about the series
These recordings feature cellist Lauren Riley-Rigby & pianist Pilley Bianchi. They were largely commissioned for the film
FULLY AWAKE
scheduled to be presented by MOMA.
We were inspired to create the improvisations after recording 2 solo piano pieces by John Cage which are exquiste tone poems. Further inspiration was derived from the composition "untitled" by Lauren Riley-Rigby featured in her doctoral performance recital at NYU.
FULLY AWAKE is a film by Cathryn Davis and a wonderful piece about Black Mountain College in Ashville, North Carolina. Fully Awake reflects on the unique educational style and long-term significance of the school using archive photography, interviews with students, teachers, historians, and current artists, and narration. While popularly known as the location for such events as Buckminster Fuller's geodesic dome, John Cage's first 'happening' and the publishing of the Black Mountain Review, the film focuses on the unique educational approach of Black Mountain College to balance academics, art, manual labor and communal living to educate the whole person--head, hand, and heart.
