Reciprocal Structures is a collaborative project between Scott Mc Laughlin (composer) and Shelley James (glass artist) to create dynamic graphic scores of light and glass, using focussed light to reveal the invisible internal structures and cording of bespoke glass objects, generating reflective and diffractive caustics. A glacially slow turntable rotates the glass to produce constantly shifting translucence as layers move in and out of light. These visual structures are interpreted in sound as spectral structures by Mira Benjamin (violin), Dominic Lash (bass), and Scott Mc Laughlin (guitar). This concert presents several performances of different glass objects across the afternoon.
Door 3:30 | performance 4pm | entry £5
Scott Mc Laughlin is a composer and free-improviser (cello, guitar, live electronics) based in Huddersfield, UK. Born in Ireland (Co. Clare) in 1975, he wanted to be a scientist but instead spent his early 20s playing guitar in art-indie bands between Galway and Belfast. Slowly he discovered more experimental non-pop musics, leading to a foundation course and subsequent BMus degree in music at the University of Ulster at Jordanstown, completed in 2001. Somewhere between that and completing his PhD at the University of Huddersfield in 2009, he reconnected with science via music, with the help of supervisors Pierre Alexandre Tremblay, Bryn Harrison, James Saunders, and Christopher Fox. Currently he teaches composition and music-technology at University of Leeds, and still enjoys reverb-drenched feedback.
His research is compositional, a practice-led exploration of the physical materiality of sound and the local teleology of performance, combining approaches from experimental music with dynamical systems theory and philosophy to explore autopoiesis and recursive feedback systems in constraint-based open form composition: especially concerning resonance and perceptual ambiguity on both macro/formal and micro/spectral scales. His music is concerned with relationships between minimal processes of transformation and proliferation: ideas of recursion, hysteresis, difference, cluster-microtonality, chaos/complexity theory, and interactivity. Recent performances have been given by Mira Benjamin, Dom Lash, National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, Duo Hevans, Sebastian Berweck, Jonathan Sage, Crash Ensemble, and Trio Scordatura.
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Dominic Lash is a freely improvising double bassist, although his activities also range much more widely and include playing bass guitar and other instruments; both writing and performing composed music; and writing about music and various other subjects.
He has performed with musicians such as Tony Conrad (in duo and quartet formations), Joe Morris(trio and quartet), Evan Parker (duo, quartet and large ensemble) and the late Steve Reid. His main projects include The Dominic Lash Quartet, The Set Ensemble (an experimental music group focused on the work of the Wandelweiser collective) and The Convergence Quartet.
Based in Bristol, Lash has performed in the UK, Austria, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey and USA. For nearly a decade he was based in Oxford and played a central role in the activities of Oxford Improvisers; much of 2011 was spent living in Manhattan. In 2013 & 2014 he took part in Take Five, the professional development programme administered by Serious.
His work has been broadcast on a number of radio stations, including BBC Radios 1 and 3 and Germany’s SWR2, and released on labels including Another Timbre, b-boim, Bead, Cathnor, Clean Feed, Compost and Height, Emanem, Erstwhile, FMR, Foghorn, Leo and NoBusiness. In 2015 he started a digital label for some of his more uncategorisable work, called Spoonhunt. Since moving to Bristol he has been involved in organising concerts under the banners of Bang the Bore and Insignificant Variation.
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Mira Benjamin is a Canadian violinist, researcher and new-music instigator.
She performs new and experimental music, with a special interest in microtonality & tuning practice. She actively commissions music from composers at all stages of their careers, and develops each new work through multiple performances. Current collaborations include new works by Anna Höstman, Scott McLaughlin, Amber Priestley, Taylor Brook and James Weeks.
Since 2011, Mira has co-directed NU:NORD – a project-based music and performance network which instigates artistic exchanges and encourages community building between music creators from Canada, Norway & the UK. To date NU:NORD has engaged 79 artists and commissioned 62 new works. Through this initiative, Mira hopes to offer a foundation from which Canadian artists can reach out to artistic communities overseas, and provide a conduit through which UK & Norwegian artists can access Canada’s rich art culture.
Originally from Vancouver, British Columbia, Mira lived for ten years in Montréal, where she was a member of Quatuor Bozzini. Since 2014 she has resided in London (UK), where she regularly performs with ensembles such as Apartment House, Decibel, and the London Contemporary Orchestra Soloists, and is currently the Duncan Druce Scholar in Music Performance at the University of Huddersfield.
Mira is the recipient of the 2016 Virginia Parker Prize from the Canada Council for the Arts. The prize is awarded annually to a Canadian musician in recognition of their contribution to the artistic life in Canada and internationally.
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Trained in textiles, at the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Arts Decoratifs in Paris, Shelley James pursued a career in corporate design for international clients including Visa International, Shell and Habitat.
Deciding to explore the themes of perception and reality from a more personal perspective, she studied Printmaking at the University of the West of England. developing new techniques for encapsulating prints in glass with support from the National Glass Centre in Sunderland and Arts Council England. An ongoing Residency with the Bristol Eye Hospital and PhD research at the Royal College of Art in London has led to a number of collaborative projects with scientists, exploring the intersection between material and virtual space.
Recent exhibitions of Shelley’s work include the MRC Centenary ‘From DNA to the Brain’ at Somerset House and the ‘Illusions’ exhibition at the Science Gallery in Dublin.
She has been selected for the prestigious Jerwood Maker’s Award and is currently working with the Institute of Philosophy at UCL, the Royal College of Art and the university of Leeds.
