Brake drums and empty wine bottles are among the “instruments” that the ٺƵ Multimedia Ensemble is using in its electronic-acoustical “score” for Yasujiro Ozu’s 1934 silent film A Story of Floating Weeds. A free, public performance — film and score — is scheduled for 8 p.m. June 4 in the Technocultural Studies Building.
This is not a score in the traditional sense, with notes on paper. Instead, the ensemble creates its sounds with a variety of methods, such as a laptop computer, and the aforementioned bottles and brake drums; plus traditional instruments such as violin, flute, trombone, horn, gong, guitar, melodica, autoharp and voice.
Each member of the ensemble is in charge of the score for one segment of the film, in turn leading the rest of the ensemble in creating the sound for that segment — in a process that can include improvisational games.
Music department lecturer Sam Nichols coaches the ensemble, which comprises 12 undergraduates from various majors.
Media Resources
Dave Jones, Dateline, 530-752-6556, dljones@ucdavis.edu