School of Music Visiting Artist
"Holding an acoustic mirror up to nature..." Environmental soundartist/composer, Philip Blackburn, will present and discuss some of his site-specific events and installations that are aimed at experiencing an aural sense of place, a "phonographic psychogeography."
“…typified by an oneiric temperament which belies the painstaking assemblage of constituents that characterizes them ... The result is comparable to a protracted hallucination, distinguishable traces emerging from the indefinite awareness of a somewhat mystical inscrutability." — Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes
“…impressive work that blurs the lines between composition, sampling, ambiance, and performance.” — Steve Holtje, The Big Takeover
“apocalyptic collisions of material with intimate vocal refrains and meticulously organized instrumental interludes." — Philip Clark, The Wire
"[A] wild journey through the dreamscape of a hyperimaginative chorister... All of this music confirms Blackburn as a startlingly original voice, one that encompasses all periods of music history in a uniquely engaging vision." — Marc Medwin, Signal to Noise
Philip Blackburn was born in Cambridge, England, and studied music there as a Choral Scholar at Clare College (BA, MA). He earned his Ph.D. in Composition from the University of Iowa where he studied with Kenneth Gaburo and began work on publishing the Harry Partch archives. Blackburn's book, Enclosure Three: Harry Partch, won an ASCAP Deems Taylor Award. He has worked at the American Composers Forum since 1991, running the innova Recordings label (which has been called “the nation’s premiere label for American new music”).