Hello. Iāve got a new album out today. Scroll down for some free download codes for the first 100 people that redeem them! Also, Iāll be doing an online (of course) SLEEP STREAM concert on my YouTube Channel this Saturday night.
SAMATHA
Welcome to Samatha, a new album of gently unfolding waves of sounds. This simple suite contains over 2.5 hours of long-playing tracks that move slowly with many pauses in sound to make room for your own experience. My hope is that this soothing, relaxing soundscape can bring some level of calm-mindfulness to your experience.
SLEEP STREAM CONCERT
Like many people around the globe, Iāve been struggling with the agitation that comes from relative captivity from the COVID-19 lockdown. That has resulted in some level of insomnia. This Saturday Iāll be going Live on my YouTube Channel. (Thanks by the way to all those that subscribed to get me to 100 subscribers so I can LiveStream!)
As an (online) concert experience these durational soundscape performances last from night until early the next morning. Ā These sleep concerts are an immersive, supportive sonic environment. A gentle sea of ambient field recordings and soft tones unfold over an evolving eight-hour concert.Ā
Themes of rebirth, Bardo states, stillness, the liminal space between sleeping-waking-dreaming-listening, processed environmental sounds and the edges of audibility are explored during these concerts.
This is a great chance for those who always wanted to experience one of my sleep concerts from your own bed š Iāll start at 9pm EST and go untilā¦ I donāt know, several hours at least š
Good morning or evening friends. Happy
Thanksgiving to everyone in the US! I hope this day is filled with the
feelings of gratitude and abundance for the collective interdependence
of life. I am halfway through my three-month residency at GlogauAIR in Berlin and I just wanted to share some projects in my life for which I am grateful.
Spektrum Performance
When I arrived in Berlin, I performed at one of my favorite venues in Berlin: Spektrum. I gave a concert of my field recording landscapes sounds where I created a surrealists collage of environmental sounds from around the world during my travels. I also made a video of found footage from around the world wide web that I showed at the performance. I am very grateful to Aude FranƧoise from SCOPE, Ienke at Spektrum and DJ Solitue who presented a mix of former Liebig12 residents and for connecting me with Spektrum last year.
Scope Sessions
The second event I did was a talk on my work and process at Scope Sessions. I focused on my work synthesizing Deep Listening, meditation, Buddhist philosophies, field recording, and ambient music. I also played some samples of my work. It was very well received and help crystallize some things for meĀ in my world. I am also very grateful to meet the host Tobias Raayoni Last.
Speaking at SCOPE Sessions
Red Bull Session
Last week was very busy for me here in Berlin! I welcomed two close friends to town at the same time. My collaborator from Mixes from the Field, Sharon Renee Stewart was in town. We met some Deep Listening friends, did some walking and field recording. At the same time, my old buddy and music legend King Britt was in town. We hung out for three days, recorded an episode for my podcast, and recorded at Red Bull Studios Berlin. Iām super grateful to King for inviting me to the recording session with Hainbach, Christina Wheeler and Clara Hill where
I got to play one of my favorite instruments, the Fender Rhodes piano!
The sessions were magical and the sound at Red Bull was extraordinary. I
canāt wait to hear the final mixes of this collaboration.
Sharon recording at Templehof
The crew at Red Bull Studios
Listening Bodies Project
This time in Berlin has allowed me to deepen my working relationship with choreographer/dancer/movement researcher Monica Genitle.
We organically came together to develop a teaching framework that
combines my music and Deep Listening practices and her somatic body
practices. Weāve done two classes here in Berlin. One at Lake Studios Berlin for dancers and one sound walk workshop at GlogauAIR and SomoS (we had a fairytale-like sound walk in the first snow of the season at night). We will do one more class exploring synesthesia and ASMR as listening body practice at Liebig12. And on Dec 10/11 we will offer a two-day workshop at Tatwerk in Berlin. We will have more exciting Listening Bodies news next week about our plans in 2019!
From the Listening Bodies Sound Walk along the Paul-Lincke-Ufer ListeningBodies.com for more information…
Once again, thank you all for your support.
Happy holidays to everyone reading this! Thanks for being a part of
an amazing year of sonic adventures. Without the connection I get by
sharing these sounds, moments and memories with you all, this would be
meaningless. In the midst of the busy holiday season I hope you’re all
finding moments of connection and peace.
If you’re looking for a tonic to the holiday sensoral overload, I recommend two Mikronesia ambient albums I released this year. :dibba-sota is a quiet sonic meditation on Deep Listening and natural spaces and Dissolve is an hour long continuous piece of music that was described by music legend King Britt
as “sonic sage”, great for clearing and cleansing a space. In the
spirit of the season all the albums on my Bandcamp (including the Landscapes series) are “name your price”. So you can download for free or pay any price that’s good for you š
Also this year I released three albums in a series called Landscapes.
These albums were created at artists residencies around the world this
year. The intention of these albums is to allow the listener to
experience a sense of place through listening and explore the sonic
character of a geographic location. The environmental recordings are
augmented with subtle effects and “sonic photography” techniques to
represent our own coloring of sound through listening consciousness.
In 2018 I’ll be continuing my nomadic life with residencies at Com Peung in Chiang Mai, Thailand and PECAH
in Uttarakhand, India. I’m very excited to travel to Asia for the first
time and focus on the soundscape recording, creation and Echozoo at these residencies.
In addition to traveling and releasing music this year I was glad to begin a new collaborative project Mixes from the Field,
with fellow Deep Listener Sharon Stewart. This project seeks to connect
people of all ages to explore modes of Deep Listening and the work of
Pauline Oliveros through field recording, sonic meditation and music.
Our initial project was supported by American Composers Forum for workshops in Philadelphia at Village of Arts and Humanities.
My connection with VAH will continue in 2018 in an exciting community
project around a basketball court in North Philadelphia that’s being
renovated by the Philadelphia 76ers. More on this early next year….
Mixes from the Field also led workshops and soundwalks in Berlin,
Germany and Arnhem, Netherlands. We’re hoping to continue the work in
2018!
A quick note for anyone in Philadelphia on New Year’s Eve. I’ll be leading a dharma talk, discussion and silent meditation
at Springboard Studio in Mt. Airy from 10pm through midnight. The theme
for the night will be intention and the infinite potentials found in
the ground of being. Hope to see you there! It will be my last night in
Philly as I fly to Thailand on Jan 1!
Again, thanks for being a part of an amazing 2017 and I look forward to keeping in touch with you all in 2018.
with MettÄ,
Michael
Hi folks, itās been a few months since my last update. Iāve been working on lots of studio projects with some occasional shows.
Hereās a rundown of recent projects I was involved with this fall.
Utopia
Over the past few months as I’ve gotten more into field recording and Deep Listening, I’ve been producing sounds for the site Cities and Memory. The most recent piece I did for them was part of a project to imagine sounds for the 16th century Thomas More’s novel Utopia.
For my piece I focused on a darker aspect of More’s work: slavery. This
seedy aspect of this well known concept of Utopia seemed to echo the
modern day issue of hidden slavey in our “advanced” society.
Another recent sonic piece I created was an audio collage of the sounds
of Pope Francis’ historic visit to Philadelphia in September 2015.
Approximately one million people visited Philadelphia creating one of
the largest gatherings in the city’s history on the Ben Franklin
Parkway. For three days I walked around with my field recorder and
captured the sounds of the crowds, choirs, vendors, singers, chanters,
musicians and ambiance to create an sonic photograph of what this
beautiful weekend was like.
The Monday after the Papal visit I was honored to perform along side two giants in the electronic music scene: King Britt and HPrizm (from Antipop Contortium) for their Buddy System series at Johnny Brenda’s. Myself, finger drummer phenom OddKidOut and Matthew Law
(AKA DJ Phsh) joined King and Priest for a smoking improvisational set
of electronic music. I’ve heard the recordings back and they’re quite
good. Look for some excerpts coming soon once the Buddy System site
launches.
<fidget> Residency / dark matter / Fall Experimental Music Festival
I’m also excited to announce that I am artist in residence at one of the most vital performance laborites in Philadelphia, thefidget space, for their 2015/16 season. As the resident composer/musician I’m sharing my time with choreographer/artist Zornitsa Stoyanova.
We’ve been working together off and on for almost nine years!
Throughout 2015 we’ve been doing some experiments with sound, dance,
reflective mylar and modular lighting. On Friday November 6 we’ll be
debuting a new piece that showcases some of that work. dark matter will
contain four channel surround sound music, video, dance, mylar, smart
phone media and live music. I’ll be joined by another old friend,
violinist Carlos Santiago, for this performance.
Friday, November 6, 8pm
at thefidget space (1714 N Mascher St) Space Pulse Pattern Presence, with: dark matter, by Michael McDermott and Zornitsa Stoyanova (2015/16 <fidget> artists in residence) SP3, by <fidget>/Peter Price & Megan Bridge (work-in-progress)
and guest curator Flandrew Fleisenberg welcomes: ID M Theft Able, Himself (Portland, Maine) Bromp Treb, Performance (Western Massachusetts)
Tickets: $10- $20 sliding scale
New Website
Finally I’d like to welcome you to my new website SoundofListening.com.
For years I’ve done sound art, film and dance scores, ambient music
albums, performances, etc. all under the umbrella of Mikronesia. The Mikronesia
moniker will still live on, but that will refer specifically to ambient
music recordings, shows and productions. With Sound of Listening I want
to highlight my work with Deep Listening, Field Recording, Sonic
Awareness and Interaction. Check it out!
