Maya Deren Films with Rob Schwimmer on Theremin, Piano, Autoharp and Haken Continuum

This event has been postponed until a later date. 

MAYA DEREN Films w/ ROB SCHWIMMER on Theremin, Piano. Autoharp, & Haken Continuum!
Improvisational music performed by Rob Schwimmer on piano, theremin, autoharp, and Haken Continuum to accompany four seminal works by pioneering Ukrainian experimental filmmaker Maya Deren.

For tonight’s special program, Schwimmer will perform improvisational soundtracks for three of Maya Deren’s most celebrated films: Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) as well as At Land (1944), and Ritual in Transfigured Time (1946) Additionally, he will perform music to accompany Deren’s unfinished short Witch’s Cradle (1946).

Maya Deren (1917-1961) Avant-garde filmmaker, photographer, dancer, writer, poet, and theorist.
Born in Kiev, Ukraine in 1917, Deren is considered one of the most important and influential avant-garde filmmakers in the US. Maya Deren’s work still reverberates today with many filmmakers—and in particular, women filmmakers—and those working in an experimental mode. Her debut work, the 14-minute Meshes of the Afternoon (1943), is a surreal, unsettling, and dreamlike experience that is often credited with kickstarting the American avant-garde movement. Deren’s films have been called ‘choreocinema’ for their frequent incorporation of dance and ritual; they are also heavily informed by voodoo.

Rob Schwimmer is a master of piano, theremin, and Haken Continuum, and here playing alone, he conjures a sound world of compelling, thoughtful, and attentive virtuosity. These 3 instruments (plus an alien-sounding autoharp) create a rarely heard combination that allows him to bring audiences to the beautiful and mysterious new sonic territory. Rob was the thereminist and pianist for Matthew Barney’s masterpiece, the both epic and epically weird movie Cremaster 3, pianist for the Museum of Modern Art’s silent film series, and The Whitney’s presentation of Christian Marclay’s Blackboard and Playing Cards. Rob has worked with beloved legends like Simon and Garfunkel, Wayne Shorter, The Boston Pops (as theremin soloist) as well as celebrated young contemporary artists such as Esperanza Spalding and Gotye, Schwimmer leads us on an organic and musically rich journey from the pensive to the thrilling, with many musical ports of call in between.

VISIT: robschwimmer.com

Rob Schwimmer is exclusively represented by Bernstein Artists, Inc. http://www.bernsarts.com