Coming Together in Rhythmic Harmony

An event open to all by composer and percussionist Billy Martin in which participants can join a core group of Montclair musicians playing a set of interlocking rhythmic pieces that anyone can join, whether or not they read music.

We will have a few instruments on hand for people who want to join in but are also inviting people to bring their own simple percussion instruments to stridulate with. We are also inviting any musicians interested in playing a little outside the box on instruments capable of playing between the notes (like a trombone, slide whistle, kazoo, or stringed instrument played with mallets for example).

Excerpted score provided by Billy Martin with further notes on the piece can be found here. In addition to the 4 movements of the piece that all will be invited to participate in, we will be performing other movements with the score projected on a screen for those who wish to follow along.

The core group for this performance will include John Sherman on his homemade Kloppbox, a zither type instrument built from piano parts with strings stretched over a banjo head, John Ehlis on his Thwackoleum, a percussion board outfitted with metal tines and springs stretched over bottle corks, Fred Parcells on trombone, Billy Loos on log drum and Bob Mellman on upright bass played with mallets.

Stridulations is a set of interlocking rhythmic pieces that anyone can join, whether or not they read music. Following an ingenious system of Xs and dots, participants play rhythmic cycles on any instrument or voice, locking together like a Samba band, or stretching out to sound like crickets calling to each other across a field.(In fact, the word “Stridulations” refers to the sound of crickets, a species that makes music collectively.) 

Stridulations song book (pdf) here