Monthly Conversations

Interviews with Social Artists, Uncommon Heroes

Newsletter #19 -- July 1, 2011

From the Editor

Richard Whittaker

Our 19th newsletter opens with an interview by Mary Stein with San Francisco composer, instrument maker and sound artist Cheryl Leonard. The two became friends through their practice of Aikido. [more]

More Conversations

• Peace Chain Reaction
• Reiko Fujii: The Glass Kimono
• Sam Bower/Anne Veh: Art as Service

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Music Outside the Box

From the mid-to-late 90s I was playing objects that were more industrial. I worked with a lot of metal objects, including a box spring mattress with the cloth removed from it, which had great built-in reverb, circular saw blades, motorcycle sprockets and plumbing pipes. Then gradually that evolved into playing natural objects as instruments. For example, when I first started playing pinecones, I knew that if you plucked one with your fingers it would produce quiet, woody, thumb-piano sounds. But then I wondered, how else can you play this?

An Improbable Project

Not only is friendship one of life's great treasures, but sometimes the least likely friendships are the most powerful. When Abubakar Abdulai, a poor Ghanaian carpenter, began emailing Jeffry Lohr in 2007, trying to find a way to attend Jeff's woodworking school in Schwenksville, PA, Jeff was justifiably skeptical. But then something happened.