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  • From: "Woody" <woody AT deadceo.com>
  • To: ch-scene AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Uncle Woody/Kevin Davis @ Nightlight Mar 3
  • Date: 24 Feb 2005 20:27:09 -0800

Hey chapel hill!

I'll be in town and playing at Nightlight Thurs. March 3 as part of a
short tour in a duo with cellist Kevin Davis. first place I ever
played in CH was the Skylight in 1995 (possibly the Circus of Crap?) so
it will be a very heartwarming homecoming. If you didn't know me, I
used to live in CH where I may have stamped your hand at the door of
the Cat's Cradle from 1997-1999. I also made bullshit noise on guitars
and stuff. Now, I live in Chicago where I make very focused noise on
the banjo.

If I'm not mistaken, a dance party follows. Way too much info below
(tour schedule, bios, review from the Wire)... see ya next week!

-Woody


Uncle Woody Sullender/Kevin Davis Duo
w/ Cantwell Gomez & Jordan, Spacelab
Thursday, Mar. 3 9PM
live @ Nightlight
405 1/2 W Rosemary St, Chapel Hill, NC (919.933.5550)


MORE INFO, MP3 EXCERPTS, AND PHOTOS AT:
http://www.deadceo.com/unclewoody/

UNCLE WOODY SULLENDER/KEVIN DAVIS DUO
TOUR SCHEDULE
Sat. Feb 26 - Lexington, KY @ Mecca opening for and performing with
Pauline Oliveros
Sun. Feb 27 - Louisville, KY @ Old Louisville Coffeeshop w/ Keenan
Lawler
Mon. Feb 28 - Knoxville, TN @ The Pilot Light w/ Mountains of Moss
Tues. Mar 1 - Nashville, TN @ The 5 Spot w/ The Bluff Duo and The
Cherry Blossoms
Wed. Mar 2 - Atlanta, GA @ Eyedrum w/ Brian Parks
Thurs. Mar 3 - Chapel Hill, NC @ Nightlight w/ Cantwell Gomez & Jordan,
Spacelab
Fri. Mar 4 - Washington, DC @ 611 Florida Ave. NW w/ Otono Brujo
Sat. Mar 5 - Brooklyn, NY @ Free103point9 w/ v.v. + a.d. sharks with
wings, aranami (michelle + kenta nagai)
Sun. Mar 6 - Baltimore, MD @ True Vine w/ Peter B.
Thurs. Mar 10 - NYC, NY @ SubTonic w/ Takehiro Nishide & Gonzo
Murakami


BIOGRAPHIES
UNCLE WOODY SULLENDER
Since migrating to Chicago from North Carolina in 1999, Woody Sullender
has been performing improvised music on the banjo under the
not-so-clever moniker of "Uncle Woody Sullender". His most recent
recorded appearances include "Nothing is Certain but Death", an album
of banjo improvisations, "Sound Writing" a lathe-cut record
compilation/art object, and "Instant Landscape" the first studio
release by Fred Lonberg-Holm's large improvisation ensemble the
Lightbox Orchestra. He has also recently collaborated with sound
artist Maryanne Amacher, incorporating his banjo recordings into an
installation scheduled for Spring 2005 at the Palacio de Bellas Artes
in Mexico City. In addition to performing and composing in Chicago,
Sullender is currently completing a Master of Fine Arts degree in
Music/Sound at Bard College.

KEVIN DAVIS
Kevin Davis is an improviser, composer and cellist currently living in
Chicago. For the last three years his main activities have largely
involved the discipline and practice of improvisation, facilitating
direct research into sound and perception and using it as a vehicle for
discovering new cello techniques and compositional strategies.

Simultaneously indebted to Euro-American concert music (conservative
and avant-garde), American traditions of improvisation, and elements of
popular music, Kevin's main interests now are in the fusion of the
compositional/improvisational space, usually through applying internal
logic or structural devices to improvised performances, using
indeterminate elements in compositions, and working with extended,
often timbre-oriented cello techniques.

Kevin organizes concerts of his compositions and of improvisations as
well as participating in other groups and projects, including the James
Falzone's Allos Consort, The Nick Broste Quintet, and three duo
projects with, respectively, Woody Sullender (banjo), Dave Rempis
(saxophones), and Jake Elliott (laptop). He has a forthcoming release
of an album of saxophone and cello duets with Dave Rempis (of the
Vandermark 5).



REVIEW FROM WIRE MAGAZINE
JAN. 2005

Uncle Woody Sullender
Nothing is Certain but Death

What about taxes? Or maybe George Dubya's reforms have rendered
Benjamin Franklin's quote irrelevant, and taxes are no longer as
certain as death. Here is a banjo album from Chicago, on which the
youthful 'Uncle" Woody Sullender presents concise solo improvising,
with and without electronic processing, alongside three duets involving
Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello), Jason Soliday (electronics) and Carol
Genetti (vocals).
Japanese improvisor Taku Unami, an occasional banjoist himself, has
said, "No matter where or how you touch it, the sound you get is
unmistakably a banjo sound. It doesn't lend itself to abstraction. In
that sense you can't fake anything, and that interests me." The
banjo's acidic honesty is traditionally ensconced in a downhome setting
glowing with nostalgia, but Sullender refers to this tradition only to
sweep it aside. "Commonwealth Edison" features pugnacious plucking and
a rapid strum that builds to a furious, orgasmic tremolo. Punk and
Derek Bailey are both influences, but these are genuine improvisations
in the sense that Sullender doesn't have an act. For the duo with
cello, he moves from his apartment to the richer sound of a recording
studio. Titled "I Am In A Consumption", the music paces about
methodically, then winds down to a bare landscape of creaking strings
and bottlenecked cello that supplies the most beautiful moment on the
album.
Sullender's style is hard-plucked and uninhibited. This pays
dividends when he cranks up his lo-fi electronics: the duo with Soliday
buries the banjo alive under juddering blasts of feedback and
exhilarating noise, and "The Grain of the String" detonates chiming
chords as if from a cannon. But Sullender is doing more than
brutalising the banjo - he's inevitably engaging in a dialogue with the
tradition, all that deft hillbilly picking and dozing-on-the-porch
plunking. He closes with two pieces that carry a whiff of old-time
playing, even if the tradition has been kababbed and barbecued. "Papa,
Help Me Across" even allows fractured chords and rhythm, in an odd
mixture of violence and tenderness towards this most American of
instruments.
-Clive Bell, The Wire, Jan. 2005




  • Uncle Woody/Kevin Davis @ Nightlight Mar 3, Woody, 02/24/2005

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