In The Blink of an Ear: a publication demonstration/celebration
10 October 2009
Issue Project Room, Brooklyn, NY

Marina Rosenfeld
GENERAL TRANSCRIPTION, in 30 second increments
The New York Miniaturist Ensemble

In General Transcription..., I've attempted to superimpose the strategy and, broadly speaking,
the technique of Sheer Frost Orchestra (1993-ongoing) upon the New York Miniaturist Ensemble's
expert string players, with the intent to create a work of proper chamber music from a source that
rather differently emphasized the provisional, the situational, and the - for lack of a better word -
anti-virtuosic. The 'Sheer Frost' technique, which consists of six freewheling, one-fisted gestures for
nail-polish bottles on amplified guitar strings, had therefore to be modified to meet both the exigencies
of the more delicate nature of acoustic string instruments and the refinement of professional musicians,
neither of which is a feature of the original. Nonetheless, I hope that some of the unusual sonorities of
glass on string, and vice versa, are retained in the new scenario.

- Marina Rosenfeld.

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Some previous Sheer Frost Orchestra (click for larger images)

Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, 1996	Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, 1999	Tate Modern, London, 2006