April 20, 2022

Season 2 Episode 07: Jess Tsang

Ben Seretan

Youth Pastoral

Soloist, sound innovator, percussionist & curator of ListenBeer

Jess Tsang is a percussionist, researcher, and improviser based in Brooklyn, NY. She is endlessly examining how objects shape our lives, and how that might be translated into music. A founding member of guitar and percussion duo party of one and experimental improv trio See You Next Yesterday, Jess has also collaborated with an eclectic variety of artists, dancers, and musicians including Rebecca Saunders, David Szanto, Elena Rykova, and Deborah Carruthers. Favorite projects include premiering Nicole Lizée’s interactive Mozart murder-mystery opera No One’s Safe, performing within Martin Creed’s installation The Back Door at the Park Avenue Armory, the world premiere of Dan Trueman and Rebecca Lazier's, Bessie-award winning There Might Be Others, and Kid Millions’ 100 Disciplines, an immersive, hour-long work at the Brooklyn Museum. She has appeared in performances throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia and was a fellow at the 2018 Eighth Blackbird Creative Lab. In 2019, she was selected as a fellow for, OneBeat, an initiative of the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in collaboration with Found Sound Nation. Jess is also the founder of listenbeer, a series of multi-sensory concert experiences merging craft beer with experimental music. Most recently, she was commissioned by Contemporary Musiking Hong Kong to create a new video work for the 2021 Sound Forms Festival: Present_Present. As a researcher, Jess has presented her lecture recital at Harvard University for Ex-Centric Music Studies: Harvard Graduate Music Forum Conference and at Queensland Conservatorium in Brisbane as part of the second annual Transplanted Roots Percussion Symposium. Entitled “Personally curated, yet easily disposable: Crossing the threshold into the realm of found objects”, it is the culmination of her research into the history and expansive ideology of incorporating found objects into contemporary percussion music. Jess holds a Master’s degree from McGill University and an undergraduate degree from The New School.

Description

Jess Tsang brings her discerning palate to spicy town this week and wows the Boys with the sweet and dynamic sounds of Ben Sertetan's  2020 release, Youth Pastoral.

Jess came to us from Brooklyn, NY, where she lives, works, and inspires as a percussionist and sound artist/innovator as well as a curator of beer-flavored sonic vibrations. Jess has also recently released an album of solo work called Sound Shadows; check it out!

Show Notes:

JESS TSANG

Jess Tsang – Bandcamp

Sound Shadows

on the web

Instagram

ListenBeer

Party of One

Photo of Jess by Alexia Webster, used with permission from Jess Tsang | Alexia Webster on IG

MUSIC

Ben Seretan on the web

Ben Seretan on Bandcamp

Youth Pastoral

My Life's Work (24-hour ambient album; go send some invoices)

My Big Break Songs & Blog

Mentions:

Fjola Evans

John Cage

Oskar Fischinger

KNOWLEDGE & MISC

Jess with The Plant Plate
Listen for the bowed sound of The Plant Plate in the episode

Synesthesia

Dark Sky Brewing

Interference Series

Robert Ashley Television Operas

Andrew's "comically large pedalboard" – not inclusive of all his pedals

Talking on "mindful consumption" with Tim OBrien – hear it in episode S2E6

DCI Drumcorps, aka "the NFL of marching bands" – 2002 Cavaliers program at DCI Finals in Madison, WI

Lehigh Valley Knights, second season, first rehearsal; circa 2002

Andrew on 2nd bass drum; circa 2002
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