Andrew Wedman is both a musician and a piano technician and in this surprising performance for CMC Presents, he draws from both faculties to push beyond so-called extended techniques. In this solo improvisation, he plays two pianos—one conventional, one he has de-tuned a full octave, what Wedman calls a ‘Bass Piano.’ The Bass Piano is a distinctive-sounding instrument with a characteristic tone that sits somewhere between a piano, and the metallic shimmer of a dulcimer. With this altered instrument, he uses microtonality and inharmonicity as a way of freeing the piano from the restraints of tempered tuning.
He has a truly unique and unruly relationship with the piano—one that could only come from his dual expertise and deeply inquisitive mind. As you will see in his performance, one moment, he is literally testing the instrument’s limits with playful slapstick flailing, the next, his unorthodox methods serve to unlock something powerfully expressive and hitherto unheard.
Curious festival participants can learn more about Andrew, his instruments, and techniques through his accompanying workshop presentation also taking place on July 20.
Credits | performance filming and editing, Gef Tremblay
Andrew Wedman is an experimental musician and certified piano technician living in Nelson, BC.
Wedman is a classically trained pianist (ARCT, Capitano College piano major, McGill University theory major). He completed the University of Western Ontario Piano Technology program in 2009.
He has been performing and recording experimental music in Canada, the US and Europe since 1999. Electroacoustic composition at McGill led to an ambient techno duo Tinkertoy that toured and released with Noise Factory Records. Andrew was active with multiple free improv groups while living in Toronto as well as performing his own compositions as Lethbridge Lodge.
His profession as a piano tuner led him to explorations in altered tunings and extended techniques for the piano. He developed the Bass Piano, a piano tuned down a full octave, in 2012 which was debuted in Berlin by John Kameel Farah. The Bass Piano has since been in performances and recordings with Lori Freedman, Marilyn Lerner, Tania Gill, John Oswald, Ryan Driver and more.
He currently performs in Manzap, a microtonal improv duet with Stanley Zappa. Zappa and Wedman are the cofounders of the Untempered Festival of Dissonant Arts in Naramata BC. Photo credit: Daniel Seguin
This recording was made on the unceded traditional territory of the Ktunaxa, the Syilx and the Sinixt peoples. I am grateful for the opportunity to live, learn and share in cultural experiences in this beautiful place.
The Bass Piano is created from an older upright piano that is slated to be recycled, thrown away or is awaiting a major rebuild. I tune the piano down a full octave from standard A440 concert pitch. Other than the obvious lowering of pitch, the tonal quality of the instrument changes drastically as the strings experience a loss of tension.
My idea for the Bass Piano came about while I was working at a piano shop, restringing pianos. I started recording my experiments of the 4 stages of restringing, from string installation, adding basic tension, then rough tuning and a final tuning. In each stage the strings hold compellingly different tonal qualities, depending on their tension. I was also seeing so many old uprights going to the dump, because their tuning pins were too loose in their pin block to repair. I thought I could save these instruments by bringing down the pitch, loosening the tension on the strings and eliminating the need for tight tuning pins.
The result was surprising and beautiful. Since then I have been exploring the Bass Piano as a new instrument, one that has a unique timbre and resonance and one that is totally unpredictable. The typically even tonal quality of a piano from top to bottom is gone. Every section of the keyboard sounds like a different instrument. Anomalies in the strings themselves are exaggerated. One note may sound bubbly, while another sparkling. Some strings buzz together against their neighbour. The low and high ends lose their tone and start to sound more percussive. The volume of the piano is lower, the sustain is longer.
In my performance, I play a Bass Piano and a conventional piano. The fluid tuning of the Bass Piano, coupled with the standard equal tempered tuning of my regular piano creates many variations of microtonal scales when playing at the same register.
The Bass Piano also offers a performer an opportunity for more extreme extended techniques and alterations. This includes mechanical or physical chromatic glissandos above the keys, foot contact with strings below key bed, and manipulation of the action (producing muted “blocking”, double hitting, percussive mechanical action sounds, action removal for more access to strings, and the “88 note chord”).
In my performances I also utilize a few different pitch bending techniques. By simply tuning a note with the tuning hammer on the tuning pin there is a range of over an octave. I can also use the flat part of the tuning hammer on the string in a slide guitar style pitch bend. Using fingers or toes to bend the string dampens the tone somewhat and allows for considerable pitch alteration due to how loose the strings are.
NOTE: The practices of piano alteration and “extreme extended techniques” seen in this performance carry a risk of harming the instrument. Ideally, an older piano or a piano that you are willing to damage is used.
CMC Presents Multilocation is generously supported by The Canada Council for the Arts, the Department of Canadian Heritage, The SOCAN Foundation, FACTOR, The Ontario Arts Council, The Toronto Arts Council, and the Ontario Arts Foundation. This presentation is also supported by The McLean Foundation and the Canada Arts Presentation Fund.
