“Lecture on Democracy as Word and Brand” is a new performance work by sound artist Alexis Bhagat, commissioned by Parsons, presented as part of the exhibition “OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding,” and integrated into the actual exhibition layout. Turn out in person or tune in on free103point9 Online Radio at www.free103point9.org.

The lecture activates a large platform designed by Liam Gillick with two different channels of pre-recorded audio. From 4 small speakers embedded into the “fora” (4 circular benches included in Gillick’s installation), recordings play that Baghat made previously during a charrette with New School students. These recordings are juxtaposed with the “Voice of Authority,” emanating from an overhead loudspeaker and delivering recorded proclamations on democracy by Edward Bernays, George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, and others. Illustrating the divergent connotations of the word “democracy,” the Voice of Authority abuses the term, while the voices from the “fora” attempt to use it. In the midst of this controversy is the artist, who stands at a lectern and talks on the history of the term “democracy”--a lecture delivered to the audience via little portable radio transmitters that will be distributed at the performance. Considering democracy as an example of a “brand,” Bhagat urges the abandonment of this hollow term.

Audience members have the choice of tuning in to the lecture via radios and headphones, or following the recordings from the Voice of Authority or the “for a.” At the end, they are encouraged to devise new terms to succeed “democracy.”

Generated in collaboration with Jesal Kapadia and students of her “Witness and Intervention: Media” class at Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts. Produced in collaboration (and with much appreciation) with free103point9. Commissioned by Parsons for OURS and presented as part of the Vera List Center’s program cycle on “Branding Democracy.”

The monthly show from the New York Society for Acoustic Ecology, this month curated and produced by David Watson. This show includes an older piece from Dallas Simpson, "Releasing the Bird of the Soul," originally intended for the Sacred Spaces show. Also three pieces, with interviews exploring the act of recording and replaying : natural sound recordist Grant Finlay; Live foley performer Sam Hamilton, and sound effects designer Rowan Watson. Intermissions by the Cicada Raiders.

Local arts organization free103point9 begins public workshops for a new community radio station this month with events at the Catskill Community Center and hosted by the Cairo Library at the Cairo Town Hall. free103point9, an 11-year-old arts organization, recently won a license for a 3,300-watt non-commercial radio station broadcasting at 90.7-FM that will be a community-run media project, re-envisioning radio as an innovative platform for local participation. The station’s inclusive programming will connect diverse voices, and distribute information across the public spectrum in New York's Greene and Columbia Counties.

Studios for the station will be in the Catskill Community Center as well as in Hudson, Cairo, and other towns throughout the two counties, and live programming may also originate from a number of other local venues, and including town meetings, workshops, lectures, school events, and local performances. “We are being overwhelmed with people calling and e-mailing that want to be involved,” says free103point9 Program Director Tom Roe. “These first public meetings are a chance for anyone who wants to be be a DJ, or help organize fundraisers, or interview your neighbors, to come out and meet others who are working to bring community radio to this area in person.” The station is hosting a community meeting and workshop for anyone who wants to get involved. The first is from 1-3 p.m. Sat. Feb. 14 at the Catskill Community Center, with a live internet radio show. Admission is free. Tune in at www.free103point9.org.

The meeting at the Catskill Community Center will be in conjunction with a children’s Valentine’s Day program there. Children (ages 5 - 10) will participate in arts and crafts, have a snack, and watch a Valentine's Day movie. (The children’s program is free, but registration is required. To register please call 518-719-8244.) “Murals of Catskill’s Historical Buildings” is the current art show on view at the Catskill Community Center. Admission on Feb. 14 to this work by local fourth-grade students, a joint project of the Catskill Central School District, Arts in Education Program of the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) and Ruth Leonard, artist and teacher, is free. Folks who stop by that afternoon can also record audio for the new community station, and meet organizers behind the effort.

An online version of the new community radio station will begin in May, and the FM community radio station is expected to get on the air by June, 2010. To volunteer to help get the radio station started contact Tom Roe at tr@free103point9.org, or call 518-622-2598. A web site with more information about the station and these events is at: http://www.free103point9.org/communityradio/

The Catskill Community Center is located at 344 Main St. in Catskill, 518-719-8244.

Percussionist William Hooker, the genre-bending free jazz legend, will improvise a soundtrack to pioneering African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux’s 1920 silent film classic — originally advertised as a chance to come see “the annihilation of the Ku Klux Klan.” Live video feed from Troy, New York. Watch video below or at www.free103point9.org. Use controls below video to adjust audio. Refresh page if video freezes. Video will only show image during live event.

The poet icon and political activist Amiri Baraka performs with Rob Brown, one of the New York City downtown music scene’s most in-demand saxophonists, in a reading of his new book “Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems.” Live video below during the show from The Sanctuary for Independent Media in Troy, NY. Refresh page if image freezes.

We will play field recordings and pieces composed and from, San Francisco, with a minimum of talking and other "packaging." Recordings from Chris Watson, Jim McKee, Andrew Roth, Robert Beahrs, Joseph Lawrence, James Goode, Aaron Ximm, and Jeremiah Moore, among others. A guest program produced by Jeremiah Moore and Aaron Ximm from Bay Area Sound Ecology will be included. Bay Area Sound Ecology (BASE) is an interdisciplinary forum centered around listening and the soundscape. We create projects and events to promote sound-environment awareness, making and encouraging opportunities for ear-opening sonic encounters, such as this radio program and our BASEbot listening salon series. Visit us on the web, and subscribe to our podcast, at http://www.basoundecology.org/

Local arts organization free103point9 begins public workshops for a new community radio station this month with events at the Catskill Community Center and hosted by the Cairo Library at the Cairo Town Hall. free103point9, an 11-year-old arts organization, recently won a license for a 3,300-watt non-commercial radio station broadcasting at 90.7-FM that will be a community-run media project, re-envisioning radio as an innovative platform for local participation. The station’s inclusive programming will connect diverse voices, and distribute information across the public spectrum in New York's Greene and Columbia Counties.

Studios for the station will be in the Catskill Community Center as well as in Hudson, Cairo, and other towns throughout the two counties, and live programming may also originate from a number of other local venues, and including town meetings, workshops, lectures, school events, and local performances. “We are being overwhelmed with people calling and e-mailing that want to be involved,” says free103point9 Program Director Tom Roe. “These first public meetings are a chance for anyone who wants to be be a DJ, or help organize fundraisers, or interview your neighbors, to come out and meet others who are working to bring community radio to this area in person.” The station is hosting a community meeting and workshop for anyone who wants to get involved. The workshops with the Cairo Public Library are at Cairo Town Hall Thu. Feb. 26 from 6:30-8 p.m., and Sat. March 7, 12:30-2 p.m. Admission is free.

The two Cairo Library meetings will be a chance to get involved with the radio station, and are also workshops training future radio journalists and DJs how to use a digital recorder that will be available at the Cairo Library for locals to record community events, performances, meetings, and lectures, to play later on the radio station, and to be archived on the station’s web site. The Cairo Library is hosting these meetings in the Town Hall.

An online version of the new community radio station will begin in May, and the FM community radio station is expected to get on the air by June, 2010. To volunteer to help get the radio station started contact Tom Roe at tr@free103point9.org, or call 518-622-2598. A web site with more information about the station and these events is at: http://www.free103point9.org/communityradio/

The Cairo Public Library and Cairo Town Hall are located at 512 Main St. in Cairo, 518-622-9864.

This rare assembly brings together Todd Reynolds (Bang on a Can, Yo Yo Ma, Meredith Monk) on violins/laptop, Ed Mann (Zappa) on percussion/electronics, David Barrett (Banda Elastica, Splatter Trio) on saxophones, and Michael Bisio on bass. Watch live video and listen to audio on this event page (below, or click "more info"), on The Sancturary for Independent Media's home page, or at www.free103point9.org. Refresh page if image or audio freeze during the performance.

Experimental Intermedia The Thirty-fifth Anniversary of EI performances at 224 Centre Street, The Fortieth Anniversary of the Founding of Experimental Intermedia, the Fortieth Anniversary of the 224 Centre Street loft, and, not least, The Nineteenth Annual Festival with no fancy name, Part Two (or B). Phill Niblock, curator March 2009.

All of the EI March concerts will be streamed on free103point9 Online Radio; click here to hear the live stream during the posted events: http://www.comm.free103point9.org:8000/ei.mp3.m3u

Michael Thieke and Kai Fagaschinski (Berlin) Friday 6
Andre Goncalves (Lisbon), Margarida Garcia (Lisbon, New York), Barry Weisblat (New York) Monday 9
Kato Hideki (USA/Japan) and Ursula Scherrer (USA/Switzerland) Tuesday 10
Screen Compositions 5 Tuesday 17
Thomas Buckner (US) and Matthias Kaul (Germany) Wednesday 18
Zbigniew Karkowski (Poland, Japan) Thursday 19
Alexei Borisov (Moscow) & Jeffrey Surak (Washington DC) Friday 20
David Daniell (Chicago) Saturday 21

Michael Thieke and Kai Fagaschinski (Berlin) Friday 6 THE INTERNATIONAL NOTHING is the collective name, both composer / clarinetists are working exclusively on compositions (no improv), where both instruments melt into one sound, which sometimes sounds like more than two instruments through the extensive use of multiphonics and difference tones; their pieces have a delicate and slowed down quality and celebrate a unique and timeless beauty; they will present a collection of pieces developed between 2003 and 2009 http://kylie.klingt.org/ http://www.michael-thieke.de/ With support by Goethe-Institut San Fransisco and Kulturverwaltung des Landes Berlin

Andre Goncalves (Lisbon), Margarida Garcia (Lisbon, New York), Barry Weisblat (New York) Monday 9 Goncalves works across the fields of visual arts, installation, music and performance; for this performance he will be using his semi-d i y analogue synthesizer and custom electronics - Garcia is interested in developing a personal and open language in double bass playing - Weisblat is a sound artist and improviser using electronic devices http://www.undotw.org/ctrl/index.htm (Goncalves)

Kato Hideki (USA/Japan) and Ursula Scherrer (USA/Switzerland) Tuesday 10 Transforming the space into a labyrinth of sounds and images, Kato (acoustic and electric instruments) and Scherrer (on analog video mixer) use text as a key structure to follow (or not to follow), in order to create a constant dialog between them, the audience and the environment www.katohideki.com www.ursulascherrer.com

Screen Compositions 5 Tuesday 17 Curated by Katherine Liberovskaya - This year marks the 5th anniversary of Screen Compositions, the yearly evening dedicated to intersections of moving image with sonic art; a program of screen works representing dynamic two-way collaborations between video/ film artists and sound/ music artists specifically intended for single-channel projection with no live or performance component; featuring collaborations by: Tali Hinkis / Kyle Lapidus; Katherine Liberovskaya / Al Margolis; Lillevan / Fennesz; Lillevan / Vladislav Delay; Van McElwee / Tom Hamilton; Marie-Helene Parant / Jim Bell; Leah Singer / Lee Ranaldo; Fred Barney Taylor / Bradley Eros; Els Van Riel / Julia Eckhardt; in addition, to celebrate this anniversary, Filmer la Musique Festival from Paris has been invited to present a short program of works selected from their previous editions (www.filmerlamusique.com)

Thomas Buckner (U.S.A.) and Matthias Kaul (Germany) Wednesday 18 This international duo has been performing together for the past few years; singer/improvisor Buckner will perform Kaul's "Silence Is My Voice", (text by Henri Michaux) using custom made low tech electronics; percussionist/ composer Kaul will perform a solo work, and the two will present a timbre exploring improvisation www.thomasbuckner.com www.matthiaskaul.de

Zbigniew Karkowski (Poland, Japan) Thursday 19 Works in the fields of extreme computer music, noise and instrumental composition; in every concert that he performs, he presents a totally new piece http://www.myspace.com/zbigniewkarkowski

Alexei Borisov (Moscow) & Jeffrey Surak (Washington DC) Friday 20 One of the pioneers of Russian modern glitch-tech electronics - Borisov, meets veteran experimenter (and knighted by Ukrainian MTV "godfather of American noise") - Surak, (also known as *Violet*); as a duo they present a perfectly balanced mixture of deep meditative lo-fi analogue drones, electro-acoustic improvisations, numerous samples and concrete recordings, creating a complete, panoramic, hypnotizing impression, at times surprisingly calm, yet punctuated by sudden intense extremes, but never afraid to veer into slow and beautiful melodies showing an uncommon side of dark and noisy music www.nbresearchdigest.com - www.myspace.com/alexeiborisov http://zeromoon.com/violet - http://myspace.com/microk7

David Daniell (Chicago) Saturday 21 The guitarist and minimalist composer will present a slow-moving long-form electroacoustic work of pre-composed textural elements overlaid with live processed guitar improvisation; the performance will include a quadraphonic realization of large portions of Daniell's album "sem", to mark the 10th anniversary of the premiere public performance of that work www.daviddaniell.com

Our programs are supported by the New York State Council on the Arts, the Aaron Copland Fund For Music, and the Phaedrus Foundation. All shows doors opens at 9 p.m., with web streams begining around 9:30 p.m. $4.99 admission each show. All of the EI March concerts will be streamed on free103point9 Online Radio; click here to hear the live stream during the posted events: http://www.comm.free103point9.org:8000/ei.mp3.m3u