With a jazzy, bluesy, funk fresh sound backing up one of the Bay Area’s best female vocalists Con Brio is one of my favorite emerging San Francisco bands. I recently got a chance to sit down with them in their studio, hear them play a few songs and talk to them about their music, their upcoming album and a few things that were on their mind.

Here are a few tracks for you to listen to while you read.

What does Con Brio mean?
Micah: It’s an old classical Italian term. Allegro Con Brio means “Quick With Vigor”

How did you start singing?
Xandra: I don’t have any formal training. I was in chorus in middle school, for a semester, and that is pretty much the extent of that. I didn’t really start singing until I started playing guitar. I started playing guitar before I really started writing songs, then I finally got up and sang at 16th and Mission. At 16th and Mission there is an open mic street performance night that happens Thursday nights. One night I finally went and I was so petrified and scared, because there are a lot of amazing people down there… So I blindfolded myself and went up into the circle and sang the song blindfolded, so I wouldn’t have to look at anyone. Just an a cappella song, just to get up and do it, and that was my introduction.

I still to this day keep my my eyes closed when I sing. I don’t know if it is a nervousness thing or just trying to be in my own world, a purely audio world that doesn’t have any distractions.

Andrew: There’s a lot of distractions when you’re playing a show, too. I mean you’re up on stage playing and performing, but there’s just a whole bunch of people out in front of you enjoying themselves and having a good time and staring at you. You can be playing and honestly you see the couple three rows back arguing, or you see the people partying to the right, the dude who is way too drunk up front. Or sometimes some bars don’t turn off the TV and you see Who Wants To Be a Millionaire and you are like, “I KNOW THE ANSWER TO THAT QUESTION!” That shit’ll happen and so closing your eyes is a way to be like, “Okay no more distractions, I just gotta listen.”

Micah: It can be kinda awkward. You’re supposed to connect with the crowd, but if you start making eye contact with people it breaks the fourth wall. “Ah, um… I’m looking at you, and you’re looking at me… and here we are.” And they’re like, “Yo— you’re not a rockstar. You’re just some dude up there!” So closing your eyes eliminates the whole problem; I just look at my hands.

How did Con Brio form?
Xandra: I was playing solo before I met any of these guys, so I had a lot of material prior to Con Brio existing. I played a little bit, singing and playing acoustic guitar. I was at a point where I wanted to form a band and expand on that front so I put the message out and Jonathan responded…
Micah: Craigslist!
Andrew: Which is insane to me. That’s insane that worked.
Nate: Craigslist is pretty amazing.
Jonathan: Sold my car on Craigslist.

How long have you been playing together now?
Micah: We have been playing together for a year.

How did Con Brio find it’s sound?
Andrew: It evolved naturally, we started in various forms and the band got pieced together as it moved along. We all listen to different music, but we all share a musicality. The more you play together with anybody, the more you learn the dialogue of their instrument. You learn how to fill in the cracks of the other person and they do the same for you, and this cohesion happens.

Micah: There was a conscious effort in the beginning when we met up and started expanding the band, thinking about timbre a lot, specifically Kirch playing upright as opposed to electric bass, me playing the organ as opposed to some other electric keyboard. We were definitely conscious about… talked a lot about getting this rich sound to back up Xandra’s vocals.

We concentrated really specifically on importance of dynamics. It’s really easy not to do that. Rock tends not to have as much dynamic as soul or jazz. It’s level; it’ll kick your ass for like 3 minutes. And the way we listen to music on MP3’s or whatever, there’s not the same dynamics as we used to get on records or better sound systems. So people aren’t used to thinking about it as much.

How would you describe your music?
Nate: In general, the way that I describe it now is that it’s rock and roll with a lot of heavy influences from jazz and soul and funk. We called it soul music for a while, we called it blues, we called it funk, we called it jazz, but it doesn’t necessarily fall into any one of those categories for me. But I think at the same time we all have a lot of different influences and there are certainly elements of all those different types of music. But we can’t necessarily be pigeon-holed into any of those categories.

Could you describe your song writing process?
Xandra: I usually come to them with a song that I have written on guitar that has lyrics and vocal parts to it and they arrange it for their instruments and sometimes if I need help on transitions or intros and outros and stuff they give input on that. For the most part, I usually write songs as if I was going to play them solo. That is just my writing process and then I bring them it to them and we build on it.

Where do you find inspiration?
Xandra: I always think that is a really weird question because I have never taken inspiration from just one place. I take it from music I listen to, from things that happened to me, from things that happened to people around me. And you know sometimes I completely fictionalize a fucking story and just write a song about something that has never happened. So I take it from all over.

So what’s next for Con Brio?
Micah: Complete world domination. 
Finish the album, get a bomb, go from there.
Andrew: World dictatorship
Xandra: Funktatorship.

Is it the lead singer who is mainly in charge in a Funktatorship?
Andrew: You are miss-hearing it. Funktatership. It’s Funk-Tater-Ship. It’s a tater-ship made out of funk. That’s a common mistake; that’s alright.

So the Funk-Tater-Ship, is that like the flying ships in Super Mario Bros. 3?
Andrew: Yep exactly, the cannonballs shooting everywhere. And the princess is never there at the end of the level, it’s kinda bullshit. It’s always in another castle.
Xandra: Toad’s like, “Fooled you again Mario!”
Jonathan: We’re in talks with Ore-Ida about sponsorship.
Andrew: Is that a tater tot company?
Jonathan: It’s a major potato company.
Andrew: I’m sorry, I’m not hip to my tater-tot brands

Jonathan: Were working on our first album. It will be done soon… ish.…

Right, right… So this Funk-Tater-Ship… How will it change the world as we know it?
Micah: Everything’s going to be a lot better.
Andrew: Well it’s run on veggie oil– it’s own veggie oil. So it’s the first self-sustaining vehicle. That in itself is pretty awesome. On top of the fact that we figure out how to make a boat out of tater tots. Cost effective, it is very cost effective.

But is it impermeable to water?
Andrew:That’s what is the most surprising about tater tots, yes. We didn’t think it would be.
Micah: You have to fry them up just right.

Andrew:You’ve gotta use Crisco oil. If you use that fancy vegetable oil it ain’t gonna happen.

Nathan: Crispy on the outside, warm on the inside, you know.

Andrew: And if you ever get shitwrecked, shipwrecked you can just eat your boat.

Wait, shitwrecked?
Is that what happens the day after a tater tot binge?
Andrew: Exactly, you know, cause that’s a lot of starch. Lotta starch involved in a tater tot. 
Things are bound to start coming out.
Micah: Another successful interview guys.
Andrew: Captain, we’ve shitwrecked!

Our Goal: Save 300 Acres of the Northern Amazon rainforest with the Amazanga people, and bridge global communities through their knowledge, culture, and spirituality. We had until May 5th to raise $73,000.

This was an amazing opportunity to use my talents for a cause that I believed in. Using emerging creative and digital tools to make saving the rainforest, or at least a part of it, tangible and relevant to people half a world away.

Today my mind was blown when I heard that we not only met our goal but surpassed it raising $103,000 in just 60 days. We owe our success to the individuals from the international community who stepped forward to show their support; donating $5-$5,500. We couldn’t have done it without the donations from Japan, Israel, Switzerland, Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, Hawaii, Washington, California, Arizona, and many more!

A big thanks to all our supporters Natural Villages, Google Earth Outreach, Google Grants, The Indigenous Mapping Network, Square, Forest Ethics, Tropical Rainforest Coalition, ZD Films, New Phoenix Rising, Net Squared, Heart of Green and the many others who helped us spread our message.

How did you get into music?

I started playing when I was 16 after I injured my shoulder. I picked up a guitar and got really into it. At the same time I was writing and painting, and when I was in college I decided to focus on the relationship between the three of them. I majored in music composition, painting and writing, and did a four-movement Interarts symphony as my thesis.

I kept pushing further and further; working with one of Harry Partch’s disciples, I started building musical instruments. I started using just-intonation and other non-conventional tuning systems, and began creating experimental instruments with them. Shortly after that experience I started building sound sculptures for people to interact and play with.

What kind of musical instruments and installations have you built?

I first made three musical bike paths—as you ride over them they create vibrations in your body. I manipulated those vibrations through mathematical proportions to play melodies. I Co-Directed The Living Pulse Project, in which I built an orchestra of instruments from natural materials and junk including sea kelp horns, didgeridoos, woodwinds, pitched percussion, and string instruments. I was also the main renovator of the Triclops Monstrosity, the Sousaplex and a couple others as a Co-Director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Fantastic Possibilities and the Elationist’s Centennial Celebration.

What is The Sound Cave?

The Sound Cave is a room-sized musical instrument—a little room built from piano parts—and when you crawl inside, you can play the walls and the ceiling. Any sound you play resonates through the 2,000 piano strings and echoes back. If you close your eyes, it feels like a 300-foot cave in every direction because of the echoes. Each of the nine boards is tuned to different scientific and mathematical principles, so it can be used as a musical instrument. It can also be used as an interactive art sculpture or a sound healing device, as well as a very unique performance stage.

You can get a feeling for The Sound Cave and its many different uses through this short video, though nothing is a substitute for the actual experience.

Sound Cave from Tyson Ayers on Vimeo.

What scale do you tune The Sound Cave to?

So now that I’ve built two Sound Caves, I have quite a few different tunings. I tune the ceiling to the natural overtone series with the fundamental tone tuned to an octave of the Schumann Resonance–the frequency the Earth emits when struck by lightning. I tuned another board to the Fibonacci series. Then I have a 33-note chromatic scale, so between C and C, instead of 12 notes, I have 33. Basically, it’s like I stuck two extra piano notes between every key. That one sounds crazy; I created it to cast the widest net for sympathetic resonance as possible. Most of the other boards are modes of the natural overtones series. I’m playing with the seven ancient Greek modes– the Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixo-Lydian, Aeolian, and Locrian. I also bring in a 7 note ancient African scale that the blues scale is based off of. I sometimes use notes from classical Indian music and Ayurvedic healing traditions, and also use some modes from the five elements system out of China, which relate to classical acupuncture techniques. So those are the main ones, and then I have two boards tuned to octaves of the orbits of the planets, or the music of the spheres.

So what’s next for The Sound Cave?

This summer I will be taking it on tour as The Sound Cave Roadshow. We will be installing The Sound Cave on the back of a 1967 Ford F600 flatbed truck so we can drive it to any event or town, and share it easily without needing to move nine pianos multiple times to do any event. Then we’ll be able to share it with a wider range of people as an interactive art piece, musical instrument, sound healing device and unique performance stage.

May 1st, we will be playing in San Francisco at Alchemy, and after that we will be performing at the DIY festival Maker Faire on May 21st, 22nd, 23rd. After that, we are going to try playing at Lightning in a Bottle, then hit the Northwest in July for Mutant Fest, Oregon Country Fair, and some others. Later that summer we will head across the northern part of the states, through Midwestern and Northeastern towns and some of Canada, before swinging through the South and Southwest during late September thru October.

You are cordially invited to come play with The Sound Cave over the next week and a half, before it goes on tour. It is living at Zambaleta, 2929 19th Street, San Francisco, CA 94110. (415) 341-1333 Come on by and visit us for a truly unique experience.

You can find out more about The Sound Cave by visiting Soundcave.org

If you would like to experience The Sound Cave, want more information about upcoming events, are interested in performing in The Sound Cave or in having it come to your town, contact Tyson @ info [@] soundcave [dot] org.

I love traveling. Moving was a regular staple of my childhood. So much so that I identify with being on the road as being home. To give you an idea, I moved from California, to Arizona, New Mexico, Florida, Washington and Oregon before I was six months old. So when people ask me where I am from I say “Elsewhere.” I am not trying to be facetious, it just happens. I could say the place I was born, Orange CA. However, I lived there less than a month and do not really identify as being from there. I could name the place I lived the longest and say I was from the Midwest; Fargo, Moorhead. But that doesn’t really seem right either. I have scattered memories from dozens of states. Some of my fondest memories are from when I went to school in El Portal, I had a bus route that went right past El Capitan.

My name is Shalaco and I am from Elsewhere.

A girl gargling a beer while she plays the squeezebox, what could be hotter?

My dear friends Mike, Shiri & Kenan  assembled as the Sourmash Hugband on Sunday at Amnesia! One of my favorite vaudevillian acts, the dexterous Mike and Shiri exchange musical instruments as if they were playing a game of musical hats. {A game in which contenders trade hats instead of seats; that way no one looses their chair and you are less likely to spill your drink!}

The dexterous Shiri and Mike exchange violins, trombones, squeeze box, kazoo, banjo, mouth organ and so on.

http://shalaco.com/gerund/audio/Digging%20up%20the%20Bones.mp3

Mark Growden returned to San Francisco amidst his western US tour, promoting his first studio album Saint Judas, in order to play for one night at a jam packed Porto Franco Art Parlor. The show sold out in less than 24 hours.

When you meet one of Mark’s fans you don’t ask them when they first heard Mark’s music, you ask them when they met Mark. While some latecomers were politely tiptoeing in between songs Mark takes one look and exclaims “I used to teach you in… 5th & 6th grade… … …Polly Habernickle!” and he puts down his accordion to give her a big hug.

“Fiery, earthy and sublimely sensual.” – Comet Magazine

Mark Growden is a musician who is steeped in charm and mystery.
There is some kind of magic about this man. His collaborative art series with John Law, Covertan ephemeral event that asks fans, not simply for their trust, but for their credulity as they are whisked away on a fly–by-night adventure. Attendants follow cryptic instructions to a meeting place “Look for the man in the Top Hat. Bring legal ID, $2.75 in quarters, and a flashlight.” here they are asked to leave behind all forms of technology as to simply be present in the moment for an exclusive concert that as an experience is a work of art.

The Ocean Breathes Salty

The Looking Place

Dinosaurs and Islands of clouds on the horizons shore

In the near distance you can see a giant miniature tugboat. Gigantic compared to me; minuscule. In the far distance beyond the clouds’ shadows you can see an island. An cumulonimbus island where the shore of the horizon meets the ocean. If you walked there you could explore that island that lives just beyond the edge of your imagination.

Vagabond Opera

When I was helping Will Chase setup for the Edwardian Ball I got a chance to sit in on Vagabond Opera’s sound check. They are an amazing six piece neo-classical opera that performs with a bit of old world yiddish theater! They were nice enough to let me post a snippet here for your listening pleasure. Why not give them a listen?

If you missed Vagabond Opera at the Edwardian Ball, don’t fret, they have an upcoming show in Berkely at the Ashkenaz with a special appearance by the Multi-talented Rose Harden as well as the Dan Cantrell Ensemble + Mira Betz . Fri, Feb 26th 8:00pm Vagabond Opera’s Tour Schedule

ANNA QUINONES The Edwardian Ball's Secret Weapon

Kingfish (Jim Sweeney) from the Hubba Hubba Review

Dizzy Decimal

More Photos…

Herbie Hatman gets pie in his eye

The instigator of the Powell Street Cable Car Turn Around Pie Fight, Herbie Hatman, becomes another victim of his own prank.

San Francisco Pie Fight At The Powell Street Cable Car Turnaround
-Laughing Squid
S.F. may crack down on ‘flash mob’ antics
-SF Gate
Avast ye there be a Hornswaggler on the horizon

John Law spies through a looking glass. But what does he see?

Extra Maritime Action Band

The Extra Action Marching Band Serenades the Construction Crew as they Move the Bay Bridge into Place. There are moments in which life becomes so fantastic that it almost feels as if you have passed through a shear curtain somewhere along the way and passed into a lucid dream. I strive to have a life filled with as many moments like this as I can. There are people who orchestrate or know the proper recipe to hand craft such moments. These people are heroes to me.

Swings on B.A.R.T.

I have absolutely no idea how swings came to be installed on BART; honest. What’s going on with the guy with the tree branch? Really couldn’t tell you. This is when randomness colides with social hijinks. Welcome to San Francisco. Please do not call it Frisco or San Fran. Thank you.

Journey

totheendofthenight.com This is my favorite contre jour that I have captured. I snapped it in the midst of playing a bike catcher in Journey to the end of the night in Oakland

Donate to My Darkroom Fund

Flipping through my photos I now realize I did not shoot a single roll of film last year; which makes me really sad. I don’t even consider it unless I am going to print them myself which means renting space at a darkroom and buying photo supplies which I have tucked in a neat little shoe box of things I would like to do but cannot afford and hidden under the bed. In retrospect I do not think it should be this way. You can see some of my film work below. If you like my photography and would like to support and encourage me to shoot and develop film you can do so via the magic of the internet. Any generosity is deeply appreciated.

~Shålaco

Donation to Shålaco’s Darkroom Fund

Tip in the hat $1.00 Roll of film $5.00 Photo Paper $10.00 Large Photo Paper $20.00 Yearly Membership to Harvey Milk Darkroom $50.00

What Film Can Do: