Voices and Echoes Tour 2012

"Voices and Echoes", presented by ISSUE Project Room in collaboration with curator Aki Onda, is a landmark tour of pioneering Japanese artists renowned for their unique, interdisciplinary approaches to sound-based practices: Akio Suzuki, Gozo Yoshimasu, and Otomo Yoshihide. The performances will span a wide array of artistic disciplines including literature, sound art, conceptual performance, and improvisation— all converging around a theme of highly personalized, experimental approaches to sound perception, production, and presentation.

Sound artist Akio Suzuki will perform on a range of unique instruments including an ancient stone flute (Iwabue) passed down through his family for many generations, and Analapos— an instrument he invented in the 1970s that creates echoes through the acoustic transmissions of a spiral cord stretched between two metal cylinders.

Experimental poet Gozo Yoshimasu will perform works utilizing his unique “vocalization” style of recitation, which relies upon a highly rhythmic delivery and intense vocal modulations. Yoshimasu will perform in collaboration with Otomo Yoshihide, an experimental guitarist/turntablist and leading international figure in the fields of contemporary noise and improv.

While Gozo Yoshimasu and Akio Suzuki— seminal figures in the fields of Japanese literature and sound art, respectively— have garnered acclaim throughout Japan and Europe, their work is largely unknown in North America. Akio Suzuki has not performed in North American since a NYC performance in 1983, and Gozo Yoshimasu has never given a public performance in the United States, outside of small readings in universities and galleries.