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projects
Since 1986 she has been producing Z Programs, an ongoing series of interdisciplinary events in which her own work has been featured along with that of other artists doing experimental work in various genres. Now, Z Programs is embarking on a new chambre music series called Room. The concerts take place in the the Royce Gallery, an intimate performance gallery in San Francisco's North East Mission Industrial Zone (NEMIZ!). In these concerts, composer/performer Pamela Z will host evenings with a variety of virtuosic, solo new music instrumentalists and chamber groups playing composed music of their own, that of other composers, as well as improvised music. The series started with a November 2006 duo concert that featured Joëlle Léandre (France) and Pamela Z and continues with a March 2007 concert with the Robin Cox Ensemble from LA.
Solo CD A Delay is Better:
Pamela Z's solo CD A Delay is Better has just been released on Starkland, the label which previously released two Pamela Z works on a compilation called "From A to Z". A Delay is Better is currently available through Amazon.com and is slated to appear in stores in the fall.
Pamela Z collaborated with cellist Matthew Brubeck and video artist Christina McPhee on a new opera based on the Museum of Jurassic Technology. The opera premiered at The LAB Gallery in 2005.
VOCI (Voices):
Voci is a solo multi-media performance work exploring the sonic, cultural, physical, and artistic worlds of the human voice. Voci premeired at ODC Theater in San Francisco in 2003 and had its New York premiere at the Kitchen in October of 2004. Voci celebrates the broad range of colours in the singing and speaking voice, and examine various phenomena such as people's perceptions of each other based on voice. It consists of layered, dynamically varied segments incorporating live vocal work with digital processing, vocal samples, and projected video. These segments approach voice as anatomy, as character, as identifier, and communicator. The piece weaves stories about voice together with arias, non-verbal utterances, choruses of "real" and synthetic voices, fragments of scientific information, beautiful and terrifying cries and whispers.
Just Dust (Sound installation for Dakar Biennale in Sénégal)
Pamela Z was commissioned
to create a sound installation for the 2004 Dakar Biennale in Sénégal
(La biennale de l'art africain contemperain Dak'Art). Just Dust is a
six-channel audio work which was installed in a room at the Maison des Eclaves
on the Island of Gorée. The work includes audio samples recorded during
a site visit in December of 2003 as well as samples of text in French, English,
and Wolof. It opened on May 7th and runs throughout the Dak'Arts exhibition
from May 7 through June 7, 2004.
Pamela also gave a full evening performance at the National Theatre of Dakar
on the evening of May 7th.
Apple Store Performance
Pamela Z performed at the Apple Store in SoHo, NY on April 24th as part of Harvestworks' "Mixing it Up" Conference and the Apple Store's "Made on the Mac" series. Photos from this performance are featured on the Apple Stores website.
Pamela Z created a performance/installation exploring physical identity, perception, and the act of spontaneous verbal description for an exhibition called "Sight Unseen" at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. This work involves, video, voice, sound processing, and audience participation.
Pamela Z was one of 13 composers commissioned by Starkland Recordings to compose a surround sound work for their year 2000 DVD Audio release IMMERSION. This historic recording is the first-ever DVD-Audio featuring works specifically commissioned and created for surround sound.
Tryon Center Residency:
In Fall of 2001, Pamela Z did an artist residency at Tryon Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, NC. In a beautiful studio provided by Tryon Center, she worked on completing work on her upcoming Starkland CD, creating an amplified metal sound installation, composing and recording a score for choreographer Jo Kreiter's The Economics of Place, and creating a new performance/video work Metal/Vox/Water.
Pamela Z was awarded a San Francisco Arts Commission grant to create a radio piece called "Parts of Speech". This piece was broadcast nationally by satellite in New American Radio's 1995 season. She created a large-scale live version of Parts of Speech at Theater Artaud (San Francisco) in the first week of December 1998.
Pamela Z is a member of a collective of composers called "sensorChip" who use sensor technology to contol sound. sensorChip is comprised of Miya Masaoka, Donald Swearingen, & Pamela Z, doing projects together and in collaboration with other composers.
SoundWORK:
Pamela Z has created a series of sound and performance workshops in which she exposes particpants to the works of various practioners in the sound art, performance, and new music fields, teaches principles and techniques of digital and analog sound recording and editing, and provides opportunities for participants to create their own sound and performance works. This course began with artist residencies that she did at the LAB Gallery in San Francisco, and will continue off and on in various incarnations through her own studio. For information on SoundWORK, contact soundwork@pamelaz.com
In 1999, pamela Z was awarded a visiting artist fellowship through the Japan/US Friendship Commission and the NEA. She spent the first half of that year living, composing new works, and connecting with other composers and artists in Tokyo (January 12- July 11, 1999). This was be her second visit to Japan. Her first was with the Interlink Festival in 1996.
PAIR:
Pamela Z did a residency in 1995 at XEROX's Palo Alto Research Center in the PARC Artist In Residence Program (PAIR). This is a program in which artists are paired with researchers to do exploration concerning technology and the arts. She worked with Michael Black, a researcher (now at Brown University) working in motion studies and gesture recognition and anthropologist, David Levy who does studies concerning work practice and documents.
Private Tutoring:
Pamela Z offers private tutoring in sound applications such as ProTools and SoundDesigner. She also offers consultation and help with FileMaker Pro Databases and general Macintosh Basics (with special discounts for artists and non-profits). For information send email to pamelaz@pamelaz.com