Nobuo Kubota

Sounds Like Kubota

Directed and produced by Annette Mangaard and Nobuo Kubota
10:30 minutes • 2006
Available on DVD and VHS

Musician/sculptor/performer Nobuo Kubota has been an innovator in free form sound art for 30 years. Drawing on the work of the Futurists, Dadaists and New York's Fluxus group, Kubota began his musical career as a member of the Artists' Jazz Band and later the Canadian Creative Music Collective (CCMC). With a shifting membership that has included Michael Snow, Gordon Rayner, Paul Dutton and other prominent Toronto artists, CCMC and their spontaneously composed music became a solid fixture on the avant-garde scene, along with bpNichol's group The Four Horsemen. In recent years, Kubota has performed solo in some of Europe's most prestigious sound poetry festivals.

This short performance piece delves into some of Kubota's best-known pieces, like Sound Cage, Mouth Mechanics and Deep Text, sound explorations that probe the limits of human voice and non-verbal communication. With a resurgence of free improv music, this extraordinary sound-art pioneer continues to inspire.