Sean Curtis Patrick is a visual artist who also makes music, so it's not unreasonable to expect when he and fellow visual artisan Kendall Babl team up with Chuck Sipperley -- expert DJ and super-synther in Hydropark and Utica -- the trio will paint electronic aural sculptures in your mind, MAAAAAAAAAN.

We asked Patrick what the group's plans are for the festival, the gear he'll be using, and received recommendations for his favorite synth-leaning recordings.

Q: What's your plan for MoogFest?
A: I’ll be playing with Kendall Babl and Chuck Sipperley, and I will be using my modular synth system.

I have two separate rolling tables, which will both be independent of one another. One will be more “playable” with a series of small pressure-sensitive pads to trigger a group of notes. The other system will be more textural.

A modular system is a really interesting way to create and modify sounds. To sum it up, it’s a series of building blocks, decided by the performer, that one can connect in different ways to create both simple and complex sounds using patch cables. It’s the closest thing to being able to make “sound science.” It looks scientific, that’s for sure. I would say that’s what the uninitiated say more than anything else: “Looks like a science experiment!” They aren’t wrong, it kind of is!

For this show, I’ll mainly be listening to what the other two will be doing to supplement their melodies with textures and the occasional measure of melody or some counterpoint. We are going to be fairly improvisational, too. I’m really excited to see what the other performers get up to and am thrilled to be able to attend and perform! Thanks for having us!

Q: What's your gear setup?
A: I am generally more known as a visual artist before a musician, and making visual art has allowed me to work with many wonderful musicians. I have made a lot of music videos and have done a fair share of art and design for albums. One particular person I have worked with for quite a long time now is my friend Alessandro Cortini. He is an incredible solo musician, lovely human being, fellow cat owner, and has been in the band Nine Inch Nails for the last decade or so. He asked me to work on a record of his that was going to come out on Make Noise Records, a component of Make Noise, a modular synth company.

I became pals with the Make Noise folks over the course of making that record and came to a great agreement with them that’s stands to this day: I make them art and I get paid in gear. I owe this new instrumental exploration totally to Kelly Kebel and Tony Rolando, and also to Make Noise pals Peter Speer and Walker Farrell. I can’t thank them enough -- 19 out of my 30 modules are Make Noise. I think they are the best modular synth company out there and I contend that Tony Rolando is my generation's Don Buchla, one of the pioneers of synthesis. I’d love to see how his brain works.

Anyway, my one larger black case is made my Make Noise and is called the Shared System, which is a full plug-and-play thing you can buy from them. The other case is a beautifully made black poplar case I commissioned from some guitar makers in Italy. It looks like the back of an acoustic guitar, with varnished bookmatched wood. They did a wonderful job and are total sweethearts. That case is filled with a number of manufacturers modules that complement the other system quite well.

I designed the tables that the synths sit on. The caster sets are Ray and Charles Eames-designed from the 1960s. I cut two plywood boards to size and installed cable management and power into the bottom. I wish I could go back in time to that kid (me) in a college dorm, programming computers to make rubbish-sounding drum machines and show them the setup he’d have one day. I feel very, very lucky to work with such lovely and talented people and the fact that I am able to use any of this still blows me away.

Q: Name some synth-related records that you'd recommend to newbies.
A: Some albums and some artists:
➥ Isso Tomita, Snowflakes Are Dancing: The record that hooked me on synths. I had to record this record on to a cassette at the university library. I still have it.
➥ Morton Subotnik, Silver Apples of the Moon: The record that allowed me to look at music through a different lens; music doesn’t have to be 3-minute jangly pop music. It can be serious, artful, and a bit challenging.
➥ Boards of Canada, anything: The best driving music ever-ever.
➥ Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, anything: Wonderfully melodic chanty/Buchla Music Easel arpeggios. If people ever discounted electronic music having soul, play them her music.
➥ Burial, anything: A musician more than any other that has shown me you can make an amazing record with just a laptop and some dodgy Christina Agulera samples slowed down.
➥ Alessandro Cortini, Avanti: My pal Alessandro did it again. This record made me cry. I also did the art and tour visuals for it, all based on 8mm family films from his grandfather. My favorite album of the year, even if I hadn’t had anything to do with it.
➥ Supersilent, Supersilent 7: Improv jazz and synths? Tell me more. Play loud or, better yet, watch the accompanying concert DVD in a dark room. Max volume.
➥ Suzanne Ciani, Buchla Concerts 1975: One incredible mind, one amazing machine, two selected concerts recorded onto tape in New York lofts in 1975. If you were wondering what just one of these boxes could do, listen here.
➥ Various artists, Electronic Music Winners: Best known as the record that inspired Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead to write the track “Idioteque” but a lot of other amazing moments on this record.

Christopher Porter is a library technician and the editor of Pulp.

Mini MoogFest is Saturday, Nov. 18, 12-4 pm in the multipurpose room and Secret Lab of the Ann Arbor District Library's downtown branch, 343 S. 5th Ave. Facebook event page. Read our introduction to MoogFest here. Check out interviews with Mini MoogFest performers Mike Dykehouse, Alex Taam, and North Coast Modular Collective.

Alex Taam is a recording-studio engineer, composer, and all around gearhead. His mastery of synths is one of the reasons why we asked him to write and record two songs using instruments from AADL's Music Tools collection, which he did in February. Taam's knowledge about all things electronica is also the reason why we asked him to help us host Mini MoogFest. He'll be on hand to demonstrate some instruments, including a modular synth, and guide you through many of the other instruments we'll have on display for hands-on play.

We talked to Taam about his Mini MoogFest plans, the gear he's bringing, and asked him to name his favorite synth-related recordings.

#modularsynth #eurorack #computer #rock #riot #manic #electromagneticpulse #mantra #speakingintongues #haunted #medical #equipment

A post shared by Michael Dykehouse (@michaeldykehouse) on Nov 12, 2017 at 4:45pm PST

In addition to being a remarkable painter, Mike Dykehouse is an immensely creative musician. But after his Dynamic Obsolescence (2001) album on the influential British electronica Planet Mu and another on Ghostly International with the shoegaze-y Midrange (2004), Dykehouse mostly went underground.

Or rather, to Instagram.

Dykehouse's daily video clips of new synth jams -- ranging from straight-up techno and boogie-bass electro to hip-hop boom-bap and exploratory noise -- are often highlights of his followers' days. (Am I projecting?)

In a rare live appearance, Dykehouse will demonstrate the latest version of his ever-changing modular synth setup at Mini MoogFest, giving listeners a front-row seat to his daily sonic rituals.

We talked to Dykehouse about his Mini MoogFest plans, the gear he's bringing, and asked him to name his favorite synth-related recordings. But to evoke the immortal Joe Perry Project, Dykehouse mostly lets the music do the talking.

"Publishing is a business," writes mega-selling author Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook) in the "Advice for Writers" section of his website. "Writing may be art, but publishing, when all is said and done, comes down to dollars."

Except with Fifth Avenue Press, the new publishing imprint of the Ann Arbor District Library.

Fifth Avenue helps local authors produce a print-ready book at no cost -- from copyediting to cover design -- and the writers retain all rights. In return, the library gets to distribute ebooks to its patrons without paying royalties, but authors can sell their books -- print, digital, or audio -- however they choose and keep all the proceeds.

Fifth Avenue launches on Sunday, Nov. 5, with a reception from 1-3 pm on the 3rd floor of AADL's downtown branch, featuring author readings from the imprint's first nine titles:

"It’s more personal than anything I’ve ever done," said singer-songwriter Timothy Monger about his latest album, Amber Lantern, in a February 2017 interview with Pulp.

It's also Monger's loveliest album, which includes two records with his former band, Great Lakes Myth Society, and two solo LPs, 2011's The New Britton Sound and 2004's Summer Cherry Ghosts.

Though Amber Lantern came out 10 months ago, Monger recently teamed up with director Brian Lillie to produce a video for "Hayward," one of the LP's most beautiful songs. "A video is something I've thought about doing for many years, but somehow never made a priority until this year," Monger wrote on his website.

We asked Monger about the making of "Hayward," the singing septic-tank man who loaned him a canoe, and what's behind the "Surf & Turf" show he's playing on Sunday, Nov. 5, with fellow Washtenaw County singer-songwriter Dave Boutette at Old Town Tavern.

Downloads:
➥ MP3 for "Slow Motion"
➥ 720p video

Tools Crew Live is an ongoing video series where we invite artists to perform with gear borrowed from the Ann Arbor District Library's Music Tools collection: aadl.org/musictools.

When not on tour, indie-rocker Stef Chura runs several karaoke nights in Detroit, the city where she lives. It's common for karaoke hosts to sing a few songs to set the stage and encourage the crowd, and Chura told MTV.com in a January 2017 interview that The Cranberries are one of her go-to bands to croon.

Cranberries singer Dolores O’Riordan comes up a lot in articles about Chura. Fleetwood Mac's Stevie Nicks comes up, too. So does Liz Phair and The Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde. Bettie Serveert's Carol van Dijk has also been mentioned, and so have Destroyer's Dan Bejar and Television's Tom Verlaine. There are hints of Billie Holiday, too.

Downloads:
➥ MP3 for "Behind the Sky"
➥ 720p video

Tools Crew Live is an ongoing video series where we invite artists to perform with gear borrowed from the Ann Arbor District Library's Music Tools collection: aadl.org/musictools.

The most common use for effects pedals in AADL's collection is to change the sound of electric instruments, such as guitars and keyboards -- not acoustic gear, such as trumpets and drums. But there's nothing common about the music of Mark Kirschenmann, PhD. He's been experimenting with changing the tone of his trumpet through electronics since the '70s after he heard Miles Davis' electro-jazz-funk classic On the Corner.

Kirschenmann is a U-M lecturer of jazz and contemporary improvisation, and he also leads the music school's Creative Arts Orchestra, which includes drummer Adam Shead, a grad student at U-M studying "cultural memory, tradition, and narrative in improvised music communities." Shead augments his standard drum setup with electronics and straight-up knick-knacks, such as a dishtowel or his wallet, so he can explore different tonalities on his kit.

Together, Kirschenmann and Shead combine their extended techniques -- such as playing the trumpet without a mouthpiece or putting a leg on the snare drum -- to create an improvised universe of sound.

We talked to the duo about why they began applying electronic effects to their acoustic instruments, Kirschenmann's use of AADL music tools in his classes, and the stories behind the two songs they recorded for us in the library's Secret Lab on April 20, 2017.

Downloads:
➥ 720p Video
➥ MP3

During the Ann Arbor Comics Art Festival -- aka A2CAF -- in June, cartoonist Jerzy Drozd interviewed his fellow author-illustrator Ben Hatke about his work. The two were on the third floor of the downtown branch of the Ann Arbor District Library, standing in front of the framed works that comprise the exhibition Ben Hatke: Art and Adventure:

Explore the plucky heroes, eerie monsters, and fabulous realms of artist and author Ben Hatke in an exhibition of original art from his picture books and graphic novels. Illustrations and watercolors from Nobody Likes a Goblin, Zita the Spacegirl, Julia’s House for Lost Creatures, and a few surprises. (The exhibition runs through August 31.)

The talk between Drozd and Hatke runs 41 minutes. Pressed for time? Grab the MP3; the conversation works fine as a podcast. Or if you want to skip around, see the list below with the topics discussed and their times in the video/MP3:

Downloads:
➥ MP3 for "Bodies” + “Bet"
➥ 720p video, 480p video or 240p video

Tools Crew Live is an ongoing video series where we invite artists to perform with gear borrowed from the Ann Arbor District Library's Music Tools collection: aadl.org/musictools.

* This video contains explicit content. *

As evidenced by their name, Approachable Minorities make strong social statements couched in playfully pointed language. The Ypsilanti hip-hop trio -- MCs Drew Denton and TJ Greggs with DJ Marcus McKinney -- released its debut album, Afro-American, in April 2016, and Denton’s solo LP, The Ascension Theory, arrived in December.

Approachable Minorities have worked hard to promote their music through a series of concerts under the name Northern Threat Entertainment, but the group is largely still a Washtenaw County phenomenon. But any label or manager looking to sign a talented and motivated group of artists who are ready to put in the work to promote their art would do well to turn 2017 into Approachable Minorities’ breakout year.

Impressed by the ensemble’s creativity and energy, we invited Approachable Minorities and their friend Cole Greve to check out a bunch Music Tools from the Ann Arbor District Library, learn how to use the gear, and come cut a Tools Crew Live video. The group re-created two cuts from Afro-American -- “Bodies” and “Bet” -- on the library’s gear and performed the songs at AADL’s downtown branch on June 9, 2017.

We spoke with Denton about the group’s history, the stories behind the songs, and the challenges and rewards of learning new music gear from scratch.

André Mehmari plays piano like it's an extension of his body. It's easy to imagine his fingers taking the place of the piano's hammers and directly pounding the strings that stretch from inside the keyboard and connect directly to his brain. His hands move like dancers, gliding over the keys with such grace and flow that it's hard not to stare at them as he fills the room with gorgeous melodies and blissful harmonic combinations.

Born in 1977 in Niterói, Brazil, a town across Guanabara Bay from Rio de Janeiro, Mehmari began studying piano with his mom at age 5, learned how to improvise soon after, and by 10 had written his first compositions. His wide-ranging, highly personal playing incorporates jazz, classical, and all forms of Brazilian music, and those styles spill out on the piano with stunning fluidity.

Mehmari returns to Ann Arbor to play Kerrytown Concert House on Sunday, July 16, two weeks shy of the one-year anniversary of his last concert there. He’s also playing the Toledo Museum of Art on Saturday, July 15, where he will get to perform in the Glass Pavilion on a super-cool Wendell Castle-designed Steinway piano as well as playing a percussive improvisation on original glass art that was crafted for the museum’s Hot Shop.

We talked to Mehmari about his technique, sui genris Beatles covers, and glass marimbas