Phill Niblock, minimalist composer, filmmaker, and a fixture of the New York avant-garde art scene since the 1960s, is one of the rare artists of his generation still active as a notable presence in the world of new music. If he is not touring or performing, he is making films, composing, recording new releases, or hosting performances at Experimental Intermedia, a foundation and performance space located in his Chinatown loft.
\nKnown primarily as a composer, Niblock prefers to be called an intermedia artist as he also makes films, which he frequently screens during performances of his music. Throughout his career, he has practiced photography, taking pictures of jazz musicians in the early 1960s and photographing New York from the late 1970s to early 1980s.1 At any point, he can search his computer and print out a multi-page single-spaced list of events, including awards, recent tours, new releases, and compositions. (He wrote fouteen new pieces from October 2, 2013 to October 2, 2014 alone!) The slow and deliberate manner with which Niblock moves and speaks belies his titanic productivity. Niblock describes his music as being \u201cwithout rhythm or melody.\u201d He records instrumental drones on multiple tracks\u2014at times as many as thirty-two\u2014and plays them simultaneously. The resulting sound is dense, uneven, and continuous. Drones do not develop in gradual progression in terms of their form, but instead have a cumulative effect that grows on the listener with every passing second. Slight variations in tone result in continuous oscillations of sound, which, at loud volumes, can be felt as a physical surge that carries the listener along in a wave of constant movement.<\/p>\n