Sound art at Dunaway Books

Brett Underwood of KDHX's No Show has sent along notice of a performance/installation at Dunaway Books, 3111 S. Grand Blvd, one-half block south of Arsenal. (Note: the second link is to a Google cache; the actual site is "currently unavailable.")

Ancora il Più Estinto II takes place from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. on the first three Thursdays in May - that's tonight, May 12 and May 19. The name translated from Italian means "staying as soft as possible" (literally: "repeat", "the most", and "very very quiet"). Here's how the email from Eric Hall, one of the organizers, describes it:

"Over the course of the three evenings dozens of artists (invited based on their ability to, and interest in, improvising within these intimate conditions) from around the region will participate. For each set a multitude of players will perform from various parts of the space, thereby creating a unique sound-art event where what each listener hears depends on when, where, and how often they move about.

Furthermore, (through the use of mixers, discrete speaker arrangements, and close mic placement) certain performances will be amplified in different parts of the store, detaching the sound from the gestures of its creation...This way the experiences are not about seeing specific collections of performers and, as much as possible, the audiences' role as spectator and the performers' sense of ego are diminished allowing for sound itself to be the focus."

There's an extensive cast of participants, including Robin Allen, Jeremy Brantlinger, Glenn Burleigh, Mike Cook, Chris Dee, Jamie Gartelos, Robert Goetz, Darin Gray, James Grubbs, Eric Hall, Matt Harnish, Ben Hanna, Andrew Hefner, James Hegerty, Jason Hutto, Jeremy Kannapell, Ajay Khanna, Sunyatta Marshall, Rich O'Donnell, Heather Oppitz, Joseph Potthoff, Joe Raglani, Tony Renner, Chris Smentkowski, Dana Smith, Joe Stulce, Dave Stone, Brett Underwood, James Weber, Jr., Ben West, John Wolf and "others to be announced."

I don't know all of these folks, but I know enough of them to convince me that this event will probably be worth checking out (provided that this sort of thing interests you in the first place). Admission is free, and you can get more information by calling 314-771-7150.