| Bob Ostertag |
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| 1957 births | |
| living people | |
| american musicians | |
| people from san francisco | |
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Raised in Colorado , he studied at the Conservatory. In 1976, he formed the improviser ensemble Fall Mountain with Ned Rothenberg (reeds) and Jim Katzin (violin), with himself on electronic keyboard. In 1979, he relocated to New York, where he befriended John Zorn , Fred Frith , Zeena Parkins and several other musical improvisers who were interested in collaborating in new forms of improvising. His first album, Getting A Head , was a trio with guitarist Fred Frith and drummer Charles Noyes. Ostertag use of sampling, tape manipulation, electronic and self-made instruments created a unique sound and approach to improvised music. Following the release of Getting A Head , Ostertag becomes the first of his generation of musicians to have his work presented at The Kitchen , at the time NYC's premiere venue for new music. Ostertag released Voice Of America, which shows his interest and concern for the political climate in the 1980's. Dissatisfied with the music industry, Ostertag stops performing and recording between 1982-1988, to pursue more political activities. Ostertag became an expert on the political crisis in Central America and publishes widely for a diverse range of publications, including Piensamiento Propio (Nicaragua) Piensamiento Critico (Puerto Rico), The Guardian (London), the Weekly Mail (South Africa), Mother Jones and the NACLA Report on the Americas (US), AMPO (Japan), and even the clandestine theoretical journal of the New People's Army in the Philippines. He alternates his time in Central America with organizing and public speaking in the US, giving lectures at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Rutgers, and many other schools and institutions Returning to music after seven years of musical inactivity to tour with Fred Frith in 1989, Ostertag releases Attention Span in 1990, featuring Frith on guitars and John Zorn on saxophone. Ostertag follows Attention Span with the release of Sooner or Later, his musical response to his years in El Salvador and the first part of a trilogy to treat the themes of grief, anger, and joy. In 1992, The Kronos Quartet commissions a new work from Ostertag. This commission produces the landmark work All The Rage . Ostertag composed the piece using a recording of a riot for gay rights in San Francisco. Ostertag originally conceived All The Rage as a collaboration with writer/painter/photographer/film maker David Wojnarowicz , but David was ill with AIDS. When David dies before the collaboration can take place, Ostertag makes a second, solo piece from the riot recordings, Burns Like Fire, and dedicates it to Wojnarowicz. In 1993, Ostertag forms Say No More , a virtual quartet, with drummer Joey Baron , bassist Mark Dresser , percussionist Gerry Hemingway . The group's music was actually composed by a computer and sampler from separate individual performances and then released as Say No More in 1993, the live - In Person in 1994, Verbatim in 1996 and Verbatim Flesh & Blood in 2000. In 1999, after 10 years working with the same sampler, Ostertag switches to a laptop computer and begins writing his own audio performance software through Max/MSP . This allows him use various controllers, including joysticks, game pads, and drawing tablets in his performances. This same year, Ostertag releases Like A Melody, No Bitterness his first cd of solo improvisation. This cd is a tribute to his sampler that he spent the last decade mastering as an instrument. Ostertag has also scored multimedia pieces such as Spiral in 1996. In 2000, Ostertag begins work with Pierre Hébert and Baltazar López on a full-scale multi-media and theater work, Between Science And Garbage , commissioned by Meet the Composer and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. On March 25, 2006, Ostertag made all of his recordings to which he owns the rights available as digital downloads under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommericial 2.5 License . {Link without Title} EXTERNAL LINKS |
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