austraLYSIS and SOMA ARTS
Creating, performing and publishing new sound and intermedia arts internationally.

austraLYSIS       The Electroband       Roger Dean    Hazel Smith     Members     HearSeeRead     Buy:Releases    Historical   soundsRite journal

"phenomenal musicianship" (Sydney Morning Herald); "cutting edge...eclectic...consummate" (BBC Radio 3); "a fascinating complex interaction of ... sonic patterns of textural virtuosity" (Sydney Morning Herald); "Visionary and voluminous" (Jazzword 2024). austraLYSIS (Will Luers, video, programming; Hazel Smith, text; and Roger Dean, sound) won the 2018 international Robert Coover Prize for their recombinant intermedia work novelling. INFO.

Recent Events(Australia and Abroad) and Publications

'Best of Australian Poems 2024' (Australian Poetry, Melbourne, 2025) included Hazel Smith’s ‘Unbalancing’; it also appears on the 2024 austraLYSIS album Dualling (below). Roger Dean gave a solo performance in Singapore (202502), and directs and performs in the premiere of his new work Niche Turbulence for the Monash Art Ensemble (Monash Big Jazz Day Out, Melbourne, 20250503); austraLYSIS appear for Melbourne Jazz Coop at the Jazz Lab, 20250504. Roger will also perform at the Kinetic Energy Theatre Company's release of a major book of its works (Cramphorn Centre, University of Sydney, 202510), for which he has written a foreword. In current austraLYSIS performances we're presenting pieces from our 2024 album Dualling, Earshift 085 (supported by Create NSW), in old and new versions (duos of people, person/media, person/machine). austraLYSIS performed for Newcastle Improvised Music Association 20241112,and at the Art of Sound series in Western Sydney Uni (202405, video here.). 2024:the new Listening Room page on Bandcamp is progressively including Smith and Dean's numerous text/sound works made for the historic ABC programme of that name. . Roger Dean/Matt McMahon played a 2 piano set at Monday Confessions Sydney 202402: see the 'hymn-sheet'prepared by composer-host Guy Gross here. austraLYSIS presented 20231114 at Tempe Jets , 202312 at Monday Confessions. 202310: Roger Dean presented a "Hook" public lecture/performance (Sydney Conservatorium), on creativity in music. See the video. austraLYSIS (Torbjörn Hultmark and Roger Dean) appeared in Scotland and England, 202310.

Page silent? Play Stretches Joins Overhangs1 (2024)

austraLYSIS new CD DUALLING (2024; Earshift 085) is now available through Bandcamp and MGM distribution, and streams on Spotify or at CD-quality on Tidal (search for austraLYSIS or Roger Dean)! It features duos between people, environments, text, machines, and electroacoustic compositions. It's created by Roger Dean(composition, piano, electronics); Sandy Evans(saxophones); Phil Slater(trumpet); Hazel Smith(text, text-performer); and Greg White(electronics). 8 additional dualling pieces, including two audio-visual works, are freely available on this web site together with detailed sleeve notes. Eric Myers (The Australian): "the most thoughtful and convincing example of the improvised music genre I've heard for some time".Ken Waxman (Jazzword): "Visionary and voluminous". Stuart Nicholson (JazzWise): "sophisticated management of electronic sounds and acoustic instruments that has musical direction".


Hazel Smith’s latest book, Heimlich Unheimlich, published by Apothecary Archive in 2024, is a collaboration with artist Sieglinde Karl-Spence. Part poem, part story, a mixture of image and text with a dash of autofiction, Heimlich Unheimlich is about the aftermath of the Second World War, transgenerational trauma, home and belonging. The book was featured in the “Notable Books” section of The Australian newspaper which said “This is an important book … and is a wonderful contribution”. The book can be purchased from the Apothecary Archive website.

Hazel Smith's ECLIPTICAL (2022), a volume of poetry (with associated multimedia work), available as book/ebook from Spineless Wonders. The online launch of the book, “Snuggling up with Spineless”, in July 2022, view ONLINE features Hazel, Anne Brewster, Joy Wallace and Roger Dean and a Q&A.


 

The flyer describing the work is here. Order a copy here.

A new web piece (2022) of electronic literature, Dolphins in the Reservoir , by Will Luers(image, coding), Hazel Smith(text) and Roger Dean(sound). The piece premiered at the international Electronic Literature Conference (ELC), Como, Italy (202205) and at ELC Coimbra, Portugal (2023); it was then in 'Wild Media', the exhibition of the International Digital Media and Art Assocation (iDMAaA) conference, Winona, Michigan, USA (202406).It was published (202212) by the leading journal of digital art and literature The New River. A screen shot is below, and another contributes the cover of our Dualling CD.


 

 

202111, austraLYSIS and MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, Western Sydney University present: The Music of Science, the Science of Music (the Milperra Sessions)

Four videos, twelve performances, discussion of the works' creation by austraLYSIS members and guests; one ArtsScience video, discussion of the science of music production, performance and perception by MARCS researchers. New music and intermedia work by Hazel Smith, Sieglinde Karl-Spence, Jo Thomas(UK), Charles Martin, Roger Dean and austraLYSIS. Duration 3h, and program notes are included in the FindOut. See also John Shand's article Sydney Morning Herald (202111), and our Limelight article on making the unfamiliar become familiar.


 

The videos are also available on the Australian Music Centre YouTube Channel, where there is an introductory article from their online journal Resonate.


Heimlich Unheimlich, an installation work by Sieglinde Karl-Spence and Hazel Smith, in an austraLYSIS collaboration, was shown at Dogwood Crossing, Miles, Queensland 202302-03 and previously at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery (South Sydney) 202011, and in Edith Cowan University Gallery 25 Perth, WA (202106). The 2024 book form of this work (published by Apothecary Archive) is described and linked above.


 



ENTER SITE GUIDE

 

from Hypnagogia (Will Luers/austraLYSIS, 2013)

  

austraLYSIS is based in Sydney and London; it was a founder member of the former New Music Network. Contact: PO Box 6, Cronulla, NSW 2230, Sydney, Australia. Tel + 61 481 309612; email : roger.dean@westernsydney.edu.au