Poet Brian Turner invited me to sketch a performance of the Interplanetary Acoustic Team at the White House, Timucua Arts Foundation (2000 South Summerlin, Orlando, FL 32806). Jared Sylvia had an amazing knot of electronics set up on three tables. Wires flowed everywhere. He set up a relaxing loop track as ambient music as people arrived. Brian Turner was front and center with guitar and occasional poetry. Two more electric guitars filled out the soundscape. Brian had asked me to sketch the group live and I hoped to do a digital sketch that would project above the stage but I couldn’t figure out the way to hook up an iPad to the projector. Pam Schwartz had helped me set up the tech once before but she was at a onePULSE Foundation meeting. I messed with all the possible connections for an hour and had to give up. The digital sketch would have made sense considering all the electronic tech on stage but I went about sketching the old school way with pencil and paper.
The Interplanetary Acoustic Team is a group of musical explorers
whose mission is to listen to the stars, to record the deep
gravitational waves rolling across the wide sweep of time, the voices
carried on those waves. The music was haunting and moving
On their debut album “11 11 (Me, Smiling)” Ilyse Kusnetz created a lyric meditation that spans the universe, encompassing
everything from the Big Bang, to the creation of life as we know it, to
cybernetics, to the uploading of human consciousness for a journey into
the unknown. Her husband, Brian Turner, has collaborated with her
to intertwine their vision and create this album. Ilyse’s voice was recorded for use in one of the songs and Brian explained that this evening would have been his and Elyse’s wedding anniversary. Ilyse lost a battle with cancer but her poetry and lyrics live on. Beauty lives on when every something is created.
Brian Turner–Vocals, Bass, Guitars, Horns, Modular Synths
Benjamin Kramer–Bass, Keyboards, Theremin
Jared Silvia: Modular Synths
Sunil Yapa: Guitars
The next Interplanetary Acoustic Team event is at Valencia Winter Park campus, Oct 18, 201 at around 7pm. Then for a Burrow Press book launch on Nov 10, 2018.