Second Sundays: Streamcast & Open House May 2014

The Clocktower joins in the activities of Pioneer Works' Second Sunday open house and invites all visitors to tour our radio and operations center, lounge in our viewing room, and learn about our programs.

Radio Streamcast Live! Clocktower Radio will stream interviews and music throughout the event. Just click our NOW PLAYING button at the bottom of the screen to tune in.

SECOND SUNDAYS is a monthly series of open studios, live music/DJ, and site-specific interventions presented by Pioneer Works the second Sunday of every month. Open art & science studios start at 5PM and live music curated by Olivier Conan starts at 7PM.

Music Schedule:

ALSARAH & THE NUBATONES – 7PM
Fronted by Sudanese singer Alsarah, the group plays what they call "East African Retro Pop" - music that harkens back to the hazy sounds of the 1960s and 70s Nubian music, with Eastern instrumentation, soaring vocal melodies, and pentatonic scales. The music has its musical roots in the Nubian "Songs of Return" that began to spring up after mass displacement and resettlement of hundreds of thousands in a region of lower Nubia that went under water after Egypt built Aswan High Dam to control the flooding of the Nile in 1970. The focus of Alsarah's new album, "Silt", both thematically and lyrically is about to return home. It embodies a certain kind of saudade - a nostalgic longing for a place that no longer exists. Alsarah and the Nubatones' music is their take on a certain musical fusion that happened in 1970s Khartoum, along with Arabic and North African influences. "The New Star of Nubian Pop", The Guardian, UK.


MELAZA – 9PM
Inspired by the golden age of New York Salsa, Melaza plays the kind of music Larry Harlow or Hector Lavoe could be proud of. This fourteen piece band is what Fania should look like in the 21st century - a latin big band wit enough of an urban edge to please the toughest New Yorker and enough nostalgia to woo the sappiest ones. Band leader and player Jacob Plasse is a veteran of the NY Latin scene and Peruvian singer Renzo Padilla can navigate Son and Boleros with charisma and dazzling musicality. Fittingly, their first album was released by Daptone records, whose concept of Neo-Soul seems to now extend to Neo-Salsa.

Open Studios

Pioneer Works’ artists-in-residence open their studios, as part of the event. Residents include Pedro Wirz; Andres Carranza; Robyn; Jasa; Joey Frank; James Mercer; Bradley Pitts; and Clocktower Productions’ newly completed radio station.