Robert Honstein

Room Tone is a site-specific sound installation. Using Google voice to translate crowd noise into text, a computer speech-to-voice program converts the text back to audio. The audio is then diffused throughout the room using small speakers discreetly placed throughout the space.

Premiered 3.4.10 Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT.

So my good friend and filmmaker Jeff Miller recently entered a short film into the Louis Vuitton Journey Awards contest. The contest required each filmmaker to respond to a given text however they saw fit. I’m not so sure about the text, it’s a little hokey. Actually, it’s kind of awful. But, Jeff did an amazing job creating something beautiful within the contest’s heavy constraints. Shooting in Hong Kong where Jeff has been living this past year, the film features beautiful shots of Hong Kong and its surroundings. I contributed music to the project. Actually, I wrote the piece for another short film of Jeff’s, but Jeff and I both agreed it worked perfectly for the Journey short as well. Anyway, we got to the finals, but sadly the esteemed Jury (and the public) picked another entry to win. Oh well…I still think Jeff’s video looks awesome and for my part, I’m pleased with the music. Check it out:

Journey Video from robert honstein on Vimeo.

This past January I joined forces with cellist Leanne Zacharias, violinist Cristina Zacharias, percussionist Ed Reifel, and singer/songwriters Christine Fellows and John K. Samson to form the Correction Line Ensemble. We represent a wide range of musical backgrounds–composer, classically trained instrumentalist, rock star, songwriter, baroque specialist, freelance percussionist–and together we try to make music that synthesizes these backgrounds into something greater than the sum of our parts. Our first attempt, a series of shows in the Winnipeg area, was a whole lot of fun and by the reactions of the folks who came out to the shows some kind of a success as well. The show included Bartok string duos, re-harmonizations of a Bach Chorale, group arrangements of John and Christine’s songs, and one of my own compositions. It’s a pretty exciting group, with each member bringing considerable experience and accomplishment to the table. But more than being incredibly talented musicians, these guys are awesome, wonderful people. If I weren’t making music with them I’d probably trek up north anyway just to have a beer.

Plans are in play for a more extended tour of eastern Canada in Fall 2010.

Coming soon, CBC Radio 2 The Signal broadcast of our show at the West End in Winnipeg.