U.S. Steel Cello Ensemble

Founder of the Steel Cello Ensemble (1970s) featuring various players over the years. The music was produced on steel instruments like the Bow Chime or the Steel Cello that were built by Rutman himself. Among the musicians he collaborated with were Rudi Moser (drummer of Die Haut and Einstürzende Neubauten), Matthias Bauer and Carsten Tiedemann. This is a recording of a concert by Robert Rutman and his steel cello's recorded at a Berlin Art Gallery. If you are unfamiliar with the Steel Cello Ensemble, it's basically a few people playing large sheets of metal which produce totaly amazing, spooky, droning outer-space sounds. Very much in the same league as Bertoia's sound sculptures.

from the liner notes:
"The instruments invented by Robert Rutman in the early 1970s. They include the Bow Chime, a six-foot sheet of stainless steel in a horizontal curve, with an iron bar attached to the top corners, and five metal rods attached at intervals to the bar. The rods are then bowed near their centers to produce deep, resonant tones, or close to the point of attachment, producing high-pitched chiming notes; and the Single String Steel Cello, an eight-foot sheet of steel suspended vertically from a stand. A wire attached to the top and bottom right corners is pulled taut to form a generous curve in the steel: this string is bowed with one hand and fretted with the other, producing a range of sounds from low bass to the highest falsetto."