PLOrk, Princeton University’s laptop orchestra, performs at Richardson Auditorium.
PLOrk, the Princeton Laptop Orchestra, is set to present Machine Yearning.
The concert is scheduled for 8 p.m. April 23 at Princeton University’s Taplin Auditorium in Fine Hall.
During the concert, PLOrk is set to process live music by Lewis Center for the Arts fellow percussionist Jason Treuting and saxophonist Sam Hillmer of the avant-rock band Zs.
The group plans to use a new performance software created by Avneesh Sarwate in a piece called Skipstep, which explores using networks to trade and vary musical materials generated live by performers in the group.
In the middle of the performance, the ensemble will lead the audience out of the theater with an electronic percussion parade inspired by Brazilian Maracatu music. This digital samba band reaches a nearby destination, where PLOrk will perform for the first time with an enormous industrial robotic arm (a collaboration with the Architecture department).
The parade features special guest Sarah Town.
Founded in 2005 by Dan Trueman and Perry Cook, PLOrk takes the traditional model of the orchestra and reinvents it for the 21st century; each laptopist performs with a laptop and custom designed hemispherical speaker that emulates the way traditional orchestral instruments cast their sound in space. In 2008, Trueman and Cook were awarded a major grant from the MacArthur Foundation to support further PLOrk developments.
More information is online at princeton.edu/music.
