2012: John Shiurba’s 9:9

Gino Robair: percussion, piano
ma++ ingalls: clarinet
Phillip Greenlief: clarinet
Polly Moller: flute, voice
Monica Scott: cello
Scott Walton: bass
Sarah Wilner: violin
Ava Mendoza: guitar
Hadley McCarroll: piano, voice
John Shiurba: conductor/prompter

9:9 is a suite of nine pieces written to be interpreted by nine players with a prompter/conductor. The score will utilize nine different types of notation all of which are somehow derived from the newspaper, so the piece acts as a celebration and/or elegy for the old-fashioned print medium. The notation types will vary from standard music notation to graphic, textual and pictorial notation, allowing the ensemble some creative input in the interpretation. The form of the suite will be open, allowing the conductor and the players to spontaneously shape the way the music develops in real time.

John Shiurba is a composer and guitarist whose musical pursuits include improvisation, art-rock, modern composition and noise. Shiurba has recorded and toured the U.S. and Europe as a member of the bands Pink Mountain, Eskimo, The Molecules and Spezza Rotto, as a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, Anthony Braxton's ensemble and the SFSound Group, and as an improvisor. Shiurba has conducted the premiers of his compositions at ODC in 2005 (Moon Cycle for SFSound) at New Langton Arts in 2002 (Triplicate) and at SFAlt in 2002 (5x5 1.4 for SFSound). Shiurba was invited to play at the Musique Action Festival and the Festival Terra Firma in France in 2007, the Music Unlimited Festival in Austria in 2007, the Push International Performing Arts Festival in Vancouver in 2007, the SFAlt Festival in 2004, the Olympia Experimental Music Festival in 2002 and 2004, the High Zero Festival in Baltimore in 1999, and the Seattle Improvised Music Festival in 1998. As a guitarist Shiurba has developed a unique and personalized approach to the guitar. Through the use of extended techniques and unusual preparations, he expands the traditional sound range of the instrument, producing stunning, often unrecognizable results. Cadence Magazine calls Shiurba a “wildly creative guitarist... anti-jazz, anti-everything else, yet utterly compelling.”

Artist (photo by Photographer)