Among many blessings citizens of the Twin Cities have to be thankful for is the wealth of regular (weekly, monthly, yearly and every so often) electronic, improvised and experimental music series happening here. Some, like the Tuesday Series, whose origin dates back to a time where local music history blends with myth, have changed venues a number of times and featured countless local, national and international talents. Others, like the fledgling Try This, foster new talents as they quickly gain their own bearings. Honoring a longstanding tradition of musical excellence and innovation, these regular events and the people and places responsible for them, carry forth the ancestral spirit of regular events that took place at now dormant musical hot spots like Gus Lucky's, Sursumcorda and the Church.
Another series of note is held on the last Sunday of every month at Acadia Cafe and is organized by the Minneapolis Free Music Society. I asked co-curator and longtime fellow MFMS member Danny Sigelman some questions about the series and the collective that puts it together. This is the first in what I hope to be a number of features on the unique series that help make the Twin Cities music community one of the most vibrant in the world.
What is your series called?
The series has been called "Minneapolis Free Music Society." For variety we have started calling it "Minneapolis Free Music Society presents..." so that it's not just MFMS as a group but some of the groups affiliated with MFMS. I learned that in a branding seminar.
How often and where does your series take place?
We have been well received and are most comfortable at the Acadia Cafe on the West Bank. We now hold the 4th Sunday of every month.
How long have you been doing your series?
I think things really got rolling playing gigs and recording for the Minneapolis Free Music Society in 2008. At the time the people who would eventually become part of the collective had separate groups; I was doing my Self Sound Orchestra project, there was Northern Cargo who were doing similar things, Samosa and Fly Rich and people like Edward Schneider, Joseph Damman and Wendy Ultan were bouncing betweem several of the bands. So the idea to further blur the group identities into one big wash of players and potential collaborators was probably inevitable. We were blessed by recording wizard Brian Susko when he moved to town around that time too as he became the most willing to start documenting what was happening which really helped things get going.
What compelled you to start your series?
I actually can't take credit for starting MFMS. That would go to Jaime Paul Lamb who really came up with the name and idea and started organizing gigs with some of the musicians involved. He was a part of Northern Cargo and started playing with me in Self Sound Orchestra. We really hit things off and he was very aggressive in getting disparate people together. In the underground or experimental music scene there are very different and distinct camps of players but Jaime is the rare kind of cat that can connect with just about anybody and persuade them to take a shot at it. Incidentally most of the core players from then including Jaime have since moved out of town leaving it up to myself and Jospeh Damman who has kept MFMS going to further the tradition of what we're all about and expand from there.
What is unique about your series?
I guess what I find most unique about it is the ease with which people are able to collaborate. Since I have come back to town I am playing with different people that I hadn't before and new ideas and different groups are coming out of the series. Things have come full circle in a way as disparate groups have come together to form the collective and are now splintering off into new groups and ensembles that are doing their own things. That's pretty exciting. I want to get more people involved now and start to combine other disciplines involved now; ie: poetry, acting, visuals or juggling, whatever.
How does your series contribute to the good of the community?
I like to think it gives a forum for people to be expressive, try new instruments and configurations with collaborators that they normally wouldn't have been open to in the past. The end result or the defined success of an event or collaboration isn't always clear but what's very evident is the process in exploring ideas. Change is always good and MFMS is constantly changing.
What have some of the highlights been for you so far?
For myself personally as a drummer I have been able to exercise my abilities in improvisation and thinking about drums as more than just a rhythmic instrument as is usually the restriction when playing in rock bands as I had in the past. Also what for myself there's been my foray into playing more electronic music which I am doing more exclusively with Self Sound Orchestra than I had done before. Anytime a sporadic moment dictates the end result like the time I had to use someone's i-phone as my instrument because my keyboard wasn't working and people didn't seem to mind or notice is always gratifying and inspires new ideas.
What are your thoughts on music in the Twin Cities ?
As much as the Twin Cities music scene is always changing and evolving ultimately it tends to stay the same. Singer/songwriters and bar bands will always dominate because naturally that's what sells drinks which is the business that drives the scene and provides a stage. At the same time there is a lot more acceptance for experimentalism and more cross pollination happening that is unique to the current times and that hasn't always been the case in the last 20 years. So to see where things go is encouraging and not always predictable and that's a healthy thing. Ultimately what needs to happen is for artists and performers to break out of the Minnesota vacuum and show the rest of the world what we got because they have no idea what they're missing.
What would your utopia be like?
Pee-Wee's Playhouse.
