Date/Time
Date(s) - June 7, 2022
8:00 pm - 10:00 pm

Location
The Lyric


Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land

June 7 at The Lyric outdoor stage and screen, 1209 N. College Avenue. Doors open at 8 p.m.; program begins at 8:30 p.m.

Free and open to all (suggested donation).

Join us at The Lyric for this special, multimedia presentation from Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land!

This Here Song performance features artwork by multidisciplinary artist Cannupa Hanska Luger, original musical composition by Colorado State University master of music candidate in education and composition Jake DiFebo, and drone footage of the Cache la Poudre River by photographer Chris Reilmann.

Luger will introduce and present Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land before joining composer DiFebo for a conversation with audience Q&A. The evening will close with a screening of Luger’s digital video and “time jump” titled Shadow holding shape to experience the energy of the sun, from the artist’s Future Ancestral Technologies series

Shadow holding shape and other works from Luger’s Future Ancestral Technologies were included in last year’s exhibition Reclamation: Recovering Our Relationship with Place at the Gregory Allicar Museum of Art, from July 7 to September 19, 2021. The exhibition—curated by associate professor of painting Erika Osborne—was part of the worldwide art project Extraction: Art on the Edge of the Abyss.

 

Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land, artwork statement
Concept artist: Cannupa Hanska Luger

Here Song connects human beings back to place through sound compositions which map the land.

Here Song is an ongoing series of projects related to Indigenous customary practices by multidisciplinary artist Cannupa Hanska Luger.

“This particular practice of studying horizon-lines from which to create sonic experience and melody for wayfinding was developed by my ancestors, the people of the Northern Plains tribes of North America. This ‘singing the land’ connected our culture to place and reinforced our relationship to the land. This is not our land, we are its people.” –Cannupa Hanska Luger

View of a bridge on the Cache la Poudre River, for Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land, 2022
View of a bridge on the Cache la Poudre River, near the Colorado State University Energy Institute’s Powerhouse Campus.

Bringing this practice into our present time, Luger often gathers drone footage to move across horizon-lines or follow rivers and other natural landforms or more imposed industrial detritus, inviting composers and performers to interpret the score of the land and create a unique living map, allowing the community to engage with the artists’ work while weaving new sonic stories that relate directly to the regions land, water and community.

Recent Here Song projects:

Here Song mobile app
Created with support from FLUX projects, 2020-2021

Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land (Friuli Venezia Giulia territory, Italia)
Commissioned by IoDeposito, Italy 2021

About the music
Composer: Jake DiFebo

“Representing something as free-flowing and natural as the beautiful Cache la Poudre River in sound was something that took some time to ponder. Well, it turned out that I would have a lot more time to ponder than I thought—due to the pandemic there were many delays with this project to the point where I wasn’t sure if it was going to happen, and I’m so grateful and excited that it is happening.It was around this time last year that I spoke with Cannupa Hanska Luger, professor Erika Osborne, and Chris Reilmann in a Zoom call. At this first point, my plan was to write a piece for solo piano that would last 6 minutes. It was going to be through-composed, and I was going to have it played by someone else due to limits on my ability to play the initial ideas. In this past year, I have grown and changed so much that the project evolved along with me. I have since focused much of my graduate work at CSU, including my thesis, on researching the processes of improvisation and musical creativity. In doing so, I have also taken jazz piano lessons from my piano mentor and dear friend, Michael Millan, a graduate in jazz piano performance from UNC.Part of the beauty of improvisation is that improv relies on the spontaneity of the here and now. For a piece like Here Song, it eventually seemed wrong to me that something dedicated to the eternally natural ebb and flow of the river would be represented musically by something linear and pre-composed. As a result, the prior piece was scrapped, and a new idea emerged: What if a piano improviser were provided with footage of the river and simply improvised based on a given set of shapes to draw from? It also eventually dawned on me that my piano improv skills had improved enough in the last year from my own study that I could simply play shapes myself. Thus, the project changed yet again.The final product is my interpretive piano improv of the river footage, utilizing a looper pedal. My goal is to let ideas flow like the river, to live musically in its lively twists and turns. I hope you enjoy the ride.” —Jake DiFebo

Cannupa Hanska Luger in front of Muscle, Bone & Sinew regalia from the artist's Future Ancestral Technologies series, 2020-2021.
Cannupa Hanska Luger in front of Muscle, Bone & Sinew regalia from his Future Ancestral Technologies series, 2020-2021.

Cannupa Hanska Luger Artist Bio:

Cannupa Hanska Luger is a multidisciplinary artist and an enrolled member of the Three Affiliated Tribes of Fort Berthold (Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, Lakota). Through monumental installations and social collaboration, Luger activates speculative fiction and communicates stories about 21st century Indigeneity, combining critical cultural analysis with dedication and respect for the diverse materials, environments, and communities he engages. He lectures and produces large-scale projects around the globe and his works are in many public collections.

Luger is a 2022 Guggenheim fellow, recipient of the 2021 United States Artists Fellowship Award for Craft and was named a 2021 GRIST Fixer, a 2020 Creative Capital Fellow, a 2020 Smithsonian Artist Research Fellow, and the recipient of the Museum of Arts and Design’s 2018 inaugural Burke Prize, among others. www.cannupahanska.com @cannupahanska

 

 

 

 

Jake DiFebo Composer Bio:

Jake DiFebo cropped headshot for Here Song-Sound compositions to map the land
Jake DiFebo, a Master of Music candidate in Music Education and Composition, with Teaching Licensure.

Jake DiFebo is a professional music teacher, composer, and singer residing in Fort Collins, CO. He currently works at the School of Rock in Fort Collins and in his own private studio, teaching voice, piano, composition, improvisation, guitar, bass, etc. He began his graduate work at CSU in 2019, and will finish earning his MM in Music Education and Composition by student teaching in the Northern Colorado area in January 2023. After this, he plans to spend many years working in public schools.

It is Jake‘s dream that every child has music in their lives. The world is in a lot of turmoil at this time, and perhaps the best healing comes from art and music. Jake hopes that hearing his aural interpretation of the inherent beauty of this land brings you some solace in whatever it is you are enduring.
You can reach Jake DiFebo at jakejdifebo@gmail.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chris Reilmann Photographer Bio:

I’m a Colorado-based photographer specializing in architecture and design, but also portraiture and travel.  I’ve always had a deep interest in societies and their cultures; how people live, eat, drink, create, build.  That, combined with a love for photography has led me down this path. My images have appeared in publications such as Colorado Homes & Lifestyles, Metropolis, Denver Life and Boulder Lifestyle. –from Chris Reilmann’s website

 

 

This presentation of Here Song: Sound compositions to map the land is a collaboration with CSU’s School of Music, Theatre and Dance and the Energy Institute, with community partner The Lyric.

Support for this project has also been generously provided City of Fort Collins Fort Fund, by the FUNd Endowment at CSU, and Colorado Creative Industries. CCI and its activities are made possible through an annual appropriation from the Colorado General Assembly and federal funds from the National Endowment for the Arts.

This project was also made possible in part through a grant from the Lilla B. Morgan Memorial Endowment, which works to enhance the cultural development and atmosphere for the arts at Colorado State University. This fund benefits from the generous support of all those who love the arts.

Fort Fund