Raven Chacon

2021Soundings

Apr 14

Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation
Currently based in Albuquerque NM

American Ledger (No. 1)
2018
Vinyl banner
Collection of the Artist

For many players with sustaining and percussive instruments, voices, coins, axe and wood, a police whistle, and a match.
For at least 13 minutes.
For any number of musicians with any number of non-musicians.
Each line is a minute or longer.

Line 1 is for both percussive and bendable tones.
Line 2 begins with a warbly long tone crossfading into waves of harmonic or dynamic increases. X = chop wood.
Line 3 is for police whistle(s). Other instruments may join.
Line 4 is for coins to be thrown. Two instruments may accompany.
Line 5 is a line.
Line 6 is a grand decelerando ending with the striking of a match.
Line 7 is for acknowledging groupings of 5's and 4's. Chop wood. End with everyone and everything.

Raven Chacon is a composer, performer and installation artist from Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation whose practice centers in sound. Chacon is one of the three members of the interdisciplinary arts collective Post-commodity, along with Cristobal Martínez and Kade L. Twist. As a solo artist and in collaborations, Chacon has exhibited or performed at Whitney Biennial, documenta 14, REDCAT, Musée d’art Contemporain de Montréal, San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, Chaco Canyon, Ende Tymes Festival, 18th Biennale of Sydney, and The Kennedy Center. Every year, he teaches 20 students to write string quartets for the Native American Composer Apprenticeship Project (NACAP). He is the recipient of the United States Artists fellowship in Music, The Creative Capital award in Visual Arts, The Native Arts and Cultures Foundation artist fellowship, and the American Academy’s Berlin Prize for Music Composition. He lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Toronto, ON.

PERFORMANCE OF RAVEN CHACON’S AMERICAN LEDGER (NO.1), 2018
19 minutes, 13 seconds

Performed at Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops, BC, the unceded lands of Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc within Secwepemcúl’ecw as part of Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts, on May 6, 2021.

A Kamloops Art Gallery and Kamloops Symphony Orchestra collaborative project
Generously sponsored by Thompson Rivers University

Digital Video: Joy Factory, editing by Vutev Video
Audio Recording: Doug Perry, Perry’s Recording Studio

Courtesy of the Kamloops Art Gallery

Raven Chacon and Symphonic Wind Ensemble
22 minutes, 6 seconds

On Thursday, October 8, 2020 at 4 pm, UBC School of Music’s Symphonic Wind Ensemble performed Chacon’s score outside the Music Building, in front of Gerhard Class’s 1968 Tuning Fork sculpture. Led by Robert Taylor, the Symphonic Wind Ensemble is comprised of the wind and percussion students in the School of Music and is dedicated to the performance of the finest wind repertoire, regardless of the period or size of ensemble and is distinguished by its high-level of performance, creative thematic programming and commitment to contemporary music through commissions, premieres and composer residencies.

NOW Society Ensemble performs
Raven Chacon’s American Ledger (No 1)
Presented by the Agnes Etherington Art Centre
Friday January 25, 2019

Tracing its roots for over 40 years, the New Orchestra Workshop (NOW) Society Ensemble has a rich and varied practice of presenting engaging and unique concerts and improvisations drawn from the Vancouver’s premiere artists, and artists from across Canada and abroad. NOW creates community by sharing innovative creation.

NOW Society Ensemble
Lisa Cay Miller – Melodica, Piano
Carol Sawyer – Voice
Gabriel Dharmoo – Voice
Jeremy Strachan – Saxophone
James Meger – Bass
Kyoko Ogoda – Marimba, Taiko
Matt Rogalsky – Guitar and Electronics

Kenyon College students perform
Raven Chacon’s American Ledger (No 1)
Presented by the Gund Gallery
November 5, 2019

Featuring student performers:
Max Lazarus ’20, saxophone
Eric Schwartz ’21, guitar
Brian Sellers ’21, guitar
Oliver VandenBerg ’20, trumpet and trombone