John Shirley: Sonic Ninjutsu

Pity the poor ninja; the noble ninjutsu tradition is a rich combinatorial stew of the arts of stealth, information gathering, disguise, and situational/combat skills -- now reduced in the popular imagination to people in black jammies and matching ski masks throwing sharpened bicycle gears about.

John Shirley's new c74 release Sonic Ninjutsu carries the fight to redeem the tradition directly to the brain, by way of the ears. Armed with a full complement of the mysterious MSP tools of his craft, his cadre of autoharps, MIDI guitars, pneumonically inflected vocalizations and cleverly disguised traditional instruments slip silently into the refined corridors of Electroacoustic power, only to emerge at his command as a rambunctious horde of ferociously entertaining musics, possessed of speed, elegance, and considerable agility. Ally yourself with this company of sonic ninjas and they will serve you well.

Cover photo by Anthony Wessling.

Click here to see a list of the C74 one-sheets.

MP3 Samples

Bauble (2.3 MB)
Passage To... (1.8 MB)
Quintet For Strings and Computer (2.3 MB)

This and the other C74 Music CDs can be purchased from our online store.

Next Steps

Purchase a product directly through our online store.

Artist Interviews

Visit the interviews section where you will find discussions with some of the c74 music label artists as well as other people who use our software. We're not as interested in having them extol the virtues of our software as we are in finding out about their approach to whatever it is they're doing with the software, whether it's music, engineering, art, industrial process control, or some combination thereof.

We hope these conversations will stimulate you to think about new approaches to electronic media, and will encourage you to check out the work of the artists if you're not already familiar with them. We've peppered the interviews with links that you can use to explore their work in more detail.