Queering Sound with NYC Composer Sergei Tcherepnin
Sergei Tcherepnin is a classically-trained, NYC composer who uses a variety of non-traditional musical instruments and techniques to make his sounds. When Sergei visited my MFA studio he spoke of how meaningless the term “experimental” has become- much like the word “weird”- it could be referring to anything, not necessarily the underground sounds Sergei aspires to make. When I asked him how he would like to be labelled, he began talking about his process to make sounds queer. This was during a discussion where I explained that my art studio is becoming queer and, much like Sergei’s music, is in desperate need of a conceptual coming out party! Sergei’s music is impossible to classify or describe, as well as impossible to capture on record; it’s meant to be seen, felt AND heard.
(Massage Performances (Music). 2012. Mixed media sound installation at Karma International, Zurich. Photo: Marina Leuenberger)
While Sergei was vague in describing what he meant by “queering sounds,” I asked him during his MFA lecture at PSU if he could give any examples or describe any breakthroughs he’s had as he finds out what “queering sounds,” means to him. He said that if one takes a musical instrument and plays it in someway that isn’t traditional, that that sound can be queer. Perhaps referencing the male sexual organs (or female) being used not as it were intended (by God, Biology, Government) - in a homosexual act. This all makes sense when you realize how Sergei likes to perform, or what instruments he prefers to use and assemble when playing music. In a November 28, 2012, New York Times music review titled, “I Hear, and Become, the Body Electric,” Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim describes Sergei’s six-channel composition, which he played through the body of the listener, at Issue Project Room in Brooklyn: “Mr. Tcherepnin played through my body by means of electric impulses sent through a blanket-covered platform I lay on, as well as through four electrodes. Two of these I held against my chest and abdomen while he moved the other two around my head.”
(Motor Matter Bench. 2013. Wooden subway bench, transducers, amplifier, HD media player. Unique. Image courtesy Murray Guy, New York)
It was recently announced that Sergei would present at the next Whitney Biennial, the last that will take place in Whitney Museum’s current location, before it is demolished. Sergei plans to use the elaborate lighting panels in the foyer to make music. Essentially, Sergei plans to make all of the Museum queer, permeating with his impossible sounds. Sergei also presented at MoMA’s first exhibit dedicated to sound artists- he literally brought in old, wooden subway benches to be his musical instrument, or sound source- using tranducers, amplifier and HD media player. My favorite piece however, at least visually since I wasn’t able to experience any of these performances in person- is Sergei’s Pied Piper, Part 1, 2012, a mixed media sound installation at Audio Visual Arts in NYC. There’s something very queer about the arrangement of metal boxed musical instruments, separated by a bright, blue door- and named Pied Piper! A character that Sergei has performed as again and again, though at the MFA Lecture he asked, “I’ve only been doing it a few years but is it old?”
(Pied Piper, Part 1. 2012. Mixed media sound installation at Audio Visual Arts, New York. Photo: Justin Luke)
It’s refreshing that someone of Sergei’s stature would question himself at his own lecture. Or that Sergei is not absolutely confident how he is making his sounds queer, just that he is compelled to do so. It helps that much of his work, particularly playing through bodies and objects that aren’t traditionally musical instruments, reminds me of his contemporaries Matmos- a queer/boyfriend duo who once made a record using only field recordings of plastic surgeries as sound sources. I look forward to hearing Sergei’s music in person one day, I hope it is as queer as I imagine it to be.
