Finally the last stop of the Bent Festival 2008. If you are in or around the Minneapolis area or don’t mind traveling there, please stop by the Intermedia Arts Center Thursday May 1 through Saturday May 3rd to check out the finest experimental artists Mid West has to offer in one place. Along with international performers that traveled specifically for this event. Workshops will begin on Friday with tutorials on HighlyLiquid’s MIDI kits and on Saturday there will be a wide range of classes for every skill level. I will be conducting the 555 timer workshop along with Mike Una and providing some exclusive GetLoFi 555 kits to everyone attending. Each night there will be Music and beverages of choice. For full lineup check out the Bent Festival website here or keep reading.
Concert 1 – Thu, May 01, 7:00 PM
(Intermedia Arts) – $10
7:00 Bent Festival Reception / Listening Party (Lobby)
8:00 Igloo Martian (Wisconsin)
8:40 Datura 1.0 (Minneapolis)
9:20 Caly McMorrow (Minneapollis)
10:00 Brian McKenna (Amsterdam)
10:40 EraSer (Italy)
11:20 Beatrix*JAR (Minneapolis)
Workshop – Fri, May 02, 7:00 PM
(Intermedia Arts) – Free – First Come First Served 7:00
Mike Una (Chicago)
Highly Liquid Workshop with Michael Una – Intermedia Arts Lobby Highly Liquid (www.highlyliquid.com) has donated 12 MSA-R MIDI-to-relay kits to Bent Minneapolis. Artist Michael Una will be showing people how to assemble them, how to apply them to control circuit bends via MIDI, and other applications like mechanical drum machines.
Concert 2 – Fri, May 02, 8:00 PM
(Intermedia Arts) – $10
8:00 Ronald J. Schleper (Denver)
8:40 Life as Number Five (Wisconsin)
9:20 Talking Computron (Iowa)
10:00 Sounds Happy (Chicago)
10:40 The Circuit Ben Reaction (UK)
11:20 Loud Objects (NYC)
Workshops – Sat, May 03, 11:00 AM
(Intermedia Arts) –
11:00 Intro to Circuit Bending
Beatrix*JAR (Minneapolis)
Dan Demchuk (St. Paul)
Class Limited to 75 | FREE | First Come First Serve
A great opportunity for kids of all ages to learn circuit bending! Bring an old battery powered electronic toy that makes noise to work on.
1:00 555 TIMER APPLICATIONS WORKSHOP with
Mike Una (Chicago) and
Alex Dyba (IA)
Class Limited to 15 | $3.00 Supply Cost + | Click Here to Register
Learn how a simple 555 timer circuit can open up a world of opportunities, like pitching down unbendable toys and adding a tremolo like effect on pitch resistors. During the workshop we will show you how to create a Theremin like synth and use 555’s square-wave oscillations for injecting into the data lines to create randomness and glitches.
3:00 Circuit Bending Drum Machines
Ronald J. Schleper (Denver)
Class Limited to 15 | FREE | First Come First Serve
Learn how to creatively modify your 1980’s PCM and analog drum machines. Some of the best rhythmic noise can be had from the Yamaha RX series and DD series, Roland TR series, Alesis HR and SR series, and Kawai R-50 as well as many kids toy drums. A brief primer on digital logic and analog circuits will be offered, and detailed instructions on my personal favorites, the Yamaha RX-17 and Roland TR-505, as well as instructions for other models as needed.
3:00 Analog Sensor Devices
Mike Taylor (Dekalb)
FREE | Lecture Based
This workshop covers the basics of building and working with analog sensor devices. It will also cover the basics of physical computing by looking at some inexpensive ways to interface sensors with computers. I/O platforms will include the Arduino and CreateUSB interfaces. We will also look at software like PD, Max/MSP, Jitter, and Processing. After an overview of the basic hardware and software, the workshop will cover building basic sensors and the electronics theory for analog signal conditioning. We will look at resistive voltage dividers and direct voltage output types of sensors. I will demonstrate my 3D accelerometer ball, magnetic shaker ball, 3D light sensor, and a really easy to build ribbon controller. If time permits we will also look at some software programming for computer interfacing.
5:00 Bent BBQ
Concert 3 – Sat, May 03, 8:00 PM
(Intermedia Arts) – $10
8:00 Crème De Menthia (Illinois)
8:40 Memory Selector (Minneapolis/Chicago)
9:20 Albino Ghost Monkey (Wisconsin)
10:00 Tim Kaiser (Duluth)
10:40 DJ Tendraw (London)
11:20 Dr. Rek (Japan)
The lineup is Solid! See you all there.