Cellist in an Echo Chamber, Echo Chamber

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Echo chambers in which the same voices are multiplied over and over have gotten a bit of a bad rap in recent times. But when a musician engages in conversation with splintered figments of her sonic self, the result can be by turns beautiful, unsettling and exhilarating. On Sunday, June 25, the fiercely talented cellist Ashley Bathgate presents a solo recital at National Sawdust as part of the very approachable Kettle Corn New Music series, which explores the expressive potential of a single instrument electronically layered over recorded versions of itself.

Anchoring the program is Steve Reich’s “Cello Counterpoint” from 2003, in which the live soloist weaves through the kinetically sparkling texture of seven recorded cello lines. Two new works, “Assemble” by Emily Cooley and “Shimmer” by Alex Weiser, expand the repertory for this new kind of one-woman octet while the Icelandic-Canadian composer Fjola Evans provides a composition, “Augun,” for soloist and six prerecorded voices. (nationalsawdust.org)

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