Damon Smith
Bass Duos 2000-2007
*2023 stock* "I met Joëlle Léandre when she was a visiting professor at Mills college in 2002. This was very exciting, as I had been collecting her albums since I started to play the double bass and she was an important influence on my work. I had a bass lesson scheduled with her the day we lost Maestro Kowald. She was very close to him and it was devastating to her. For me, it meant losing a role model; for her, it was losing a close friend and supporter. We had a long phone conversation and sh…
God Made My Soul An Ornament
*2023 stock* "There are some people who are very singular in their conception of improvisation. People whose music embodies them as much as they embody the music. People who take from their life experience and put it into their sonic practice. People who search every crevice of their instrument to find sonic potential. These practices are beyond what may or may not be learned at a conservatory, no matter how deep the teaching goes. Listening to these improvised moments between Sarah Ruth Alexand…
A Railroad Spike Forms The Voice
*2023 stock* "Don’t follow.” That’s the admonition saxophonist and composer Roscoe Mitchell (b. 1940) was known to give his students at Oakland’s Mills College in one-on-one sessions. In musical communication and creation, not following or directly responding to others is central to Mitchell’s philosophy and approach. As he said to me in a recent conversation, “I just let things develop with my intent, with my work, and I’ve never been a person that went around looking for people to play with. I…
Hugo Ball: Six Sound Poems, 1989 & 2013
*2023 stock* "This recording is a modern interpretation of sound poems written and performed by German Dadaist Hugo Ball more than a century ago. Those familiar with Ball know him as the author of these innovative works and founder of the Cabaret Voltaire, Dada’s Zurich birthplace. Despite the sound poems’ artistic legacy, they constitute only a small part of Ball’s creative output. The purpose of these liner notes, then, is to consider the complex life and work of the man behind the sound poems…
Quartet:Quartet:Trio
*In process of stocking* "A double album of electroacoustic improv sessions from Sommerville, MA, centered around electronic artist Andrew Neumann on the Buchla Music Easel--a complex additive analogue synth--heard in quartet and trio sessions with Forbes Graham (trumpet), Sandy Ewen (guitar & objects), Junko Fujiwara (cello), Damon Smith (double bass) and Eric Rosenthal (drums & percussion). Neumann, also an artist, sculptor and installation artist, can be heard on the Driff album Bathysphere w…
Precipitation of a Decision
Tip! *In process of stocking* "Two distinct session, the first CD presenting free improv trio perfomances in St. Louis, MO between Paul Hartsaw on soprano & tenor saxophones, Damon Smith on double bass and Jerome Bryerton on percussion, the 2nd CD finding Hartsaw and Smith in the studio in Oakland CA for a more experimental session, Smith adding laptop & field recordings and both employing extended techniques." - Squidco
Duals
"In this 3-CD set each disc contains one duo session between the three musicians: trombone-bass, piano-bass and piano-trombone. Recorded over the course of Bishop's last year of residency in Boston and soon after Smith had moved to St. Louis, these recordings capture a glimpse of the city's creative music scene at a particularly active time between 2016-22, when, the three musicians interacted frequently in many settings in the Boston area. The Smith/Bishop disc consists of all improvised music,…
The Eternity-Cult
*2023 stock* "A blend of intonation and improvisation, The Eternity-Cult is a harmonies-across-the-seas program featuring the trumpet and objects of Birgit Ulher from Northern Germany with the double bass (Damon Smith) and percussion and electronics (Chris Cogburn) from the southern US. Despite geographical distances the three are equally committed to free-from improvisation. This disc's single 37-minute track finds the trio exploring textures and pitches from minimalist to embellished, while ma…
Room of the Present
Fundacja Słuchaj! presents Room of the Present by Guillermo Gregorio, Damon Smith and Jerome Bryerton. Recorded by Todd Carter, Experimental Sound Studio, Chicago 2007 & 2008. Mixed & mastered by Ryan Edwards. "Madipiece 1," "Madipiece 2," "Coplanar 1+2," "Moholy 2," and "Otra Musica 4b." by Guillermo Gregroio, Copyright Guillermo Gregorio "Cards" by Roscoe Mitchell Art Ensemble Of Chicago Publishing Co. Ascap.
This album is structured around two performances of Guillermo Gregorio’s graphic scor…