"Interview: Jeff Talman" by Peter Traub

[img]http://transition.turbulence.org/networked_music_review/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/jt-in-munich-2007.jpg[/img]
Interview: Jeff Talman
By Peter Traub
Networked_Music_ Review

Jeff Talman’s sound installations focus on notions of “self-reflexive resonance”, often using no other sound source than the natural ambient resonance of the installation site. His works also have a strong visual component, owing to his dual backgrounds in music and the visual arts. His latest work, “A Play of Flows” premiers on October 23, 2008 at the Galleria Mazzini in Genoa, Italy. Talman was awarded a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in Sound Art in 2006 and was a recipient of the New York Foundation for the Arts Award in Computer Arts in 2003. He currently resides in Manhattan.

Due to the nature of his pieces, Talman does not provide sound samples on his website - the pieces are simply too site-specific to experience in any other way than first-hand. As such, we will only be providing photos and discussion with this interview.

Peter Traub: Before you began creating sound installations in the mid 1990s, you were a more ‘traditional’ computer music composer and musician. Could you discuss how you made the transition into sound installation work? Was there a particular experience of a space or place that pushed you in this new direction?

Jeff Talman: First, let me thank you very much for your interest in my work and this opportunity to go into your well-thought through questions. Many thanks also to Networked Music Review and Helen Thorington and Jo-Anne Green. I’ve found that interviews can really help tremendously because they put me as an artist outside of myself, so new or different slants to the work may become available. It’s is a very welcome kind of refreshment. Read more.

In case you haven’t visited the site recently, don’t miss Peter Traub’s interview with Karen Van Lengen.

All of the Networked_Music_Review Interviews can be found here.