Our collaboration with Buke and Gase!

On the Boston Celebrity Series Stave Sessions.

When Sō Percussion first teamed up with Buke and Gase, we hoofed it up to Aaron Sanchez’ old farmhouse outside of Hudson, NY. After squeezing a few drumsets and a vibraphone into the upstairs loft, we set to work layering our music together and seeing what might come of it. As comprehensive as we feel the percussion quartet is as an ensemble type, we learned that adding a couple of amplified guitar-doohickeys and an amazing singer creates something really special. There is a rawness in Buke and Gase’s sound that compliments percussion very well. Their approach to crafting songs is airtight, but the custom built instruments (Baritone UKElele and Guitar/bASs) contain a strangeness that sets them apart from the ubiquitous amplified guitars and basses we’re all accustomed to. They love flipping grooves and patterns as much as we do, and Aron Dyer experiments with alterations in her charismatic singing style. 

Aaron Sanchez contributed his instrument-building prowess to another of Sō’s central projects, Bryce Dessner’s Music for Wood and Strings. He fabricated a newly conceived instrument for that work, the “chordstick.” We in Sō are used to making our own instrument assemblages out of tin cans, wood planks, or metal pipes, but Aaron’s skills are of a higher order. Inventing a new sound world with each piece is central to the idea of the percussion ensemble – as it turns out, it is now central to a lot of music making. Our collaboration with Buke and Gase exemplifies this.