Last weekend I had the distinct honor and pleasure of attending the first-ever Transmission Arts Colloquium, hosted by free103point9 – a non-profit organization whose mission is devoted to advancing transmission arts (loosely defined as the creative manipulation of the electromagnetic spectrum) and access to the airwaves more broadly.
free103point9 has an interesting history. One of its principals founded 87X, a pirate radio station in Tampa, Florida at the height of the pre-LPFM microradio movement. After moving to the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, free103point9 was born in 1997. This microradio station provided an outlet for lots of programming, but became quite well-known for its sonic experimentation. Following the passage of LPFM, free103point9 evolved from rogue broadcaster to thriving arts organization. Continue reading “A Weekend at the Wave Farm”
Tag: wave farm
Hiatus Ahoy
I’ll be taking a short break from updating the site, as I prepare to move from Wisconsin to New York next week to begin life as a professor at Brooklyn College. Plans for the move itself have been fraught with difficulty – more than I had expected, but things are (finally) beginning to come together. Boxes are being packed, loose ends squared away, and I’m test-dosing the cats with tranquilizers to see how they’ll handle the 16-hour drive.
Once I’m in NYC, I’ll be hitting the ground running. I’m teaching two classes in the fall: one intro-to-TV-production class, and another called “The Broadcast News Process.” The latter should be fun, as I’ve set it up to revolve around two key questions – do you really want to work in the corporate media? If not, how can you find/make the opportunities to be a working journalist without having to turn off your brain and/or sell your soul? Continue reading “Hiatus Ahoy”
Free103point9 Goes Country
Not so much in the format sense as locationally: the NYC-based radio-as-canvas collective is opening up action on a second front. It’s two and a half hours upstate, on 30 acres of woodland! Dubbed the Wave Farm, it “will host occasional performances, as well as an artist residency program called AIRtime.”
The Wave Farm opens July 4th with Tune(Out))) Side, an afternoon and evening of 50 performers on five frequencies. Later in the month is Campfire Sounds, “a weekend of avant folk.” In August the Wave Farm will host workshops devoted to “broadcasting/webcasting, performing with video, organic gardening, and music improvisation,” catering to both kids and adults.
It might very well be the first ever incubator devoted specifically to the transmission arts. Sounds like a special place in the making.