Timothy "Ill Poetic" Gmeiner

'With Flying Colors' (2021 - present)

by Timothy “Ill Poetic” Gmeiner & Ben Guerrette

“With Flying Colors” (WFC) is a collaborative audiovisual performance by Timothy “Ill Poetic” Gmeiner and Ben Guerrette that explores the relationship between light and sound: a circle of fifths transformed into a 16 foot circle of lights. WFC traverses a spectrum of genres through live performance: from hip-hop, downtempo, funk, and soul to beat scene and ambient electronic via a synesthetic palette of colors, piano, voice, and synth. Catalyzed by curiosity, exploration and collaboration, ‘With Flying Colors’ is our attempt to bring synesthesia to life as something the experiencer, both singularly and communally, can reach out and touch.

Logistics: This performance is centered around two laptops synced through Ableton, allowing MIDI and other audio signal data to flow between laptops and trigger a series of 24 RGB LED lights on a 16’ x 16’ wooden circle modeled via Touch Designer and DMX control.

Tools used: rtpMIDI, Ableton Live 11, Touch Designer, Waves Plugin Series, Alesis49 keyboard, Akai APC40-mini, 24 LED Lights, UR22mkII Interface, Sennheiser e835 microphone, TC-Helicon Vocal Synth Pad, Behringer Xynyx 802 mixer, various percussive instruments.

More details below:

Timothy Gmeiner is an interdisciplinary artist and music producer. He is currently enrolled in UCSD’s Computer Music PhD program with a focus on spatialized and interactive audiovisual compositions in virtual spaces. He has toured internationally under the name "Ill Poetic" and garnered public acclaim for his releases from artists and publications such as King Britt, Portishead, Rolling Stone and Pitchfork.

Ben Gurette is a music producer and installation artist who’s provided visuals at Coachella among other music events. He is currently the Creative Director at Pixite Apps, a creative product development company. The two collaborated on "Tetralume" in 2018, a light and sound performance built around a 13 foot tetrahedron and continue to create and perform under the name "With Flying Colors".