Happenings

Monday, February 8 @ 11am -1pm via Zoom

Micaela Tobin is a soprano, sound artist, and teacher based in Los Angeles, CA who specializes in experimental voice and contemporary opera, composing under the moniker “White Boy Scream.” Within this project Micaela dissects her operatic and extended vocal techniques through the use of electronics. She has performed extensively throughout the western United States, most notably as a guest with hip-hop experimentalists clipping. during their 2017 tour in support of The Flaming Lips. Micaela’s most recent full length release, “BAKUNAWA” (Deathbomb Arc) is part sonic ritual, part diasporic storytelling. Of the album, Steve Smith of The New Yorker Magazine asserts that “opera would do well to pay attention.”

As an opera composer, Micaela premiered and earned a five-star review for her first original experimental opera, entitled “Unseal Unseam,” at the world’s largest art festival, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, in summer 2016; the work was described as “hypnotic” and “paralyzingly beautiful,” by New Classic LA after its U.S. debut in October 2017. Her most recent opera, “Belarion: A Space Opera” which premiered at the American Legion Center in Pasadena, CA in February 2019, is about the magickal practices of JPL founder Jack Parsons. Tobin hopes to perform the opera again at the Mount Wilson Observatory in 2021.

As a performer, Micaela most recently played the principal role of Coyote in the critically acclaimed opera, SWEET LAND (dir. Yuval Sharon & Canuppa Luger; Comp. Raven Chacon & Du Yun). She also performed with The Industry in their groundbreaking opera, “Hopscotch, a mobile opera for 24 cars (dir. Yuval Sharon).” Other major roles include the poet Mina Loy in the opera “Dada Divas” (dir. Jacqueline Bobak) which has toured internationally both in Europe and Mexico; as a principal vocalist in the premiere of Ron Athey and Sean Griffith’s automatic opera, “Gifts the Spirit”; and as a soprano soloist alongside Annette Bening in the play “Medea” at UCLALive.

Micaela is currently a voice teacher on faculty at the California Institute for the Arts and teaches privately out of her home in Los Angeles, CA.

Monday, February 1 @ 11am -1pm via Zoom

Casey Anderson is an artist working with sound in a number of media, including composition, improvisation, electronic music, saxophone, text, and installations. Performances, exhibitions, and residencies include MOCA – Los Angeles (CA), ISSUE Project Room (NY), STEIM (NL), Atlantic Center for the Arts (FL), Mass MOCA (MA), The Walker Art Center (MN), and The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA (CA). He co-founded, and co-edits (with John P. Hastings and Scott Cazan), the Experimental Music Yearbook, and owns and operates a wave press. He currently lives in Los Angeles, California and teaches in the Media Design Practices and Humanities and Sciences departments at ArtCenter College of Design.

Monday, May 4th @ 2:00pm in B305B

Holland Hopson is a sound and media artist, composer and improviser. A multi-instrumentalist, he usually  performs on clawhammer banjo and electronics. Holland often augments his instruments with custom-designed sensor interfaces and performs with his own highly responsive, interactive computer programs. Holland has performed in Australia, Europe and North America along with notable experimental and outsider musicians such Macarthur Genius Award winners Anthony Braxton and George Lewis, live electronics pioneer David Behrman, sonic meditator Pauline Oliveros, mutant-trumpeter Ben Neill, network music trailblazer Tim Perkis, free-improv innovators LaDonna Smith and Davey Williams, and others. Holland has held residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida; at LEMURPlex, Brooklyn; and Harvestworks Digital Media Arts, New York. Holland is Assistant Professor of Arts Entrepreneurship in New College at the University of Alabama and a Fellow of the Collaborative Arts Research Initiative (CARI).

Saturday, May 2nd @ 2:00pm PST on Twitch

Performances by:  Shan Ni, Brian Morones, Dylan Marx, Zaq Kenefick

twitch.tv/calartsesp

ESP Fest is a multi-day virtual concert series presented by CalArts Composition and Experimental Sound Practices (ESP) students. From a program committed to experimentation and innovation, the fest aims to examine the challenges posed to musicians, composers, and sound artists by nationwide shelter-in-place orders and the uncertain future of live performance. Over the course of five days between Tuesday, April 28th and Saturday, May 2nd, fourteen ESP students will showcase work that ranges from electronic music to performance art. Join us as we explore performance’s new relationship to the internet.

Friday, May 1st @ 6:00pm PST on Twitch

Performances by:  María Bulla, Hazel Feiner

twitch.tv/calartsesp

ESP Fest is a multi-day virtual concert series presented by CalArts Composition and Experimental Sound Practices (ESP) students. From a program committed to experimentation and innovation, the fest aims to examine the challenges posed to musicians, composers, and sound artists by nationwide shelter-in-place orders and the uncertain future of live performance. Over the course of five days between Tuesday, April 28th and Saturday, May 2nd, fourteen ESP students will showcase work that ranges from electronic music to performance art. Join us as we explore performance’s new relationship to the internet.

Wednesday, April 29th @ 6:00pm PST on Twitch

Performances by:  Brian Griffith, Rebecca Drapkin

twitch.tv/calartsesp

ESP Fest is a multi-day virtual concert series presented by CalArts Composition and Experimental Sound Practices (ESP) students. From a program committed to experimentation and innovation, the fest aims to examine the challenges posed to musicians, composers, and sound artists by nationwide shelter-in-place orders and the uncertain future of live performance. Over the course of five days between Tuesday, April 28th and Saturday, May 2nd, fourteen ESP students will showcase work that ranges from electronic music to performance art. Join us as we explore performance’s new relationship to the internet.

Tuesday, April 28th @ 6:00pm PST on Twitch

Performances by:  Shuwen Zhao, Azariah Felton, Abigail Johnson, Andrew Dyet

twitch.tv/calartsesp

ESP Fest is a multi-day virtual concert series presented by CalArts Composition and Experimental Sound Practices (ESP) students. From a program committed to experimentation and innovation, the fest aims to examine the challenges posed to musicians, composers, and sound artists by nationwide shelter-in-place orders and the uncertain future of live performance. Over the course of five days between Tuesday, April 28th and Saturday, May 2nd, fourteen ESP students will showcase work that ranges from electronic music to performance art. Join us as we explore performance’s new relationship to the internet.

Monday, April 27th @ 2:00pm in B305B

Julia Holter is a composer, performer, and recording artist based in Los Angeles. Her interest in sonic mysteries has led her to record in various settings–in her home, outside with a field recorder, and in recording studios—as well as to perform live, often with a focus on the voice and the space between language and babble. Holter’s music is multi-layered and texturally rich. She has amassed a body of work that explores melody within free song structures, atmosphere, and the impulses of the voice. She has released five studio albums: Aviary (2018), Have You In My Wilderness (2015), Loud City Song (2013), Ekstasis (2012), and Tragedy (2011). Holter has performed her music at venues and festivals throughout the world with an ensemble of creative musicians. She has written music for the Los Angeles Philharmonic and other ensembles, as well as scores for the films “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” (2020) and “Bleed for This” (2016) and the TV show “Pure” (2019).