Pamela Z to teach, perform at Centre

RELEASED: January 3, 2008

DANVILLE, KYPamela Z is a San Francisco-based composer, performer and audio artist who works primarily with voice, live electronic processing and sampling technology. Says one reviewer, "Pamela Z is a wonderful performer. I couldn't quite make out which wires led to where, but every time she moved a part of her body she triggered a sound bite."

Pamela Z has toured extensively throughout the United States, Europe and Japan and will be performing at Centre College on Wednesday, Jan. 9, at 7:30 p.m. in Weisiger Theatre on campus. The concert is free and open to the public.

She will also be teaching a CentreTerm course titled "Soundwork: Silence to Sound—Music to Noise." CentreTerm is the College's distinctive, three-week January term.

Processing her live voice through "MAX MSP" software on a PowerBook, Pamela Z creates solo works that combine operatic bel canto and experimental extended vocal techniques with found percussion objects, spoken word and sampled concrete sounds. These sounds are triggered with a MIDI controller called The BodySynth™, which allows her to manipulate sound with physical gestures. Her performances range in scale from small concerts in galleries to large-scale multi-media works in flexible black-box venues and proscenium halls.

According to a reviewer in the SFWeekly, "When Pamela Z takes the stage, she's mesmerizing. Her compelling stage presence and intense performance style are part of her pull, but it's more than that. As her use of digital delays shapes her strong, expressive voice into textured layers of sound, the combination of that technique with her original use of movement and odd musical instruments/props enables Pamela Z to create evocative performances that have the ring of poetry."

For more information, please visit: http://www.pamelaz.com.

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Founded in 1819, Centre College is ranked among the U.S. News top 50 national liberal arts colleges. Consumers Digest ranks Centre No. 1 in educational value among all U.S. liberal arts colleges. Centre alumni, known for their nation-leading loyalty in annual financial support, include two U.S. vice presidents and two Supreme Court justices. For more, visit http://www.centre.edu/web/elevatorspeech/

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