabbath Guitar Lessons on YouTube have been received with great enthusiasm by metal fans all over the world. His metal band Häßliche Luftmasken premiered in June 2011.

With computer music pioneer Phil Burk, Didkovsky created Java Music Specification Language which is used by composers all over the world. He has taught JMSL at Dartmouth College, CalArts, Columbia University, and NYU. With composer Georg Hajdu, he has created MaxScore, an object that uses JMSL to bring music notation to Max/MSP.

His Punos Music record label serves up his more extreme musical projects.

Brooklyn-based saxophonist/clarinetist/composer Josh Sinton is probably best known as the leader of Ideal Bread, the Steve Lacy repertory band. He also performs regularly with Andrew D’Angelo’s DNA big band, Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society, the Nate Wooley Quintet and Anthony Braxton’s Tricentric Orchestra. He’s played with avant-garde luminaries such as Roswell Rudd, Karl Berger and John Butcher, newer voices Ingrid Laubrock, Matana Roberts and Jeremiah Cymerman and pop singers Michael Buble and Norah Jones.

In 2012, Sinton released his autobiographical album Pine Barren (featuring Jon Irabagon, Jonathan Goldberger, Peter Bitenc and Mike Pride) with accompanying essays on the Prom Night Records label to critical acclaim (“deeply confessional and emotionally revealing” – Shaun Brady, Downbeat, Nov. 2012). This year he will release another record on Prom Night, anomonous on which he freely improvises on the amplified contrabass clarinet with Denman Maroney (hyperpiano) and Ben Miller (electronics). Currently he’s in the midst of finishing arrangements for the next Ideal Bread record, an ambitious re-recording of all the material Steve Lacy put out on the Saravah label in the 1970’s and was recently repackaged as Scratching the Seventies. The working title of this work-in-progress is Beating the Teens.

Sinton grew up in the Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey, came of musical age attending AACM classes in Chicago and completed his classroom education in Boston at the New England Conservatory of music. Along the way, he’s toured and played in India, Israel, Japan, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Finland. Currently he happily resides in Brooklyn, NY with his wife Laura and daughter Zosia.

Also available as part of…

The Complete Eris 136199 on CD

The Complete Eris 136199 on CD

Limited number of Eris 136199’s two CDs at a special price.

Eris 136199 (BAF001, 2018).
• Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559, 2015) with Josh Sinton.

[Get the set…]

Also by Eris 136199…

Cover of ‘Peculiar Velocities’ (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)

Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone) and Nick Didkovsky (guitar). [About this ensemble…]

© + ℗ 2020 Han-earl Park.

Cover of ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)

Eris 136199 (BAF001) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone) and Nick Didkovsky (guitar). [About this ensemble…]

© + ℗ 2018 Han-earl Park.

Also from SLAM Productions…

‘io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) CD cover (copyright 2011, Han-earl Park)

io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) [details…]

Performers: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone). [About this project…]

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

‘Mathilde 253’ (SLAMCD 528) CD cover (copyright 2010, Han-earl Park)

Mathilde 253 (SLAMCD 528) [details…]

Performers: Charles Hayward (drums, percussion and melodica), Han-earl Park (guitar) and Ian Smith (trumpet and flugelhorn) plus Lol Coxhill (saxophone). [About this ensemble…]

© 2010 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2010 SLAM Productions.

updates

03–06-15: add news and updates feed.
04–22-15: add purchase links (Improjazz, Crazy Jazz, Jazzcds, Proper Music, iTunes and eMusic).
06–02-15: add Disk Union link.
08–13-15: add Wayside Music link.
08–15-15: add new video trailer.
09–18-15: add Downtown Music Gallery link.
09–23-15: update Downtown Music Gallery link.
11–24-16: added reviews.
03–24-19: added BAF001 album.
11-02-20: update discography with the addition of Peculiar Velocities.

video discography

I’ve created a video discography—a YouTube playlist of video ‘trailers’ for selected albums. (This now joins the video playlist of selected performances and 13 hours or so of ‘recent’ performances.)

The albums currently represented in the playlist are Numbers (CS 201 cd) with Richard Barrett [more info (get the CD)…]; io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) with Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder [more (CD/download)…]; and Mathilde 253 (SLAMCD 528) with Charles Hayward and Ian Smith plus Lol Coxhill [more (CD/download)…]; with more to come.

CD cover of ‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) with Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park (copyright 2012, Creative Sources Recordings)

Numbers (CS 201 cd) [details…]

Performers: Richard Barrett (electronics) and Han-earl Park (guitar). [About this duo…]

© + ℗ 2012 Creative Sources Recordings.

‘io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) CD cover (copyright 2011, Han-earl Park)

io 0.0.1 beta++ (SLAMCD 531) [details…]

Performers: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone). [About this project…]

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

‘Mathilde 253’ (SLAMCD 528) CD cover (copyright 2010, Han-earl Park)

Mathilde 253 (SLAMCD 528) [details…]

Performers: Charles Hayward (drums, percussion and melodica), Han-earl Park (guitar) and Ian Smith (trumpet and flugelhorn) plus Lol Coxhill (saxophone). [About this ensemble…]

© 2010 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2010 SLAM Productions.

updates

09–22–14: embedded playlist starts with Numbers.