Birgit Ulher and Nicolas Collins 
Lampo Performance
Saturday, April 15, 7 p.m.

Limited capacity; register here

At the Graham, Collins (!Trumpet) and Ulher (Trumpet!) perform together and present solo sound and video work. !Trumpet + Trumpet! are two trumpets and two very different approaches—one electronic, the other acoustic. While Collins works with a computer program and cobbled hardware, Ulher uses metal sheets, radios, milk frothers, and other everyday objects. Their diametrically opposed sound production leads to oddly similar sonic results.

Collins explains: “After 40 years, I finally figured out how to program a computer to sound like glitching circuits, and cobbled hardware and software into a brass package: a trumpet with a built-in speaker, sensors reading valve positions, a breath control, and an infrared mute. In a nod to David Tudor’s legendary composition Bandoneon! I’ve dubbed my instrument !trumpet. But where Tudor tags on the ‘!’ to indicate factorial, I lead with it as the symbol for logical negation. This is definitely not a trumpet.”

Presented in partnership with Lampo; additional support provided by the Goethe-Institut Chicago and Hamburg Ministry of Culture and Media.

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