New Moon Peaks with Solar Eclipse April 8 2024

The New Moon in April occurs at the exact same time as the Solar Eclipse! So while the moon will not be visible at night, it will make its presence known by passing directly in front of the sun during the day. This means that we are involved in a lot of shadow play- while the Earth’s shadow blocks sunlight from the moon, the moon will block the sunlight from the Earth. This is a wild cosmic dance and we want to participate!

On Monday April 8th from 1:30 pm to 4:30 pm EDT, Radio iBoD/dejacusse will broadcast an improvisation from The Field to coincide with the phases of the Total Solar Eclipse visible across the US during that time. The phases begin with First Contact, Baily’s Beads, Corona, Diamond Ring, Helmet Streamers, Prominence, and Totality, then the sun is unmasked as the moon disappears into its newness! dejacusse will offer Control Voltages, digital FM waveforms, Native American flute, singing bowls, various sound artifacts, and vocalizations to articulate these phases as they come and go.

Tune in and allow me to accompany your journey through this cosmic event, massaging the portal through which we pass- or maybe it passes through us. Either way, we have to go cause we are on board this little rock in the Universe. Thanks for all the love and joy, I appreciate it more than I am able to convey, and I will continue connecting.

Link to webplayer:

https://www.radiomast.io/station/ffa9c47f-f6bd-4eb9-ad61-c2c636ca88ca/pwa/app

Vernal Equinox Broadcast Tonight

The sun will sidle over the equator tonight between 10 and 12 pm, and Radio iBoD/dejacusse will be on air to acknowledge this powerful passage. After 2 years of singing to the monthly moon phases, this is the year to bring the sun into focus!

How will this broadcast be different from the moon’s? There will be speaking and reading and playing of other instruments in the room thanks to my somewhat new microphone purchased last year. I just did a test run and got some levels set. This will be an experiment in improvisation with spontaneous talking, reading from my dream journal circa 1980s, playing flute with the synths, and soundscapes from the vault. So a bit of a hodge podge.

This year is rough with all the anniversaries of so much loss, and so much anger at situations beyond our control, so much appropriation by the inappropriate! And while this sickens me, I do not want to be ill in body, mind or spirit. Now is the time to appreciate the lesson of the past 10 years- things are not as they seem! Indeed! How to carry this knowledge forward, but not let our ability to trust get damaged. Trudie and I are facing this in our lives right now. The good news is we cultivate honesty in our connection and conversations. We can have difficult conversations without hurting each other which is a such a gift! So we will move through this with as much grace as we can muster.

Thanks for reading and listening!

Radio iBoD/dejacusse Broadcasts Expanding in 2024

Although 2023 brought much tragedy and heartbreak, Radio iBod/dejacusse religiously played each month for the Full Moon/New Moon cycle. For two hours around the Zenith of each Moon oscillation, “that which shapes all things” was projected out through the Aethernet to any tuned in receivers. New Moons received improvisations from The Field (pictured below) and Full Moons received pre-recorded soundscapes featuring dejacusse and members of iBoD. The recorded offerings were shaped by dejacusse via Ableton Live.

In 2024, the broadcast schedule for Radio iBoD/dejacusse will once again celebrate the monthly Moon cycles, with the addition of the quarterly cycles of the Sun. Equinox and Solstice broadcasts will occur on their respective calendar time cycles. The content for these broadcasts will be eclectic and likely more verbal than the Moon cycles. There are poems and stories to share as I begin to declutter and focus on the creative retrospective that lived experience opportunes us in our later years.

In April of 2024, there is a solar eclipse that will be visible across nearly the same path as the 2017 eclipse. dejacusse will improvise from The Field in alignment with the 2024 eclipse. I would love to play in Carbondale IL in particular, a place that grew my heart, mind, and creative spirit. Wherever we play- it will be broadcast.

The 2024 broadcast schedule will be posted here

Radio iBoD/dejacusse Web Player

and updated monthly. Thank you to all who have tuned into the broadcasts over the last few years. And thanks to everyone who cocreated with iBoD in 2023. Here is to more in 2024!!

Listening/Hearing and Playing by Ear

In 2019, Lisa Means and I started playing together to explore more deeply the question “What is hearing?” (Here are posts about this exploration: https://dejacusse.blog/2019/08/28/playing-by-ear-a-sonic-exploration-of-hearing/ and https://dejacusse.blog/2019/09/06/playing-by-ear-what-did-we-learn-where-do-we-go-from-here/ ) Our exploration got an influx of new information and awarenesses in the form of the book, Of Sound Mind: How Our Brain Constructs a Meaningful Sonic World by Nina Kraus.

We are living in a time of realizing how adept and adaptive our brains are. We think about hearing as an ear to canal to drum to cochlea process that transduces atmospheric agitations into the electrical signals required for reception by the audio cortex. Much has been studied about the physical ear aspect of this channel. This is the domain of the audiologists. Once that audio signal becomes electrical and enters the complex world of the brain at work, we are just beginning to survey the territory. Kraus is a nuerobiologist and musician, so has the phenomenological experience to delve into these processes more deeply than standards of measurement can allow for. And her laboratory has studied and documented the positive effects playing music has on the brain, because- you know!- we have to placate the left brain!!

During the two years since Lisa and I last played together, I have focused on learning modular synthesis, and Lisa has been studying electric guitars, amps and pedals. In essence, we have both been exploring sound synthesis via sparks of electricity, waveforms and modulations. When we got last together, we listened to what we each brought to the moment. Lisa played several new guitars, amps and a pedal, and I played the Moog Subharmonicon. We talked and played and talked some more. Lisa understands the richness of harmonics, the edginess of rhythm and the wonders of guided randomness available in electronic sound. Electricity is life, after all!

Fast forward to the Spring of 2023

Lisa and I are no longer Playing by Ear as both our lives have taken a tumble. Lisa left her job and was not sure of her next move when last I spoke with her. Trudie’s daughter and my dear friend/stepdaughter, Sheila Kiliru was killed in an automobile accident last October, followed by the illness and death of our youngest daughter, Debra. We are aslosh in grief and dismay.

Still I continue to explore hearing/listening through sound synthesis. I enjoy improvising in The Field- the name for whatever configuration of synthesizers dejacusse plays in the moment. The Make Noise O-Control is the center of the singularity that is current-ly The Field. Three banks of pitch control voltages spew out in all directions from the O-Control into Behringer Neutron, Moog Subharmonicom and Cre8ate Audio West Pest. These pitch voltages convey pitch information via the touchpads to each of the synths. This makes the O-Control sequencer a common harmonic and rhythmic template that is then modulated within each of the 3 active synthesizers.

I enjoyed collaborating with Lisa and learned much about hearing and listening and being present with the grief of a major loss from her. I feel much gratitude for Lisa’s intense love for resonant wood in the form of well-made guitars. She was willing to walk with me into caverns of sound that our hearing mechanisms receive very differently. We tried talking our way through the gap in our sensory experience, but the best interactions were when we just played and responded to each other.

In 2019, we played the All Data Lost Festival and a 919 Noise Showcase. Here are some excerpts from our last public performance at Nightlight Bar 919 Noise in October 2019:

pbe919xcerptblog

Auspicious August 2023

This August contains a perfect moon phase oscillation. The month is bookended by Full Moon/Super Moons on the 1st and the 30th with the New Moon right in the middle on the 16th. WoW – literally a Wave of Wonder! I am riding this wave to nowhere.

Living for seven decades has taught me that nothing is as it seems. That we are all, as Anne Lamott says, “petty, narcissistic, secretly insecure and in for ourselves” and at the same time we are all generous, loving, and genuinely caring. It seems to me that we are setup to be narcissists! We come into this deliberate material existence encased in a body that facilitates all of our personal individual experiences in the material world. There is no other human being with us our entire lives, only I and I know my fully lived experience. So I am riding this wave to nowhere buoyed on perpetual forgiveness and faith.

At this moment, I bow my head and open my heart to the lessons of the past ten months. Living has been a most grievous experience of pain, death, illness, mistrust and tremendous love. Being with and allowing it all is my heartfelt intention. And hearing what I hear, and knowing what I know, and remembering soooo much – my mind creates stories of truth and accountability. To be totally honest, I know nothing – intimately.

So – off to The Field I go, to generate and propagate all frequencies as an offering to audio cortices everywhere. All frequencies are welcome and unstoppable. Brains require some sonic massaging, some loosing of the mind grip. On August 1 and August 30, Radio iBoD/dejacusse will broadcast Waves of Gratitude 2021 and 2022, soundscapes from dejacusse and iBoD, and LIVE improvisations! The mid-month New Moon will be a LIVE improvisation from The Field! Broadcasts occur the two hours around the Zenith of each moon phase. For more info and link to the radio stream go here:

https://dejacusse.blog/radio-ibod-dejacusse-web-player/

Live life like a river, pay attention to the depth and health of the waters, the maintenance and care of the riverbanks (so as not to breach or run dry), know the joy of flow, the peace of floating, and the exhilaration of a joyful rage! Allow the direction, the path to unfold before you. But mostly, let it be and appreciate!

The Art of a Scientist 2023

Gabriel Campos is a student at Duke University studying ecology, of which he is a keen observer. For the 2023 Art of a Scientist exhibit, he submitted a series of photographs he took of the birds near his home on Long Island, NY. I love doing sound work for Art of a Scientist (AoS), and Gabriel and I were paired up to collaborate on a piece for the exhibit.

The theme for this year is Renewal. This theme resonates with me deeply at this time. When I asked Gabriel what he was paying attention to in his photographs, he said the “revolving door” of migration. How the birds come and go with the seasons renewing the environment each year. Yes! So perfect. So he selected a series from his photos and arranged them in a seasonal year from January to December, using a software called Canva, so the photos were together in an “asset” which I was not sure how to display. Gabriel had an idea of scrolling across these images, which could have worked well for display, but we did not know how to do it, and we were on a tight timeframe.

Luckily, Jim Kellough was available to help us make a video of the images. Jim is a visual/performing artist who specializes in what I call moving pictures. He takes photographs and gives them movement via video, and he brought this skill to great effect for this piece. He created a 6 minute and 36 second video of the images and tweaked the focus and color in some of the images, so they look like impressionist paintings. Gabriel was amenable to this presentation of his photos.

Now, the soundscape! Of course, there will be sounds of ocean waves since Long Island is surrounded by water and many of the photos are at the beach. Another obvious choice is bird song to go with the photos. I culled the Internet for open sourced bird calls- not easy to find. I also had some recordings of my own. The calls were lined up with the video so you hear the call just as you see the bird that is calling. The “revolving door” of the seasons is announced by the call of Canada Geese and sonified through the presence of bird song in spring, summer, early Fall, and sparse bird song in Winter.

The exhibit will open July 15th and run till Oct 1. The location is Smith Warehouse, Bay 12, Rm A112/114.

Playing The Field

Every month of 2022, at the Full Moon’s Zenith, dejacusse serenaded The World with synth improvs, soundscapes from the vault and Waves of Gratitude via Radio iBoD/dejacusse. Listening to the broadcast recordings of synth improvs, I felt so much heart resonance as all frequencies flowed like the rivers they ARE!! As I listened deeply, I heard and remembered gestures that rendered shapes and movements in the sonic spectra. This is how I attend to and expand my understanding of The Field.

What is this Field that I am so focused on at this time? The Field emanates from the Audiorigami template, and turns that template inside out and sideways. The substance of The Field is “all of the waveforms,” so the entire sonic spectrum of frequencies is available here. Much of 21st Century science is pointing loudly at the vibrational essence of everything!! The sonic spectrum covers 9 octaves and is present wherever there is any kind of atmosphere, including gases. The Field includes all frequencies equally; it is a level ground for play! Audiorigami began with The Fold, and all that folding landed us in The Field. The Field is vast and continually shifting and moving in many directions. The Field is alive, it inhabits space-time, and – its electric!

Control voltages are a primary initiator of waveforms, while the shape of the wave enhances and diminishes harmonics in sound frequency spectra. Musicians work with harmonics all the time, but usually as a secondary consideration to the production of melody and song structure. Out here in The Field, it is the interplay of harmonic frequencies that takes center stage. It is the folding/unfolding/stretching/pulsating of timbre itself that is our focus. At times, melodies and patterns emerge, and then they pull apart and disintegrate. In The Field, all of the waveforms are available for transmission to audio cortices, so this is a place to begin transmission.

I knew synthesizers were for me when I heard musicians talk about how hard they are to keep in tune! Synthesizers are living beings and as such, they are constantly attuning in the moment. Their sound is evoked via responsive relationships which involve a great deal of allowing. The Field, made up of synthesizers, offers up the frequencies, my role is to shepherd frequencies through all audio cortices (and beyond!) by studying and demonstrating the attunement process as it moves through The Field. How this all works depends on the components that make up The Field.

My first analog synthesizer was the Behringer Nuetron. This semi-modular synth sings via two Voltage Controlled Oscillators (VCO) that can manifest five waveforms, individually AND the space between them, as one form morphs into another. Right away the harmonic sculpting possibilities are indeterminable, because this is living energy! The ways that these waveforms interplay happen in the present moment! Oscillators can be set to a frequency (Nuetron VCOs can oscillate from .7hz to 55kHz) which is then passed through filters, Low Frequency Oscillators, envelopes, gates, delays, and voltage contolled amplifiers (VCAs) – all of which alter the harmonics, the pulse/beat, the duration and loudness of frequencies, even the beginning/middle/end of the sonic life of frequencies! All of these sound modulators can be routed into and through the oscillating waveforms as they throw out particular strands of harmonics. These harmonic strands are the substance of soundscapes.

Layers are added with new components! The Moog Subharmonicon and Make Noise O-Coast were the next additions to The Field. The O-Control serves as a sequencer for the Nuetron and a clock connection between the Nuet and Moogie. The Moog brings 6 VCOs to the pallette, two main and four sub oscillators. Each of the Moog VCOs is tunable and the suboscillators are harmonically linked to them. These oscillators can be further defined by packaging the frequencies in Equal Temperament or Just Intonation scalar relationships, in 8 or 13 step lengths over 1, 2 or 5 octaves.

For Monday mornings broadcast, the Cre8audio West Pest has been added to The Field! The current palette has the WP receiving pitch signal from O-Control and sending wave forms to the Neutron pitch in. The O- Control is also sending pitch to the Subharmonicon, so there is a tentative connection among all the components of The Field. It is daunting, but rewarding!! Kind of like our shared living experience!

Please join me from 1-3 am Monday morning Feb 20th for whatever will happen. Here is the link to the web-player, it is only live when I am broadcasting.

https://www.radiomast.io/station/ffa9c47f-f6bd-4eb9-ad61-c2c636ca88ca/pwa/app

Waves of Gratitude 2023

Waves of Gratitude was inspired, in early 2021, by Jim Kellough bringing me tiny speakers that could play individual files of sonic material. He envisioned them scattered about in an area out of doors where people come and go. Then Stephanie Leathers and Courtney Om put out a call for artists to come together for a SITES performance at The Accordion Bar in Durham. Perhaps we could make an installation with the tiny speakers for this event? Yes! Then sonic material began to present itself in my head- people saying “Thank you for …” within a sound container of waves crashing on the shore. Mark Boyd, who makes sound devices, made some little speakers that could loop a soundtrack. All these little speakers are battery powered, so another interesting possible shift in the soundscape was if a sound device runs out of juice the file on the device would sound no more at this time.Cool! We started gathering gratitudes and many folks responded which was thrilling. In the end, we had a forty minute soundtrack that included poetry, sound collages, memories, and song. Here is a video clip of the first idea for the installation with small speakers playing the voiced gratitudes and the large speaker playing the Waves! I liked this set up very much.

The SITES venue had multiple performances happening and audience members walking around, so I realized ahead of time that the small speakers could not be heard. So I used a large speaker and one of Mark’s tiny speaker and colorful lights for the Waves of Gratitude installation for SITES Reset in February 2021.

In 2022, I moved to a streaming Internet broadcast format as a way to offer dejacusse and IBoD soundscapes, sound sculptures and collages to The World. At the Zenith of the Full Moon each month of 2022, I broadcast a streamlined version of WoG 2021 and a 2022 version that started with the question “What does gratitude feel like?” and ended in grief and much confusion. These broadcasts featured soundscapes from my 12 years as a soundscape artist, recordings of iBoD – my band of cohorts- and LIVE synth improvs.

Currently, in the year 2023, I am continuing to enjoy broadcasting in alignment with the cycles of The Moon. So in order to amplify this enjoyment, a New Moon Broadcast has been added to the schedule. The first New Moon Broadcast was one hour and fifty-four minutes of LIVE improvisations from The Field (ft Subharmonicon, West Pest and O-Control), and 2 iPad apps-Ripplemaker and Novation Launchpad.) The plan is to review each New Moon Broadcast recording, find those profoundly resonant moments, and cast them into 2023 Waves of Gratitude.

Each month I will post the dates and times for the upcoming broadcasts on the page linked below. The New Moon will be all improvisation and the Full Moon will be Waves of Gratitude in all of its manifestations plus pre-recorded sound works by dejacusse and iBoD aaaand some LIVE improvisation. Here is the link to the blog page.

https://dejacusse.blog/radio-ibod-dejacusse-web-player/