On Sunday, this year's solstice, The Candle Factory in Traverse City transforms into an immersive light and soundscape of improvised music and dazzling colors. This performance is the brainchild of interdisciplinary artists Daniel Mangiaracino and Cardin Chung, who are brought to northern Michigan by the Falco Woodworks Artist Residency.
Mangiaracino and Chung are both composers, pianists and dancers who combine their individual expertise in improvisation — and whose friendship began through an improvisation session. In Studio A, the two musicians showcased original and improvised musical pieces as a sneak peek for what to expect on Sunday.
Mangiaracino, classically trained pianist, bridges sound design and electronic music in his compositional process.
" I'm very influenced by a lot of electronic genres, and I think piano is a wonderful medium to explore how that genre and the difference in variety of texture translates into a singular instrument," he says.
Mangiaracino performed two original and improvised compositions in Studio A: his "Inference no. 2" and an original improvised transcription of Bill Evans's "Reflections in D."
When asked why he named the work "Inference," Mangiaracino replied, " The general definition of an inference is drawing information pragmatically by logic and reasoning rather than from sensory input and more emotional conclusions. I think that it's fun to push the boundaries of those definitions because especially in the creative process, some of the decisions that I'll make based off of emotion aren't really necessarily emotional decisions."
Chung also performed two original compositions in Studio A at the piano and guitar. One of the pieces was started during his time in Traverse City and only completed a day before the recording session.
" [The work] came from an improvisation I did back in October when I had visited Traverse City. The Milliken Theater had this very beautiful grand [piano]. It just has such a soft and beautiful tone to it, and from there I made this improvisation where I was playing this B-flat note constantly as everything around it was shifting and changing," said Chung.
Chung, who comes from a background of jazz performance, is also a creative technologist. He will harness that interdisciplinary background in the upcoming performance by setting audio-reactive lights to improvised music.
"Based on the frequency of the piano being played, different lights will turn off and on," added Chung. "'Creative technologists' refer to people who use a lot of coding to integrate within their artworks like that."
While their June 21st performance at the Candle Factory is sold out, the Falco Woodworks Artist Residency will be presenting another performance at Milliken Auditorium on June 28 at 3 p.m.
Music performed in Studio A
Daniel Mangiaracino, Inference no. 2
Daniel Mangiaracino, Transcription on "Reflections in D" by Bill Evans
Cardin Chung, 2 pieces
Jack Conners engineered this edition of Studio A.
Additional production support came from Emma Stadelmann and Julianna Stratton.
