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PRESS RELEASE
The Boy Beneath the Sea fluidly weaves together music and spoken word to create an affecting 40 minute immersive environment. The story of a boy who leaves his home to live under the sea is unique and yet somehow familiar, like a book remembered from childhood. Dean Santomieri's narrative is evocative and personal, and the words are perfectly complemented by the musical contributions of Bruce Anderson, Karen Stackpole and David Kwan.
Santomieri chose three experienced and respected musicians to work with in creating The Boy Beneath the Sea. Bruce Anderson, leader and founder of the seminal Art-Rock band MX-80, plays a specially designed chromatically tuned, baritone guitar. Bruce has performed and recorded with The Residents, Henry Kaiser and Bertram Turetsky. David Kwan is a composer and video artist whose electro-acoustical works encompass performance, video, and installation. His approach to sound production stems from ideas and techniques found in the visual arts, such as collage and film montage, as well as in musique concrete, radio, and seventies dub. His solo and collaborative works can be heard on the Asphodel/Sombient and Artifact recording labels. Karen Stackpole is a drummer/percussionist with a soft spot for gongs. Most recently she's played drums with the bands Cactus Motel and Moxie. Her current involvements include Euphonics, a gongs/metals/singing bowls duo, and Malcolm Mooney & the10th Planet. She has worked with a number of local Bay Area free jazz and improvisational groups including John Schott's Diglossia.
Collectively this ensemble of Kwan, Anderson and Stackpole improvised a rich musical setting for Santomieri's timeless fable. Words and music interact and a spell is cast. Images grow, become vivid, and fade into salt washed ghosts. The waves of the story recede and The Boy Beneath the Sea leaves behind pools of dreamy tableaux for us to muse upon, beachcombers to the phantasmagoric.
Dean Santomieri has been working with electronic music and musique concrete since 1971, as well as creating multi-image pieces, super-8 and 16mm films and videos. In recent years Santomieri formed the electro-acoustic performing duo Donkey Boy (with Luther Bradfute in 1995) which employed live electronic music, slides or video, story-telling, costumes, and props in their many Bay Area performances. In 1996 he collaborated with Joyce Todd to form the baroque performance group Theater of Memory. Since 1997 Santomieri has also been performing with Malcolm Mooney & the10th Planet (Mooney was the original singer with the German progressive-rock group Can), providing electronics and guitar. In 1998 Santomieri formed a multi-media group with musicians Bruce Anderson, Karen Stackpole and David Kwan, for live performance of his short stories (narration accompanied by live music and video). This ensemble's first show, The Boy Beneath the Sea, was performed numerous times in the Bay Area, and lead to this CD release. In 2000 the Archipelago imprint released Santomieri's Crude Rotation, a 3" CD, EP of musique concrete/electronic pieces, to critical praise.
The Boy Beneath the Sea continues a collaboration between Hypnos and The Foundry, which will continue with an ongoing series of releases featuring ambient and experimental music. The Boy Beneath the Sea also continues Santomieri's relationship with the Foundry, initiated by last year's release of Crude Rotations under the Archipelago imprint. Orders may be placed with Hypnos (http://www.hypnos.com/Merchant/merchant.mv), or with The Foundry (www.foundrysite.com/order), and this release will also be available from Amazon.com and other outlets. Supplemental material for The Boy Beneath the Sea, including non-album tracks and a PDF format booklet are available at www.foundrysite.com/santomieri/boybeneaththesea.