Kevin Corcoran works with sound in contexts of music, art, and place. His approach combines percussion, location recordings, and electronics in performance, recording, and installation projects.
As a percussionist he is focused on extended techniques which emphasize textural sound, friction, sympathetic vibration, sustained tones and the use of found materials. Whether working sparsely with a single drum or frenetically on the drum kit, improvisation is crucial to his practice as generative method and non-hierarchical exchange of ideas with collaborators.
In fieldwork projects, tensions between land use and disuse, infrastructure and open space, contamination and remediation guide his place-based practice through walking, listening, and making location recordings in sound, image, and text.
Electronics figure in his work through feedback systems, radio, tape, software, and various means of amplification in live, studio, and fieldwork settings.
Based in San Francisco, California, Kevin collaborates across disciplines with musicians, dancers, filmmakers, writers and visual artists. He has performed in North America, Europe, and East Asia, exhibited in the US and Taiwan, and published internationally on small imprints dedicated to experimental music.
Since 2015 he is co-founder and co-organizer of the performance series Re:Sound which takes place in disused navy architecture on Mare Island and operates under 23Five, a long running nonprofit dedicated to the increased awareness of sound in the arts.
photo by Rae Diamond