Index

ICE and MDdL will present the second performance of “Portals Before Dawn” on October 20th, 2011 at the Kitchen, as part of the SONIC Festival. Here is a recording from the world premiere last March at Le Poisson Rouge.

Performers:
Claire Chase, flute
Eric Lamb, alto flute
Joshua Rubin, clarinets
Cory Smythe, piano
Nathan Davis, percussion
Mario Diaz de Leon, composer, synth

Levy Lorenzo, sound engineer
Ryan Streber, audio recording

From the concert last March in NYC. Special thanks to Meerkat Media, Ryan Streber, Levy Lorenzo and ICE for this amazing document.

ICElab at LPR | Music of Mario Diaz de León from ICE on Vimeo.

PRISM PATH: Music of Mario Diaz de León

Performers:
Claire Chase, flutes
Eric Lamb, flutes
Joshua Rubin, clarinets
Cory Smythe, piano
Nathan Davis, percussion
Mario Diaz de León, composer, synth

Levy Lorenzo, sound engineer
Ryan Streber, audio recording
Video by MeerkatMedia


Prism Path for two alto flutes and percussion (2010) NEW YORK PREMIERE
Altar of Two Serpents for two flutes (2010)
Mansion for two alto flutes, percussion, and electronics (2009)
The Soul is the Arena for bass clarinet and electronics (2010) NEW YORK PREMIERE
Portals Before Dawn for two flutes, clarinet, percussion, piano, and synth (2011) WORLD PREMIERE

“The Soul is the Arena,” for bass clarinet and electronic music, was written for Joshua Rubin in summer 2010, and is dedicated to him.  Inspired in part by accounts of wrathful deities in Tibetan Buddhism, whose spirits take wrathful forms to vanquish forces that hinder one’s path to spiritual liberation, TSITA is also concieved as a journey inward. The title from the piece comes from the prelude to Kazantzakis’ “Last Temptation of Christ,” discovered by way of Sepultura’s “Under Siege” when I was 12 years old. Sepultura’s version of the text:
From my youth onward has been the incessant, merciless battle between the spirit and the flesh, and my soul is the arena where these two armies have clashed and met.
The piece’s musical influences include technical death metal, Sun Ra’s distorted electric organ, and the solo instrument music of Stockhausen. Like many of my pieces, electronic feedback sounds are featured here, for a special atmosphere—like if Vajrapani (pictured below) made an appearance in a bardo version of Mortal Kombat.
Joshua Rubin will give the world premiere at the Velvet Lounge in Chicago on November 19th, 2010.
On April 24th, JACK Quartet performed my 2nd string quartet, “Psalterion” (2007) at St. Peter’s Church, NYC. Also on the program were works by Steve Lehman, Zosha Di Castri, Alex Mincek, Victor Adan, and Brahim Kerkour.

Mirrorgate performed a set at the final West Nile show, on April 13th, 2010. Also on the bill were Skeletons, Wish, Moonwalk, Freddy Nightliker + Nickel Emmet, and Nasties. Thanks to Steve Bookman for the video. More photos of the event here. The next MIRRORGATE show is May 18th at Issue Project Room.

Paris London West Nile Finale 13 April 2010 from Steve Bookman on Vimeo.

First, thanks to everyone who made it out to Armory Show last weekend. It was an amazing experience, and i’m really grateful to have worked with such amazing people in a that wild space.

Three new reviews of “Enter Houses Of” in Impose Magazine, New Music Box, and Pepper Zone (France).

Talea’s US Premiere of Trembling Time II at Symphony Space went great, and I was thrilled to be on the program with awesome works by Du Yun and Victor Adan.

Lastly, Mirrorgate, my new band with Doron Sadja, is performing Wedesday Feb 23rd at Death by Audio in Brooklyn.

Members of Talea premiered this piece in Paris during our tour in fall 2009. Thanks to Anthony Cheung for the video! The US premiere will be February 22nd, 2010 at Symphony Space in New York. This is an expansion of the work I composed for “Portrait of Glenda Goodman”, a video I made with Jay King, which was shown at the “White Noise” exhibition at James Cohan Gallery in summer 2009.

A performance with Doron Sadja on December 9th at West Nile was reviewed by Impose Magazine. Thanks to Nate Dorr for the writeup. Also last week, “Enter Houses Of” made Time Out New York’s “best of 2009” in Classical and Opera.
One of the highlights of my year has been the reunion of Disembodied. I performed for a short time with this group in the late 90’s, and they were a huge influence on me in general. The reunion was initially a one-off as part of the release of Burning Fight (a book by Brian Peterson documenting the 90’s hardcore scene), and they’ve since played a bunch of shows and even played Europe for the first time! Prime Directive records recently released “Psalms of Sheol“, a rarities collection, which features four songs I recorded with the group in 1997. All the songs are remixed, and they sound brutal as hell. If you live in NYC, don’t miss Disembodied when they play Santos in January!