GUSTAVO MATAMOROS’S LISTENING CLUB SERIES
A special four-part series presented by Subtropics Organization and City of Coral Gables LIVE and IN-PERSON at Books & Books in Coral Gables
Created by Gustavo Matamoros, the Listening Club is a series of listening experiences curated for the stimulation of the sound mind: the mind with which we listen. The 2022 season is in four parts and makes its Coral Gables debut in celebration of the 40th anniversary of Books and Books.
LISTENING CLUB – PART 1: EGGSTRAVINSKY
Monday, June 6, 2022 | 7PM
R.S.V.P. HERE TO ATTEND
This two-hour long first episode of Listening Club explores the audible influences of Modern Music on 1970s Progressive Rock and features recordings of compositions by Egg and Stravinsky. Episode highlights include the use in music of asymmetric and multi-metric rhythms, not as capricious novelties, but as grammatical tools that make musical sentences feel surprising, less redundant, more poetic, natural and easier to discern.
LISTENING CLUB – PART 2: A DISTURBANCE IN THE FORCE
Monday, June 13, 2022 | 7PM
R.S.V.P. HERE TO ATTEND
This two-hour long second episode of Listening Club explores modalities of listening in general (to music and otherwise) that highlight the role of sound as audible description of the world around us. This episode introduces us to alternative ways of discerning and understanding sound that expand our sonic vocabulary and help us appreciate the value of befriending that which we have learned to dismiss as “noise”.
LISTENING CLUB – PART 3: SONGBOOK
Monday, June 20, 2022 | 7PM
R.S.V.P. HERE TO ATTEND
The word ‘song’ is used by poets, musicians and ornithologists alike. So, what makes the “song” a song? The language? The melody? The warbling? Something else? This third episode of the Listening Club is in the form of a songbook — an anthology of recorded songs, many of which may not sound like it to you or me. Warning: some of this music may evoke strong emotions, bring about laughter and/or tears.
LISTENING CLUB – PART 3: SUPERSONIC TALES OF SOUND AND SPEED
Monday, June 27, 2022 | 7PM
R.S.V.P. HERE TO ATTEND
With the advent of recorded sound, we are now able to speed up or slow it down. Composers today use digital tools to explore the nature of sound the way biologists use a microscope to discover and study marvelously tiny worlds. The listening playlist in this final episode of the Listening Club makes us aware of the richness of content in sound relative to speed. It seeks to show aspects of sound often difficult to discern with our naked ears.
About the Author:
GUSTAVO MATAMOROS is North American interdisciplinary artist born in Caracas who works in Miami since 1979 in the arenas of experimental music, sound installations and intermedia. He is the founding artistic director of the Subtropics Festival and is currently in residence at Florida International University’s i360 XR Theater, and at Deering Estate Theater — residency for which he received a 2021 Knight Arts Challenge award. His work was recently featured during the Aspen Ideas: Climate conference at the New World Center in Miami Beach.
Special thanks to:
Mitch Kaplan, Cristina Nosti and Sophie Feinberg of Books & Books; Catherine Cathers of the City of Coral Gables; and Claudia Ariano of Arianographix for her fabulous series brochure design. This program is made possible in part by a grant from the City of Coral Gables, and by the continued support from the Miami-Dade County Mayor, the Board of County Commissioners and the Department of Cultural Affairs.