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Christian Carey: I heard great things about the performance at Le Poisson Rouge last Saturday. Could you tell us a bit about Glamour Girl?

Lukas Ligeti: I wrote this piece for the Bang on a Can All-Stars, with these specific musicians in mind. The All-stars are the perfect combination of a rock band and a contemporary chamber ensemble and can therefore address many facets of my musical imagination. I love African pop music, and the guitarist Mark Stewart, having worked a lot with Paul Simon, is a big expert in African guitar styles. David Cossin is the rare combination of a great drumset player and a great classical percussionist; I have developed a special polymetric drumming technique for my own playing but here employed this technique when writing for David. The piece is a fantasy in polymetric layering and, at the same time, a psychedelic treatment of African pop forms.

 CC: How often have you worked with the Bang on a Can All-Stars?

LL: This was my first piece for them, and I’m happy they’re performing it often.

 CC: Your most recent Tzadik CD, Afrikan Machinery, makes use of a new instrument, the marimba lumina. I understand that Don Buchla designed it; how did you learn out about it and how do you find using it?

LL: I’ve played electronic percussion for years, so i keep somewhat abreast of the relatively few instruments available in this field. I first tried the lumina at Don Buchla’s house, but he had stopped building them, so it took me about two years until I finally tracked one down in 2005. i love playing this instrument; the software is extremely sophisticated and has great depth, while the mallet paradigm enables me to improvise melodically.

CC:  I really enjoyed the CD’s opener, “Balafon Dance System.” It’s the only piece on the CD that’s for playback rather than live performance, correct?

LL: Yes, that’s right.

CC:  It’s great how the piece incorporates so many of your compositional interests: sampling, African rhythmic patterns and percussion instruments, and the overlapping of these ideas to create something completely fresh. I particularly liked the way that you played with “de-tuning” the balafon sounds.

LL: I like working outside the well-tempered tuning system, but i don’t want to replace one tuning ideology with another. So, rather than using just intonation, quarter tones, or any set system like that, I tweak knobs until I find a tuning I like. For example, it’s not necessary for a tuning system to even include octaves. Spending lots of time in Africa, where tuning systems can vary from one village to the next, I’ve come to appreciate tuning variations as a way to broaden the harmonic and timbral pallette. In Balafon Dance System, I achieve tuning changes through pitch bending. Intonation slides constantly and remains unstable throughout.

 CC: You mention in the CD’s liner notes your tremendous affection for the continent of Africa. Would you share with us a few of your favorite African experiences, musically or personally or, hopefully, both?

 LL: There are too many to count, but most important for me are the many friendships with people in Africa – musicians and non – that I’ve been able to forge over the years. Also, playing or listening to music under the night sky, in the African heat and with the liveliness of the street on a Friday or Saturday evening in countries such as Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Mozambique, or Uganda, has left lasting impressions. African music touches me emotionally, and the African air – especially at nighttime – has something indescribable about it. It’s no coincidence that many people who go to Africa end up being addicted to it.

 CC: What are you working on now?

LL: Lots of things at the same time. Marimba seems to be the order of the day for me, with a marimba solo piece and a concerto for the marimba lumina and orchestra for the ACO in the works. Also, several upcoming CD releases, one with my band burkina electric, and another of my “pattern language” quintet featuring pianist Benoit Delbecq and bassist Michael Manring.