Gregory Whitehead (Nantucket, MA) is a writer, radio program maker and audio artist based in
Lenox, Massachusetts
Lenox is a town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. The town is in Western Massachusetts and part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Pittsfield Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 5,095 at the 2020 United States census ...
.
Allen S. Weiss considers him to be a major figure in the fields of
audio art and
radio art.
[Allen S. Weiss, ''"Lost Tongues and Disarticulated Voices: Gregory Whitehead’s Pressures of the Unspeakable", in Phantasmic Radio, Duke University Press'', January 1995,]
, February 2, 2010 In 2001, Whitehead made a generous private
donation
A donation is a gift for Charity (practice), charity, humanitarian aid, or to benefit a cause. A donation may take various forms, including money, alms, Service (economics), services, or goods such as clothing, toys, food, or vehicles. A donati ...
to the
Åke Blomström Award.
Works
Active in
cassette culture during the 1980s, his early works include ''Disorder Speech'' (1985), ''Display Wounds'' (1986), ''Beyond the Pleasure Principle'' (1987), ''The Pleasure of Ruins'' (1988), ''Writing On Air'' (1988) and ''Reptiles and Wildfire'' (1989). In 1991, RRRecords released a 7” vinyl record titled ''Vicekopf''. Whitehead collaborated with
Christof Migone
Christof Migone is a Swiss-born experimental sound artist and writer, formerly based in Montreal, now living in Toronto.
He currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Visual Arts at the University of Western Ontario
Migone's solo r ...
on the 1995 radio play, ''The Thing About Bugs'', for New American Radio. Other radioplays from the 1990s include ''Pressures of the Unspeakable'' (1992), ''Nothing But Fog'' (1996) and ''Bewitched, Bothered, Bewildered'' (1997). Since 2000, Whitehead has produced numerous plays and documentary essays for
BBC Radio
BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927. The service provides national radio stations cove ...
, including ''The Marilyn Room'' (2000), ''American Heavy'' (2001), ''The Loneliest Road'' (2003), ''On One Lost Hair'' (2004), ''No Background Music'' (2005), ''The Day King Hammer Fell From The Sky'' (2007) and ''Bring Me The Head of Philip K. Dick'' (2009). ''The Loneliest Road'' and ''No Background Music'' (featuring
Sigourney Weaver
Susan Alexandra ( ; born October 8, 1949), better known by her stage name Sigourney Weaver, is an American actress. Prolific in film since the late 1970s, she is known for her pioneering portrayals of action heroines in Blockbuster (entertainme ...
) both won
Sony Gold Academy Awards.
Awards and honors
*1992 ''Pressures of the Unspeakable'' received a
Prix Italia
The Prix Italia is an international television, radio-broadcasting and web award. It was established in 1948 by RAI – Radiotelevisione Italiana (in 1948, RAI had the denomination RAI – Radio Audizioni Italiane) in Capri and is honoured with th ...
award.
*1993 ''Shake, Rattle, Roll'' received the BBC Newcomer Award at the
Prix Futura
Prix was an American power pop band formed in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1975 by Tommy Hoehn and Jon Tiven. The group ended up primarily as a studio project. Its recordings were produced by Tiven along with former Big Star member Chris Bell, who a ...
competition in Berlin.
*1995 "The Thing About Bugs", special commendation, Prix Futura
*2004 "The Loneliest Road"
Sony Gold Radio Academy Award*2006 "No Background Music"
Sony Gold Radio Academy Award*2015 "On the Shore Dimly Seen"
short-listed for Prix Italia
References
*
Jacki Apple, "Screamers", High Performance, Spring, 1992.
* Kristiana Clemens, review, Turned On, Tuning In, Musicworks #95, Spring, 2005, p. 53.
* Kersten Glandien, Art on Air. A Profile of New Radio Art, in: Simon Emmerson (ed), Music, Electronic Media and Culture (Ashgate, 2000).
* Thyrza Nichols Goodeve, "No Wound Ever Speaks For Itself" in Art Forum, January 1992, p. 70.
* Elisabeth Mahoney, review, The Loneliest Road, The Guardian, October 20, 2003
* Joe Milutis, "Radiophonic Ontologies and the Avant-Garde," TDR 40, no. 3 (Fall 1996): 70. 5
* Jon Pareles, review, "Five Concerts All at Once, And It's Quiet", New York Times, April 24, 2004
* Allen S. Weiss, "Purity of Essence", in Breathless: Sound Recording, Disembodiment and the Transformation of Lyrical Nostalgia, Wesleyan University Press, 2002
External links
Official siteInterviewDiscussion
{{DEFAULTSORT:Whitehead, Gregory
American male composers
21st-century American composers
People from Lenox, Massachusetts
Living people
American contemporary artists
American sound artists
American radio producers
21st-century American male musicians
Year of birth missing (living people)
Cassette culture 1970s–1990s