take a walk with Marc Ribot & other musicans - this weekend

Issue Project Room’s Soundwalk-a-thon is happening this Sunday, June 7th. That event consists of 21-odd tours through Brooklyn focused alternately on making or listening to “music” (either in the sound art/music-of-everyday-life sense of the word, or actual music). As Issue puts it, activities range from “meditative deep listening, to sing-a-longs, to noise-making walks incorporating instruments, iPods, boomboxes, cell phones, or silence in order to amplify the nuances of our ever-changing soundscape.”

Some titles describe the activities outright (“We would like to run past all your walkers, opposite their direction, while screaming songs” is one), while others are more vague, like the “All Borough Bag Walk,” which invites you to “trace a route to the Can Factory that is determined by the presence of discarded plastic shopping bags.”

A walk led by guitarist Marc Ribot was recently added to the proceedings. Details on that tour, with the full list of walks below.

It should also be noted that the event is a benefit for the non-profit space. And you can catch Ribot in a more traditional venue (ie playing guitar) at The Stone on June 30th. For a more traditional show actually AT Issue Project Room, try James Blackshaw on June 8th, or anything else on the Brooklyn venue’s schedule.

Registration for all walks is open, space permitting, till June 6th.

Info below…

Marc Ribot Soundwalk

Title of work: Gowanus Soundwalk
Start Time: Noon
Start location: 233 Butler St. (between Bond and Nevins)
Total capacity for walk: to be annnounced
Listening or Producing? Listening
Environmental or Electronic? Natural
About this walk: I will distribute a copy of the score to each participant (note reading helpful but not essential).The score will consist of different musical activities to match different locations and different human activities (ie: walking or standing still. )

We will stop at various magic loci along the gowanus canal and play or not play. Key loci will be:

* A pipe organ repair factory at a secret location
* The gowanus canal pump house across from 233 butler
* The union street bridge
* The carroll st bridge (and former issue project rm silo)
* The candle factory on nevins
* The 3rd st bridge
* A place on nevins where I once got a flat tire on my bicycle.
* An amazing abandoned place behind a parking lot on 4th st.

Duration c/a 45 minutes- 1 hr
Does this walk require using the subway? No
What to bring: Each walker should bring an easily portable instrument capable of playing a chromatic scale. In order of preference:

1. melodica
2. chromatic harmonica
3. cheap portable keyboard with a bad organ sound
4. flute
5. clarinet
6. trumpet or trombone
7. anything else
8. guitar

Artist Bio: Marc Ribot was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1954. As a teen, he played guitar in various garage bands while studying with his mentor, Haitian classical guitarist and composer Frantz Casseus. After moving to New York City in 1978, Ribot was a member of the soul/punk Realtones, and from 1984 – 1989, of John Lurie’s Lounge Lizards. Between 1979 and 1985, Ribot also worked as a sidemusician with Brother Jack McDuff, Wilson Pickett, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas, Chuck Berry, and many others. Ribot’s recording credits include Tom Waits, Soloman Burke, John Lurie, Elvis Costello, Marianne Faithful, and many more. Ribot’s own recording projects have included the bands Rootless Cosmopolitans (Island Antilles), Shrek (Tzadik), and Los Cubanos Postizos (Atlantic). Marc’s solo recordings include “The Book of Heads” (Tzadik), “Don’t Blame Me” (DIW), “Saints” (Atlantic), and recently “Exercises in Futility” (Tzadik).

Issue Project Room’s Soundwalk-a-thon schedule:

Choose your own adventure
* All Borough Bag Walk led by Michelle Nagai
* Balloon Bassoon Promenade led by Kenny Wollesen
* Bang a gong for ISSUE led by Jonathan Kane
* Carroll Street Soundwalk led by Todd Shalom
* Demasking The Bridges led by Daniel Neumann
* Detox Project led by Betsey Biggs
* Gowan-us! A Crudrophonic Sound Event led by Dylan Gauthier
* Gowanus Field Reflections and The Great Steel Elevator led by Bradford Reed
* Gowanus Soundwalk led by Marc Ribot
* Listen 2009 – Remote Access led by Keiko Uenishi
* Poets March led by Steve Dalachinsky
* Prospect Park Ravine Soundwalk led by Jonny Farrow
* Prospect Park Soundwalk led by Andrea Williams
* Shuffle Sing-a-long led by Collective Opera Company
* Soundwalk (Anthony Coleman) led by Anthony Coleman
* Soundwalk (Edmund Mooney) led by Edmund Mooney
* Tin Can Telewalk led by Kurt Gottschalk and Marie Evelyn
* Transmutation in the shift (—Documenting the Grand Concourse) led by Du Yun
* Underpass Walk led by Bruce Tovsky
* Urban Zen sound meditation and labyrinth walk led by Eric A. Dahl
* We would like to run past all your walkers, opposite their direction, while screaming songs. led by Flaming Fire