James Ashley (Jim) Franklin - Branchings: 5th Interlude (for shakuhachi and theremin, played simultaneously by one performer)
NOMINATION: Performance of the Year - Jazz / Improvised Music
NOMINATION: Performance of the Year - Jazz / Improvised Music
For the performance of a single Australian work, showcasing the performer(s)’ success in improvisatory creation or collaboration. This may entail entirely improvised work or significant improvisatory input such as solo passages.
A work is defined as a single complete musical composition, or expression. This includes music with movements or sub-works (i.e. song cycles), installations, and real-time compositions (improvised music).
If you believe your performance to be nominated in the wrong category or the details of your nomination to be incorrect, please contact the AMC via email at awards@australianmusiccentre.com.au before proceeding with the nomination.
Branchings: 5th Interlude (for shakuhachi and theremin, played simultaneously by one performer)
Composer(s) of the work
Jim Franklin
Performance Date
3/3/2024
Venue
Online/YouTube
Nominator Statement
This piece, created in March 2024, is the tenth movement of Franklins large-scale work, Branchings, for shakuhachi and live-electronics (a genre largely created by Franklin himself). This movement is a structured improvisation which extends the concept of embodied performance considerably beyond that which is normally encountered. In this piece, Franklin simultaneously plays two instruments, both of which can be considered to be whole-of-body instruments: shakuhachi, which must be performed with the support of the entire body from lips to toes; and theremin (augmented by live-electronic processing), which reacts with extreme sensitivity to the position and movement of not just the hands, but of the entire body. In this case, the pitch sensitivity of the theremin has been adjusted to react to the performers torso and right arm rather than just the right arm, hand and fingers, allowing for performance of the shakuhachi with both hands at the same time as performance of the theremin through body and arm position. Additional real-time electronic processing allows for fine vertical movement of the hands (holding the shakuhachi) to modify dramatically the volume and timbre of the theremin at the same time as playing the shakuhachi. Accordingly, this piece, which combines multiple, diverse sound layers (acoustic and electronic), is performed by a single performer, generating all sounds heard in real-time, and at an extreme of embodied performance technique. The publicly-disseminated video recording of the performance documents this process: a recording of a single performance, with no editing. Jim is a pioneer in his field.