Reviews

BOX #10 - 24 February 2002 - Mastaneh Nazarian - Cameron Street

Review by Greg Jenkins

Sunday 24 February, 7pm-10pm Metro Arts Theatre
MASTANEH NAZARIAN with Jackie Marshall & Barnaby Ralph
CAMERON J. STREET

The Sunday session at the Victory Hotel was in full swing as I arrived next door for the second small black box (sbb) of the year at the Metro Arts Theatre.  It makes for an interesting juxtaposition. On the bill were Cameron J. Street and Mastaneh Nazarian. I?d not previously heard Mastaneh Nazarian?s work, though I knew she?d studied composition at the Conservatorium with Gerard Brophy and Rodolphe Blois. I?ve always enjoyed the music of Brophy and Blois and so was keen to hear Nazarian.  Her set started almost by stealth with a quiet, insect like drone working it?s way thru the PA.  With a soft voice, she greeted the audience then called the recorder artist Barnaby Ralph to the stage.  
Barnaby produced two oversize recorders, requested an ?A? from Mastaneh and with a flourish ensured they were tuned.  That done, he promptly put the recorders away and reaching below the shrouded table in front of him produced two bowls of water, followed by a wok, gas stove, a bowl of rice, cooking oil, cutting board sushi knife? you can probably see where this is headed.

While Barnaby made sushi, Mastaneh made music.  She played with the expected level of skill of a conservatorium trained guitarist, laying angular riffs on top of the backing tracks, pausing occasionally to change the CD and the mood of the piece.  She employed a variety of performance techniques including wrapping what looked like edit tape around the neck of the guitar as a sort of semi-effective capo.

The rack of electronic gear and effects pedals set up were used to only subtly influence the sound of the guitar or add the occasional delay - no wild frippertonic inspired wails here.  There were some nice resultant melodies and rhythms, the best of which I thought was created when she pulled a live guitar lead out of it?s socket. The crackling noise this generates, a sound familiar to all guitarists, continued on for several minutes through the delay line.  This may or may not have been deliberate (?I meant to do that? Mastaneh semi-apologised to the audience) but it was the highlight of her set for me.

After the sushi came a game of backgammon between Mastaneh and Barnaby, accompanied by an edited and affected Mahler Symphony, played off CD.  As an exercise in taking a dead white European male composer?s work, mangling it in a fairly uninteresting way, (though careful not to alter it beyond recognition) then amusing oneself with a board game in an effort to completely ignore it, I suppose it was successful.  Her friends in the back row shouted encouragement but the rest of the audience were decidedly bored by now gauging by their reaction.

After checking with the Kettle that she still had time left, Mastaneh despatched Barnaby and called another collaborator from the audience, Jackie Marshall (vocal).  The final piece was a rambling jazz vocal number with stochastic guitar accompaniment.  Mastaneh again displayed her guitar skills but the piece was almost entirely Jackie?s.  Her vocal abilities were impressive, literally soaring from whisper to scream and back again. She managed to do what Mastaneh had failed to do all night - engage the audience.

Mastaneh was certainly honest with the audience - her frequent asides an effort to communicate with the crowd.  But overall she seemed awkward, and I was unsure of the dynamic she was attempting to establish.  I got the impression she?d be happier in an intimate jazz club, where she could look the audience members in the eye and speak to them one on one.  I?m sure the Cageian performance art cooking seemed like a good idea at the time but it was a shame she didn?t capitalise more on the ?happy accidents? these sort of performances generate instead of just going through the motions. Mastaneh showed she could quote the vocabulary of experimental composition.  Let?s just hope that next time she?s got something more to say.

Interval, and the stage was re set for Cameron J. Street, solo bass guitarist.  From the outset it was apparent that he was attempting to set up a quite different mode of communication with the audience.  A thin veil of cloth had been hung separating the stage from the audience, enforcing the performer/listener separation.  Cameron was not into idle chit chat.

Cameron managed to extract an enormous range of sounds and textures from his bass guitar employing his B.G.B.T. (Bass Guitar Bastardising Techniques). These techniques included using all manner of electronic effects and physical objects to entice sound from his bass guitar.  Some of the objects employed included an electric fan, tuning forks, a packet of crisps and my favourite, a child?s squeeze toy. The two enormous arrays of effects pedals were expertly employed, performing tasks like adding seemingly infinite sustain to notes and turning a bass guitar into a weft generator, looping and layering rhythmic phrases, dynamic eq effects and distortion. Using the BGBT, Cameron effortlessly made the guitar wail, thump, throb, growl, fart  and pop.

Another technique he employed was to use the bass guitar body as an electro-acoustic resonator by holding the neck of the guitar up against cymbals and crotales then striking them.  The physical vibrations of the percussion instruments transferred thru the body of the guitar, causing the strings to vibrate sympathetically enabling some interesting effects like a wah wah pedal on cymbals.

While there was a fair bit of improvisation going on (how would you score the use of a squeeze toy on a bass guitar?) it was obvious that the entire set was a structured composition and Cameron?s commitment to this process should be applauded.  Musically though, I felt that the set verged too close to the stifling seriousness of prog. rock on more than a few occasions.  Some of the ideas were very interesting but much of the set would have benefited from a little more restraint to allow the subtleties of his technique to shine through.

Overall a bit of an uneven night but isn?t that the whole point of small black box? Last month?s gig has generated more discussion than any other sbb that I can remember.  That is a good thing.  If you ever you doubt this all you need do is step outside the metro arts and listen to the strains (literally) of ?khe sahn? emanating from the Victory Hotel next door.

Greg Jenkins, 2002.