Guitarist David Bernabo creates piece inspired by underground aquifer
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Musician David Bernabo holding photo of Will Dyar of Host Skull
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Most musicians specialize in one genre. Pittsburgh musician Dave Bernabo isn't one of those self-limiting types.
Instead, Mr. Bernabo bounces between erudite rock, experimental sound, and jazz guitar, playing a number of different roles in two disparate incarnations of his latest musical project, Host Skull. Previously, Mr. Bernabo was a member of long-running indie-rockers Vale & Year, and still leads the Zappa-influenced art-pop band Assembly, but Host Skull is his collaboration with former local resident Will Dyer, who moved to New Mexico.
"It's myself and Will writing and producing all the songs," he explains. "We pulled in people from both Pittsburgh and Santa Fe. What we'll release in the summer is a full-length [album] under the name Host Skull. The band is modular -- because Will lives in Santa Fe we can have two bands, but there will be live performances. It'll be different from Assembly -- we'll reimagine the pieces from the record in a scaled-down lineup."
Where: Frame Gallery, 5200 Forbes Ave., Carnegie Mellon University, Oakland.
When: 7 p.m. Friday.
Admission: Free.
That's where Mr. Bernabo's interest in modern composition and theoretical practice takes flight. "I want to incorporate different performance techniques. [For example], we'd play a song, and later on in the set we'd show a video of the same song being played. And then maybe at another point, there'll be a segment from that same song with a different arrangement, or maybe the chairs would be in another position so you'd hear it from another angle. I'm still working out the concepts."
In the meantime, the first version of Host Skull Pittsburghers will hear is a 12-minute electro-acoustic magnum opus called "Fourth River," to be premiered this Friday during an art opening at Carnegie Mellon University's Frame Gallery. During the course of the work, the mood veers from gentle post-rock guitar work (reminiscent of a mellower Tortoise) to spectral ensemble scrapings (a la composer Giacinto Scelsi) to a flat-out electronic noise barrage (like some works at Paris research center INA-GRM). Most of the track is fairly subdued, however, with contributions ranging from the modular synth work of Soy Sos (a.k.a. Herman Pearl) and vibes/percussion by Jeff Berman to the chamber trio of saxophonist Brandon Masterman, flutist Kerrith Livengood and violinist Ben Harris.
First Published April 28, 2011 12:00 am
