Leap of Faith Chinese Orchestra
Magic Squares
“…A unique and fascinating edition of the Leap of Faith Orchestra, bringing special guests Jimmy Zhao, Yazhi Gao, Jiaxin Winky Wan, Ziya Gao, and Kaixin Hou performing on Chinese instruments to join with the core duo of David Peck on clarinets, saxophones, clarinets & flutes, Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice, along with percussionist/drummer Michael Knoblach and bassist Scott Samenfeld.…”
Squidco Staff
Excerpt From Liner Notes by PEK
“…Anyway, this large unit follows up on the earlier LOFCO sets with a dense work of sound, sometimes with the Chinese sounds forward, sometimes with the improvisors forward, and sometimes a more even blend of cultures. It’s a fascinating aesthetic problem and one that I will schedule as often as I can in the future…”
Magic Squares:
Leap of Faith Chinese Orchestra
Evil Clown Headquarters, Waltham MA: 27 January 2024
1) Magic Squares – 1:09:43
2) Ordinary Vectors – 5:16
PEK – clarinet, contralto & contrabass clarinets, alto, & tenor saxophones, bass flute, tarota, guanzi, novation peak, moog subsequent, prophet, [d]ronin, theremin with moogerfooger, 17-string bass, gongs, plate gong, Englephone, danmo, log drums, brotosaurus & tank bells, cowbells, Tibetan bowls, bells & chimes , orchestral chimes, balafon, xylophone, almglocken, orchestral anvils, bells, seed pod rattle, flex-a-tone
Eric Dahlman – flugelhorn, overtone voice, moog subsequent, novation peak, Linnstrument controllers, game call
John Fugarino – trumpet, slide trumpet, flugelhorn, trombone, moog subsequent, novation peak, Linnstrument controllers, log drums, wood blocks, bells, seed pod rattle, danmo, Englephone
Tom Swafford – violin
Aleksander Nivette – violin, crotales, moog subsequent, novation peak, gavel, Linnstrument controllers, nord stage 3
Jimmy Zhao – erhu, banhu, quhu, jinghu, jing erhu, bawu
Yazhi Guo – suona, bass suona, guanzi, hulusi
Jiaxin Wan – guzheng
Ziyi Gao – pipa
Kaixin Hou – Chinese percussion: Cha (cymbals), Luo (gong), Chinese drum, Bangu (opera drum)
Moyu Zhang – piano (nord stage 3), voice, novation peak, Linnstrument controllers, syntrx
Scott Samenfeld – electric upright bass, electric alto recorder, algaita
Michael Knoblach – Quartz Crystal Singing Bowls, various shakers, devil chasers, split bamboo mallets, LP udders, Fisher Price Happy Apple, wooden clacker, bells Bodhran, copper bowl, enamel bowls, sand blocks, African circumcision rattles, slinky, tit-fers, wooden billiards triangle, meinl helix bowls, xmas ornaments, tiny sleigh bells, glass furniture carpet protectors, ratchets, tiny seed pod shakers, huge & medium seed pods, party time balloon pump, wooden robot, Griswold cast iron skillets, flex-a-tones, vibratones, whisk, abacuses, basket of rocks, turtle skin rattle, egg beater, happy apple, pitchforks, devil chasers, wood shakers, fisher price turtle, fisher price bee, first years clown, humpty dumpty toy, spooky world noise makers, plastic tubes, castanets, Victorian children’s rattles, antique Asian bronze children’s rattles, healing balls, mortar & pestle, confirmation bells, wooden bell, sleigh bells, elephant bell, sistrum, antique sheep shears, axatse, scalp massagers, basket rattles, metal rattle, African wood blocks with stone inside, dinosaur and star teething rings, bags of marbles, water filled mason jar, magic wands, water filled lobster pot, palm frond rattles, plastic ball rattles, American Percussion busy box drum
Joel Simches – Live to 2-track recording
Bandcamp | Squidco | YouTube 1 | YouTube Shorties | Soundcloud
Full Performance
Video Shorties
Liner Notes by PEK
Leap of Faith is the core duet of the Leap of Faith Orchestra (LOFO) comprised of PEK on clarinets, saxophones, clarinets & flutes, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic & voice. The ensemble is based in Boston and dates back to the early 90s. We utilize a huge arsenal of additional Evil Clown instruments to improvise long works featuring transformations across highly varied sonorities. At times, the core unit has been a trio or even a quartet. The longest running core unit was comprised of PEK, Glynis and drummer Yuri Zbitnov, who played for the last couple of years of the archival period and the first 5 years of the reboot starting in 2015. The ensemble has always been highly modular, and our many recordings (well over 100) feature the core unit in dozens of configurations with a huge list of guests and occasionally as only the core unit with no guests. Currently, the core unit is the duet of PEK and Lomon and we are regularly presenting LIVESTREAMs to YouTube from Evil Clown Headquarters with other guest performers.
According to the declared band aesthetic above, I generally do not credit a performance to Leap of Faith or one of its variations unless Glynis is on the session. This time, Glynis had a family issue and could not make the set, but I am still going to call the ensemble Leap of Faith Chinese Orchestra. There are two previous performances by the LOFCO with various Chinese musicians brought by Jimmy Zhao. Jimmy had a band with percussionist Michael Knoblach, trumpeter Eric Dahlman called and a few others called the JMDE Quartet. Early on in my association with Michael Knoblach (the Expanse project) Michael brought the entire JMDE Quartet for a few sessions with me as the fifth player. These sets were credited to Expanse Meets the JMDE Quartet. The next time Jimmy came he brought more Chinese players, and I invited Glynis, Tom Swafford (vln), Kit Demos (b) and Steve Skop (b) for a western string section. This was the first set credited to the LOFCO.
For this edition of the LOFO I have titled the ensemble the Leap of Faith Chinese Orchestra… Not because it is like a traditional Chinese Orchestra, but because it is Leap of Faith Orchestra with a strong Chinese element. The declared aesthetic intent of the LOFCO is to combine traditional Chinese instruments and aesthetic with modern free improvisation in a large ensemble format. Even without Glynis, for this set we had 13 performers, so the aesthetic intent was met, and I decided that it did not make sense to credit the performance to some other ensemble name.
For Magic Squares we have 3 horns, 3 western strings, 6 Chinese musicians and Michael Knoblach on percussion. The main studio room fits at most 6 players if there is a drummer, 8 or 9 without a drummer. Typically, the overflow goes in the kitchen, most often the drummer since that also isolates him in the recording and helps the mix. 13 was such a large unit that we put the percussion in a third room, 4 of the Chinese players in the kitchen and the horns and western strings in the studio proper. The video mix has 8 cameras, one of which is handheld by camera operator Paul Brennan. Paul was very busy for this set, since we couldn’t get complete coverage from the static cameras and Paul ran around trying to cover as much as possible the action that was out of frame of the static cameras.
Anyway, this large unit follows up on the earlier LOFCO sets with a dense work of sound, sometimes with the Chinese sounds forward, sometimes with the improvisors forward, and sometimes a more even blend of cultures. It’s a fascinating aesthetic problem and one that I will schedule as often as I can in the future…
I really like this set, and I bet you will too…
PEK 1/28/2024
Paul Brennan Photos
Video Screen Grabs
