Active in Seattle's avant music scene since the 1970s, David Mahler creates music that radiates a playful grace. A decade ago I saw Mahler perform and was entranced. Flipping on a tape recorder, he emitted a burst of strange, nonhuman sound. Despite the flow of strangeness, Mahler, placid and forthright, held everyone's attention. After another minute, he stopped, rewound the tape, and revealed what he had done. Playing the tape in reverse, it turns out that Mahler had performed the Mickey Mouse Club theme backwards.
Mahler's mission seems to be to transform ordinary sonic material into unusual music. In "The King of Angels" (1977), Mahler spliced and mutated an old 45-rpm Elvis single into a miasma of distant oceanic depth charges. An homage to James Tenney's seminally plunderphonic "Blue Suede" (1962), "The King of Angels" is not only an early sampling specimen but also an illustration of Mahler's ability to extract exotic music from the commonplace recording.
For this discussion and performance, dubbed "On the Vocal Line," Mahler serves up his own work alongside songs by one of his main influences, Charles Ives, America's first maverick composer. "Ives felt that music had a life of its own," says Mahler, "and that music existed not to be understood, but to challenge. Almost every day I think of Ives' words: 'My God! What has sound got to do with music!'" CHRISTOPHER DeLAURENTI
David Mahler discusses and performs Wed Mar 12 (Jack Straw Productions, 4261 Roosevelt Way NE, 634-0919) at 7:30 pm, free.
