Norman Lowrey is a maskmaker / composer / performance sound video artist and Professor Emeritus of Music at Drew University, Madison, NJ. He holds a Ph.D. in composition from the Eastman School of Music. His earlier compositions for orchestra, several in the rental library of Carl Fischer, Inc., have been performed throughout the U.S. and heard in radio broadcasts in Canada and Europe . These works include a setting of Dylan Thomas' “A Child's Christmas in Wales ” for narrator and Orchestra, and “Breaking Open,” a setting of poetry by Murial Rukeyser for Women's Chorus and Orchestra. He is the originator of Singing Masks. The masks, ceramic, carved wood, leather and virtual, incorporate flutes, reeds, ratchets, electronics and other sounding devices. Each mask has a unique voice. They have been exhibited in East Coast museums and galleries, including the New Jersey State Museum. His primary creative work over the last two decades stems from a project that he initiated in collaboration with the Delaware Riverkeeper (Cynthia Poten) called River Sounding: gatherings of people along the 350 mile length of the Delaware River to listen to the river in silence and create work in response to that listening. He was a long-time student/colleague of the late composer-philosopher-accordionist-humanitarian Pauline Oliveros, is now the web master for her site, is certified in her Deep Listening practice and was on the Board of Directors of her former non-profits, the Pauline Oliveros Foundation and the Deep Listening Institute. The latter organization was dissolved and moved to the Center for Deep Listening at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He presently serves on the Board of Advisors for the Ministry of Maåt, which among other things, continues Oliveros' teachings. |
Lowrey has presented Singing Mask ceremony/performances in such diverse locations as Plan B and SITE Santa Fe in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Roulette and Lincoln Center in New York City, The Deep Listening Space in Kingston, New York, The New Jersey State Museum in Trenton, and at the site of pictograph caves outside Billings, Montana. His most recent work has included performances in the CRAIVE lab at Rensellaer Polytechnic Institute, and a commissioned video installation in the Smithsonian's Arther M. Sackler Gallery of Asian Art for an exhibit of 2500-year-old Chinese Bells, . WRITINGS ABOUT by Catherine Keller in Sound and Me: Fly with Your Spirit by Peter Berg by Jenna M. McKnight by Bonnie Langston by William Osborne by William Osborne by Mary Luthi by Tom Bickley by Paul Somers |
My life-long passion has been, and continues to be, exploring the universe via Dream Action Theatre, making music of all kinds, with traditional instruments, Singing Masks, chatterboxes, audio/video documentations of local environments, various technologies - all grounded in Pauline Oliveros’ Deep Listening practice and IONE's Dream Teachings.
