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Other Minds Records
MS.414
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Table of contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
University of California, Santa Cruz
Title: Other Minds records
creator:
Other Minds (Organization)
Identifier/Call Number: MS.414
Identifier/Call Number: 629
Physical Description:
113.7 Linear Feet
109 boxes, 2 rolled items, 12 framed items
Date (inclusive): 1918-2018
Date (bulk): 1981-2015
Language of Material: English
Collection is open for research.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Charles Amirkhanian, 2016.
This collection is arranged in eight series:
- Series 1: Events files
- Series 2: Charles Amirkhanian files
- Series 3: Administrative files
- Series 4: Scores
- Series 5: Other Minds Record Label files
- Series 6: Subject files
- Series 7: Other Minds Audio Archive files
- Series 8: Artwork and oversized materials
The San Francisco based Other Minds organization is a non-profit institution supporting new
and contemporary music since it was founded in 1993. The mission of the organization centers
around the propagation of new and experimental music, primarily by living composers around
the world. As part of this goal, the organization concerns itself with four primary efforts:
live events, particularly the annual Other Minds Festivals accompanied by the Djerassi
Artist Residency program, featuring primarily new music by living composers; the creation of
recordings of new compositions by up and coming composers as well as previously unrecorded
music of the recent past; radio broadcasts of new music and interviews with composers; and
the archiving of materials inherited from the Bay Area radio broadcasts of KPFA (1960-1992).
Other Minds was co-founded by Charles Amirkhanian, who continues to serve as Executive and
Artistic Director as of 2018, and Jim Newman. Both individuals came to Other Minds with
extensive experience producing new and experimental art, film, music and television
projects.
Composer and radio broadcaster Charles Amirkhanian was born in Fresno, California in 1945
and has lived in the San Francisco Bay Area since the late 1960s. He served as the Music
director for Pacifica Radio's KPFA-FM broadcasts in Berkeley, California from 1969 until
1992. During his tenure, Amirkhanian curated radio programs featuring contemporary music as
well as interviews with noteworthy composers. From 1974–1990, Amirkhanian programmed
experimental music concerts for the Cabrillo Music Festival in Santa Cruz, CA. Between 1988
and 1991 Amirkhanian co-directed the Telluride Institute's "Composer to Composer" festival
in Telluride, Colorado. As a composer, Amirkhanian is known for his electroacoustic and
text-sound/sound poetry compositions. In addition to supporting contemporary music,
Amirkhanian has efforted to revive the music of older musicians of the recent past, such
George Antheil, Johanna Beyer, and Alan Hovhannes, among others, through public
performances, radio broadcasts, and recording projects. Other Minds co-founder, Jim Newman
was born in Omaha, Nebraska and received his Bachelors of Music from Oberlin College in
1955. He moved to Los Angeles, California following his graduation where he produced
performances of jazz by musicians like Count Basie and Dave Brubeck and also began working
in the art world by founding the Syddal Gallery with Walter Hopps. In 1958, Newman moved to
San Francisco where he founded the Dilexi Art Gallery in 1959. Following the closing of
Dilexi in 1970, Newman reentered the music scene, taking up the study of flute and holding
the baritone saxophone chair in the Junius Courtney Big Band from 1982 to 2013.
In 1991 Amirkhanian left the Telluride festival to accept directorship of the Djerassi
Artist Residency program. He also announced his resignation from his longtime position at
KPFA as part of this pursuit. Newman, a longtime listener and supporter of KPFA's
programming, contacted Amirkhanian to try and convince him to remain involved in the Bay
Area music scene. Together Amirkhanian and Newman conceived of the Other Minds organization
through the inspiration of the collaborative, inclusive model established by Telluride, New
Music America, and other previous music festivals devoted to experimental music. The name
Other Minds was suggested by Newman as a response to an obituary for the composer John Cage
(1912–1992), which stated "His epitaph might read that he composed music in other peoples'
minds." The significance of the name of the organization is reflected in its concert
programming, featuring composers from diverse backgrounds and parts of the world who create
works outside the usual parlance.
The first concert presented by Other Minds featured pianist Volker Banfeld giving the North
American Premier of Hungarian composer György Ligeti's Piano Etudes at Hertz Hall of UC
Berkeley in January of 1993. Later that year the first Other Minds Festival (OM I) coincided
with the opening of San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Performing Arts (YBCA). In
coordination with the Djerassi board of directors, the inaugural festival featured eleven
guest composers, including Robert Ashley, Philip Glass, Meredith Monk, Conlon Nancarrow,
Trimpin, and Julia Wolfe, among others. As of 2017, OM has produced twenty-two flagship
festivals, each with a cohort of composers at various stages in their careers. The
organization also produces concerts with specific themes, such as composer retrospectives,
film festivals, and other special events pertaining to new music.
The Other Minds record label launched in 1999 as a complementary endeavor to the public
performances of the organization. The label produces select recordings by composers whose
works remained unavailable to the general public despite their significance to experimental
composition. Notable releases include the
Complete Music of Carl Ruggles, the
Complete Studies for Player Piano by Conlon Nancarrow, and collections of
works by composers such as George Antheil, John Bischoff, Sheila Booth, John Cage, Kui Dong,
Amy Neuburg, Ezra Pound, Sarah Cahill, and Carter Scholz. The label also hosts digital
downloads of live performances presented at OM concerts.
In 2005, Other Minds began a new series of radio broadcasts on KALW 91.7 San Francisco
called "Music From Other Minds." This hour-long program continues the legacy of the KPFA
broadcasts and furthers the aims of the Other Minds organization by broadcasting new music
on a weekly basis in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Other Minds records. MS 414. Special Collections and Archives, University Library,
University of California, Santa Cruz.
Processed by Jay Arms, Madison Heying, and Jon Myers in the Center for Archival Research
and Training (CART) with assistance from Alix Norton, 2017-2018.
This collection contains the organizational records of Other Minds, a San Francisco-based
contemporary music non-profit organization. The records primarily include business records
and correspondence related to the annual Other Minds New Music Festival, other events,
artists, publications, fundraising and development, radio broadcasts, and the work of Other
Minds staff and Board of Directors. Also included are Executive and Artistic Director
Charles Amirkhanian's administrative and planning files, original scores, artwork,
photographs, marketing and press materials, programming publications, and assorted realia,
as well as CDs, VHS, DAT, and audiocassettes related to the Other Minds festival, events,
associated artists, and the Other Minds record label. Events and activities of the
California College of Performing Arts (CCPA) and the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music
are also documented, mostly through Other Minds' Director Amirkhanian's involvement.
Property rights for this collection reside with the University of California. Literary
rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. The publication
or use of any work protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use for research or
educational purposes requires written permission from the copyright owner. Responsibility
for obtaining permissions, and for any use rests exclusively with the user. For more
information on copyright or to order a reproduction, please visit
guides.library.ucsc.edu/speccoll/reproduction-publication.