SIECOX, wildly creative duo of non-conventional improvised musics featuring the inventive, visceral, and free guitar work of Sabrina Siegel (performance and fine artist) and Charles Coxon, blazes a unique path among but outside the genres of jazz, noise, rock, folk, and classical. The two began their collaboration in 2004 out of frustration with the limitations of their backgrounds in conventional musics (Sabrina's in classical voice and flute and Charles' in rock) as well as a longing for a more direct and free form of communication. These recordings from the "Friendly House" (an old cement and cinder block Quaker meeting house) document with one microphone the physical space and the relationship(s) lived/improvised therein. Their multi-tonal, multi-dimensional music emerges through their energetic/corporeal relationship to their instruments and each other -- manifesting complex energetic and musical tensions (sometimes ecstatic) within the simple format of spontaneous no-effect acoustic and electric guitar(and occasionally drums, vibes, kitchen implements and other household items) improvisation. The result is direct, raw, visceral expression, formed primarily of a "primal organic" or "energetic/biological" playing, as if by beast, animal, insect, bird, or the earth (or "heaven") itself. Their vast sonic tapestry, created through simple instrumentation, is due largely to Sabrina's practice of playing the electric guitar with rocks (a practice taken up for a greater sonic palette, simultaneous and complex layerings of sound, the creation of a "natural" physical structuring element [that between the rocks, hands, body, and strings and all the possible combinations of size, shape, number, placement, pressure, motion, rhythm, etc.] as well as it's not being completely controllable [thereby allowing a great potential for working with chance/"accident," as well as requiring a heightened bodily awareness and deeper listening in the moment, as her playing is not based on known musical structures and relationships]. Charles weaves and coincides, on a child's or other acoustic guitar, percussion, or electric guitar, closely, with a raw, true, sparse expression that merges often seamlessly with Sabrina's, creating the unique SIECOX sound.
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