{"id":10811,"date":"2016-05-19T05:00:12","date_gmt":"2016-05-19T09:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=10811"},"modified":"2016-05-19T06:53:02","modified_gmt":"2016-05-19T10:53:02","slug":"asheville-electro-music-festival-high-technology-human-scale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2016\/05\/19\/asheville-electro-music-festival-high-technology-human-scale\/","title":{"rendered":"Asheville Electro Music Festival: High Technology, Human Scale"},"content":{"rendered":"

In his influential 1982 book Megatrends<\/i>, author John Naisbitt<\/strong> observed that \u201cwhenever new technology is introduced into society, there must be a counterbalancing human response, or the technology is rejected.\u201d The very human and innovative nature of 21st<\/sup> century synthesizer-based music is a real-world example of Naisbitt’s observations in action. A local group of musicians has focused on the nexus where music and technology intersect, creating the Asheville Electro Music Festival to showcase local and international music. The Festival took place May 6 and 7 in Black Mountain, NC.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt all grew out of the internet-based electro music community, people who wanted the opportunity to get together and share their musical ideas and expressions,\u201d says event organizer Greg Waltzer<\/strong>. The event started in Philadelphia and eventually moved to New York. After Waltzer and his wife moved to Asheville, they decided to start a similar event in 2012, initially called Mountain Skies. \u201cThere’s a great artistic community here, and there are a lot of creative people,\u201d Waltzer says. Plus, Asheville was already a popular vacation destination for many of his musical friends.<\/p>\n

\"Photo

Photo by Hong Waltzer<\/p><\/div>\n

Though it features more than two dozen acts performing over the course of two days, the Asheville Electro Music Festival is distinctly different from other similarly-themed events. Waltzer characterizes the participants as \u201cmore interested in their passion for music, and for sharing it, than in music as a business or commercial enterprise.\u201d He says that the focus has always been more on community than \u201cdrawing big-name artists who will sell a lot of tickets.\u201d<\/p>\n

For participants, it’s partly a networking event, says Waltzer. \u201cIt’s a chance to get together and collaborate with other artists who have similar interests.\u201d But he says that it’s also an opportunity for the broader community to \u201cexperience music that’s a little bit different than what you see and hear in mainstream music.\u201d He characterizes the music showcased at the festival as \u201cless constrained to the conventional genres.\u201d<\/p>\n

The festival lineup does emphasize accessibility. \u201cIt’s engaging music that’s innovative at he same time,\u201d Waltzer says. The festival encompasses electro-acoustic and electronic music, which means attendees will see and hear performances that employ synthesizers, home-made circuits, wooden flutes, voice, and any number of \u201cfound\u201d objects. Trance, ambient, space and electro-pop are just a sampling of the styles showcased at the festival.<\/p>\n

Candy Durant<\/strong> of Charlotte-based Tenderlash<\/strong> (performing Friday afternoon) believes that electronic music has the ability to be emotive and organic \u201cif you let it. Turn that attack knob, add some delay or resonance, and even though the pattern is the same, it sounds completely different. It takes on a whole other personality and mood. That’s a very organic process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Performers are primarily drawn from the community that Waltzer has come to know via the electro-music.com website and larger events in New York. About half are local or regional acts. If there’s a common thread among all the performers, Waltzer says it’s \u201cpassion for innovative music and expression, for doing something out of the ordinary.\u201d While many acts on the bill have played at previous festivals, Waltzer says that he actively seeks to feature more local acts.<\/p>\n

The intimate, up-close nature of the festival also means that there’s much less of a wall between performer and audience: it’s a living example of Naisbitt’s \u201chigh tech\/high touch\u201d paradigm. Attendees socialize with each other, and with the musicians, Waltzer says. After each performance, concertgoers often \u201cgo up on stage and talk to the musicians about their technique and equipment, and how they make their music,\u201d he says. \u201cSo it’s really interactive.\u201d<\/p>\n

From the start, visuals have been a key component of the festival. Waltzer says that the goal is to \u201ccreate visuals that will complement the music and enhance the experience.\u201d Each of the two days kicks off with a seminar\/performance workshop.<\/p>\n

Waltzer’s goals for the future are decidedly modest and human-scale. \u201cWe’re not trying to grow it and become another Moogfest,\u201d he says. \u201cWe’re not trying to make a profit. We just hope to keep doing it every year.\u201d<\/p>\n

An edited version of this feature appeared in<\/em> Mountain Xpress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In his influential 1982 book Megatrends, author John Naisbitt observed that \u201cwhenever new technology is introduced into society, there must be a counterbalancing human response, or the technology is rejected.\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10812,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,7,40,41],"tags":[237,2700],"class_list":["post-10811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ambient","category-avant-garde","category-instrumental","category-interview","tag-asheville","tag-asheville-electro-music-festival","cat-5-id","cat-7-id","cat-40-id","cat-41-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10811"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10811\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10822,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10811\/revisions\/10822"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}