I was present and can verify that Lawrence's account is pretty objective.
I'd not heard/seen Lawrence Upton and Bob Cobbing before and was mightily
impressed by their 'duets' and the possibilities suggested.
Also: if you've never been before and can get to it, London Artist's Book
Fair is well worth a visit. Not only did I come away feeling excited about
making work but that nasty swelling in my wallet was well and truly lanced.
There were stalls devoted to Ian Hamilton Finlay and Moschatel Press and
another stall with huge 'everything £2' bins where you could get, for
example, Karen Mac Cormack and much rare poetry emphemera.
Cheers
David
-----Original Message-----
From: Lawrence Upton <[log in to unmask]>
To: british-poets <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 20 November 1999 22:50
>Today, 20 11 99, Bob Cobbing launched at The Barbican a range of books by
>him or published by him.
>
>The books were the two new Cobbing volumes from Etruscan Books, the WF book
>by Peter French and the 2 Barbican DANs - all listed in yesterday's report
>
>The launch consisted of a performance by Bob Cobbing, with and without
>percussion, joined by me vocalising for much of it and Jennifer Pike
dancing
>for some of it.
>
>Cobbing performed linear and visual texts from both Etruscan books - he
did
>"ping pong" and his 2 for Liz Lochhead and the linear part of Shakespeare
>Kaku all solo.
>
>The artist David Barton introduced the book by the late Peter French, who
>had been David's student, and then Cobbing and I performed a double page
>spread, 2 voice, each single page a voice
>
>During our brief loud revisiting of the DANs made for the Barbican,
Jennifer
>Pike, masked and clothed in white drapes bearing parts of Cobbing's textual
>contribution, danced.
>
>This time there were no projections of text though the whole thing was
>filmed as it had been the day before.
>
>I forgot to say yesterday that I sought to use the largely unnecessary
>microphone we were each provided (to make ourselves heard in a medium-sized
>space) by moving in and out of its sensitivity area to change the timbre of
>and even distort my voice - unfortunately, whoever was teching assumed this
>was poor technique and kept adjusting on the fly so that the effects were
>far less abrupt and far-reaching than I intended. Today, we eschewed the
>mikes.
>
>We had a time-planned programme and went through it like a dose of salts,
>even with a clock in front of us, and ended with 10 mins to spare so Bob
>said we are finished too early and I said yes we are and Bob said that
won't
>do and I said no it won't and Bob said let's do my Shakespeare Kaku so I
>said yes let's so we did and it was good I think and we stopped dead on
time
>and people clapped.
>
>L
>
>-----------------------------------------------
>SVP: http://matrix.crosswinds.net/members/~subvoicivepoetry/
>Lawrence Upton: http://members.spree.com/sip/lizard/index.htm
>RWC: http://members.tripod.com/~ReadandWrite/contents.html
>Writers Forum: http://www2.crosswinds.net/members/~writersforum/
>-----------------------------------------------
>
>
>
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