This one is in via Todd Barton
via MMT
"Join us as Howard Moscovitz shares first-hand stories from his time working with Don Buchla in the early 1970s. In 1972, Howard had just received his masters degree in electronic music from Mills College, which had become the new home of the San Francisco Tape Music Center where Buchla developed his new modular synthesizer in the late 1960s. That same year, Don Buchla was hired as the “Technical Wizard” for the Electronic Symphony Orchestra, a pioneering and highly experimental effort to combine custom modular synthesizers with traditional orchestral instruments. Howard joined Don’s team as an electronics technician to help with the project.
The Electric Symphony Orchestra was essentially an attempt to electronically amplify and distort all of the traditional acoustic instruments in an orchestra. Howard will present his own very amusing firsthand accounts of Don’s efforts to “electrify” a traditional symphony orchestra and the somewhat disastrous outcome of those efforts, which culminated in a single infamous performance in Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall later that year.
The Buchla Machine
As part of his presentation, Howard will also present and discuss several historical artifacts from his own collection that he has generously placed on loan at EMEAPP. One of these is "The Buchla Machine," a simple yet fascinating distortion amplifier made with the first commercially available transistor. Don told Howard that The Buchla Machine was the first circuit he ever built, which of course makes it a very interesting object. But the way Howard came to possess it is even more interesting — and he will share that story as well.
Howard's tales offer a unique first-hand perspective on Buchla’s way of inventing and interacting with people during what is a very little-known time in Don's career (actual factual information on the Electric Symphony Orchestra and Buchla's work with it is very hard to come by). This presentation offers a rare chance to hear firsthand about a very special time in the history of electronic music.
Throughout the evening, Howard's stories will be interspersed with performances of new music played on some Buchla instruments, including new and vintage Music Easels as well as a software version of the Buchla 700. Howard will introduce his new Balsam synthesizer, a contemporary homage to Buchla’s instruments made in Durham, North Carolina. The musicians that will join Howard for the performances include Jil Christensen, Bill Fox, Joel Izquierdo, Doug Llewellyn, and Jared Stack.
There is no registration fee but donations are encouraged and gratefully received."
https://tickets.themmt.org/events/mmt/2301094
