I am so happy to collaborate again with choreographer, Lionel Popkin, and his incredibly talented creative team! Part performance event, durational installation, and social agitation, Reorient the Orient is renowned choreographer and performer Lionel Popkin’s response to the dubious history of interculturalism. Seeking to expand the discourse on how brown South Asian bodies inhabit contemporary art and performance spaces, Popkin draws from his nearly 30-year archive of dance-making. In REDCAT’s theater and gallery, dancers, videos, archival materials, rugs, sculptures, neon yellow wiffle balls, and the headpiece from an elephant costume invite audiences to make their way, choosing where to be and what to see.
Choreographed by Lionel Popkin
Danced by Lionel Popkin, Jay Carlon, Arushi Singh, and Wilfried Souly
Sound Design by Tom Lopez
Video Design by Meena Murugesan
Lighting Design by Christopher Kuhl
Costume Design and Visuals by Marcus Kuiland Nazario
Saturday & Sunday, March 9 - 10
REDCAT Los Angeles
open 2:00 - 10:00pm
activations 3:00 - 5:00pm and 7:30-9:30pm
Many thanks to percussionist and Oberlin alum, Tyler Smith, for performing two works this evening! sfound Objects: 3 Vertices for solo percussionist and 21 found sound objects. It's companion piece, sfound Objects: 3 Vertices & 12 Speakers for percussionist and live electronics was also performed by Tyler.
Performance by Tyler Smith
Electronic music by Tom Lopez
Saturday, February 17, 8:00pm
Wurtzel Theater
Oberlin College
I will present a live performance of Triptych at the venue Arkaoda:Berlin. The show will feature 8 Oberlin students who have spent winter term workiing with me at the amazing Catalyst Studios in the old Funkhaus.
Very excited to announce my return to IMFA this summer in beautiful Duino, Italy. I will present Tempus Ouroboros: cinéma pour l'orchestre and Confetti Variations for piano and fixed media, featuring the incredibly talented pianist, Adam Zukiewicz.
The upcoming TIMARA Faculty concert in the Wurtzel Theater will include a new version of my work for percussion ensemble dedicated to Terry Riley. In C (in common time) was written in 2017 for Michael Rosen, then director of the Oberlin Percussion Group. This new version, In C+, adds eight channels of live electronics to the ensemble performance. Many thanks to Ross Karre (current director of OPG) and the performers: Brin Jaeger, Matthew Walton, Orson Abram, Tyler Smith, Will Dahle, and Zeyi Guo.
I am very proud that Oberlin Conservatory has promoted me to Professor this year. I will take this as a sign that I should update my bio. While at it, I posted a more recent photo from Italy this past summer.
I am very happy to collaborate again with choreographer Lionel Popkin. This installation work for sound and video will appear at the Center for the Arts on the campus of Wesleyan University. This should be the initial instance of a much larger-scale project slated for development in 2023-2024.
Very excited to announce a couple showings of my work in Italy this summer. Tempus Ouroboros and Metropolitana will be presented at the International Music Festival of the Adriatic in Duino, Italy.
I will perform Love in the Time of Covid on the TIMARA Faculty concert in the Wurtzel Theater. This piece features hammered dulcimer with live electronics. This particular performance will feature two lovely dancers: Holly Handman-Lopez and Solaina Lopez!
I would like to invite you to watch my latest creative project. It’s a new piece for the Oberlin Orchestra on video, and it will premiere tomorrow night (Saturday) at 7pm, on the final concert of the Oberlin Stage Left series this year.
After the concert, the piece will remain available online, so please check it out another time if Saturday night doesn’t work for you: Tempus Ouroboros.
If I had to summarize the piece, I’d say it’s “a day in the life of a conductor.” Due to the pandemic, the orchestra was forced to utilize fewer musicians on stage, no live audience, and multiple spaces for rehearsals. In one sense, the piece captures Raphael’s conducting experience this year.
I am super excited to perform on hammered dulcimer and laptop to open for Ami Dang at the Cat in the Cream. The hammered dulcimer was my preferred instrument for a number of years and samples from it have appeared in a lot of my work. It will be fun to revisit my old friend. And speaking of friends, Ami Dang is returning to Oberlin to perform ambient music with sitar, Ableton Push, and computer - this will be a fabulous event, I hope you'll check it out.
Here is a link to the live stream if you would like to listen online: Cat in the Cream.
Saturday, January 30, 8:00pm
Cat in the Cream
Oberlin, OH