photo Simon Beckmann
“What I found at Joya: AiR was a soundscape of uncrowded sounds — a place for deep listening and reflection. At Joya: AiR I developed new site-derived systems for improvisation with sound and movement, investigating the many unique features of the landscape and the interstitial spaces within the architecture. Much of my work during these 9 days dealt with sound mapping: measuring and recording features in the infrastructure, then using discrete elements from these source materials as different instruments in a kind of ensemble —like the sound of the electricity of the undulating wind turbine plays against the crackle of the solar panels as revealed by electromagnetic microphones, or the continuous whir of cicadas in the midday sun.
Working alongside my partner and collaborator Dana Hemenway, I approached video with a similar kind of improvisational approach, featuring small flowers in various stages of life, insects, and Dana’s ephemeral clay sculptures rendered as dance partners in daily movement improvisations. These exercises ended up becoming a part of my live set choreography for subsequent concerts in Barcelona. I also took short percussive samples and built drum machines entirely from Joya: AIR found sounds: rocks from the barranco struck together to produce various tones, the long bass of the stove in our studio opening and closing, the ubiquitous chain curtains dividing the inside and out.
Being part of an international residency introduced us to 3 fellow artists from Birmingham UK, Barcelona, and Paris. Our respective artist talks gave us an in-depth introduction into each other’s practices, and led to some exciting spur of the moment collaborations. On one of our last nights we staged a night shoot / dance routine that will not soon be forgotten! “
— Matt Robidoux, July 2021
Matt Robidoux is a San Francisco based composer / improviser interested in accessibility within contemporary music and the communicative capacities of musical improvisation. In 2017 he established the Adaptive Instrument Ensemble (AIE), a community based practice focused on expanding the improvising community across abilities, demographics, and geographies. Beginning with a pilot workshop in 2019, he founded the Prepared Guitar Ensemble in collaboration with Creativity Explored, a studio-based collective that partners with people with developmental disabilities to celebrate and nurture the creative potential in all of us.
He has worked with Eclipse Quartet, Henry Kaiser, Maggi Payne, William Winant, Jaap Blonk, Stuart Dempster, Laura Steenberge, Sunburned Hand of the Man, gabby fluke-mogul, Elizabeth Millar/Craig Pedersen (Sound of the Mountain), J Mascis, TONED, and Alan Courtis. His scholarly work is scheduled to be published as a chapter in "Improvising across Abilities: Pauline Oliveros and the Adaptive Use Musical Instrument" book on University of Michigan Press in 2021.