Marshall Trammell: Music Research Strategies

Music Research Strategies Performing Political Education (Towards a Solidarity Economics Conduction System for Improvisers)

Oct 17 – Oct 29, 2019 @ 7:00pm

Events take place October 17, 24,  and 29 at 7pm

Music Research Strategies (percussionist Marshall Trammell) instigates social practice collaborations at sites of political opposition. Music Research Strategies began as a critical ethnographic framework bridging Trammell’s ongoing interests with improvising strategies, organizational improvisation and psychology, and street-level, social justice action. Music Research Strategies navigates the global economy as a touring musician performing research and political education nationally and internationally through a battery of modular, social science-based systems.

For his residency and series of events at Western Front, Trammell will undertake a collaboration and exchange with Vancouver artists who use percussion—including Eileen Kage and John Brennan—and present his research around music as a tool for collective organizing. Over the course of a two week residency with three events, Music Research Strategies will continue the Insurgent Learning Workshop (ILW) series focusing on “Solidarity Economics,” a participatory, improvised music workshop. The workshop serves as a public & collective process towards developing a new language through improvisation based on a general framework of ideas developed by the US Solidarity Economy Network.

This series of events will unfold over three evenings:

October 17, 7pm
Insurgent Learning Workshop: Solidarity (Cooperative) Economics Conduction System
Night one consists of an open rehearsal and workshop with Trammell and collaborators.

October 24, 7pm
Indexical Moment/um: Solidarity (Cooperative) Economics Conduction System
Night two consists of three “conductions” with a collaborative group and a solo performance.

October 29, 7pm
Social Impact Assessment: Music Research Strategies with John Brennan
Night three concludes the series with a talk by Trammell and a final performance with John Brennan.

Mamiffer "All That Is Beautiful"

Heres a video for 'All That Is Beautiful" from the new Mamiffer LP "The Brilliant Tabernacle". Video by Lauren Rodriguez. Thank you Randall Dunn, Matt Bayles, Jon Mueller, Veronica Dye, Monika Khot and Lauren.


From Faith: "I worked with Lauren Rodriguez on this video, and gave her my notes and themes which she interpreted into film. She was involved in the process on a heartfelt and emotional level as well as a creative one. She helped me create a visual narrative representing the psychedelia and different mind-states of new parenthood and the feeling of being "earth-bound". 

"Focusing on the matrilineal connection to my mother, grandmothers and great grandmothers. In the video I dress up in their clothes and jewellery,  I wash their blankets and make their beds. I was attempting to follow in the strength of their footsteps- that when seen as domestic- were silenced and made invisible/mundane- and instead elevate them to the full colour of the present. I wanted to find the power of their souls, and carry that through visuals of where I live, and the land that surrounds our home. Two artists that inspired me in the making of this video and song were Audre Lorde's The Erotic As Power and the documentation of the "earth-body" artist: Ana Mendieta."

More info HERE

Pre order HERE