Antiphon Trio

Michael Century (accordion), Chris Fisher-Lochhead (viola and pedal steel guitar), and Zach Layton (17-string bass) announce Chronolucence, an album built from an unusual instrumentation and an even more unusual collaborator: composer and sound artist Pauline Oliveros's Expanded Instrument System (EIS).

The EIS was designed by Oliveros as a "time machine" for expanding temporal perception, so that, in her words, "present/past/future occurring simultaneously with transformations."

Across Chronolucence, the trio's acoustic sound is fed into this system of multiple delays and processing algorithms, producing an evolving, emergent timescape that rewards and requires deep listening.

Sounding in Response

The name "Antiphon" means "sounding in response," rooted in ideas of concord and concordance — a fitting description of how the trio interacts, not only with one another but with the EIS itself. It is a continuous call-and-response with the deep-seated echoes and future projections of the musicians' own sounds. With the capacity for up to forty-four discrete voices across its delay lines, and ambisonic panners that sculpt what the group calls "spatial progressions," the EIS builds clouds of sound that envelop the listener.

Performers:
- Michael Century — accordion (also pianist; Professor of New Media and Music, Arts Department, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute)
- Chris Fisher-Lochhead — viola and pedal steel guitar
- Zach Layton — 17-string bass

Bios

Michael Century is a pianist, accordionist, and cultural theorist, and Professor of New Media and Music in the Arts Department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Musically at home in classical, contemporary, and improvisational settings, Century often interweaves his music with visual images and creates software applications for live performance and interactive installations. Recent performances include the Barcelona Center for Contemporary Culture, Stanford University's CCRMA, Harvestworks Art and Technology Center, and The Music Gallery (Toronto).

Vermont-based composer/improviser Chris Fisher-Lochhead has developed a creative practice that cultivates open, adventuresome, and playful spaces for musical and social experimentation. He has created notated compositions in close partnership with performers of new music (including the JACK Quartet, Ensemble Dal Niente, Third Coast Percussion, and Quince Ensemble), toured and recorded as an improviser, and participated in interdisciplinary research collaborations. He is a founding member of the Grant Wallace Band, a recipient of commissions from the Fromm Foundation and Barlow Endowment, and a faculty member at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Zach Layton is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, curator, and educator who practices the rare 17-string bass. He has performed at the Guggenheim Museum, Lincoln Center, PS1, and many other venues in New York and internationally. A recipient of the Foundation for Contemporary Arts music/sound award and a MacDowell Fellowship, Zach is Associate Professor of music production at Ramapo College of New Jersey. He earned his PhD in Electronic Arts from RPI in 2017.