Sauna Music with Kaija Siirala

This screening took place on Thursday, July 10, 2014 at 8:00 pmGlobe Theatre, Atlin BC

2014 AAMF Kick-off event! The first event of this year's festival is fittingly a live music performance with live video mixing at The Globe Theatre. Experimenting in a kind of structured improvisation across forms, musicians Jordy Walker and Micah Smith (YT) and media artist Kaija Siirala (ON) explore how music and video can interact and inform one another in live performance. Using analog synths, no-input mixer, guitar, lap steel and a constant swell of feedback, Sauna Music creates moving soundscapes that change incrementally across time, dynamics and tone. A new partnership with video artist Kaija Siirala will add a visual dimension to this musical landscape. Experimenting in a kind of structured improvisation across forms, they will explore how music and video can interact and inform one another in live performance. Using live video mixing, Kaija will respond to the changing shape of each of the musical pieces with a dedicated bank of moving images collected locally and beyond that explore the themes of how geography and space effect feelings of intimacy, isolation and memory. Similarly, the musicians will not only be responding to one another but also what is happening visually. Although both the musical and visual content for each piece will be decided on beforehand, how the piece takes shape will be entirely informed by what is happening in the live context with each performer drawing from his or her own bag of tricks. This interaction across forms strives to engage the audience by blending the visual and auditory to take them through both the happy accidents and wonder of a live, immersive experience.