Performers, Panelists, and Composers
Artist Biographies
Gustavo Aguilar, percussionist, composer, and improviser, has been honing his craft as a music artisan for almost two decades. His commitment to combining pre-composed (notated) and present-composed (improvised) musical elements has earned him the reputation as an "intuitive, methodical mystic." His music has been called "beautiful, introspective and passionate," "thought-provoking and thoroughly fresh."
A champion of Contemporary New Music, Gustavo has performed at major festivals throughout the Americas, Europe, Asia, and the Pacific, including IRCAM's Festival Agora (Paris), the Zagreb Biennale International Festival of New Music (Croatia), the Acousmania International Festival of Electro-Acoustic Music (Bucharest), the Jooksan International Arts Festival (Seoul), the Green Mills Project (Melbourne), the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Green Umbrella New Music Series, and the Interpretations Music Series (NYC) among others. He has worked closely with some of the most innovative composers of our time, including Ana-Maria Avram, John Bergamo, Chaya Czernowin, Anthony Davis, Iancu Dumitrescu, Julio Estrada, Art Jarvinen, Anne LeBaron, Annea Lockwood, and Roger Reynolds. For well over a decade, Gustavo has dedicated himself to Creative Music—an approach to improvisation with roots that can be traced to the 1960s and to Chicago's African-American music organization, the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Music). He has studied under, performed and developed a close working relationship with Creative Music luminary and AACM member, Wadada Leo Smith, appeared as a soloist/group collaborator at such festivals as the Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon International Jazz and Improv Festival (Austria), the Copenhagen Jazz Festival (Denmark), and the American Composer's Orchestra Improvise! Festival (NYC), and performed and/or recorded with such creative artists as John Bergamo, Anthony Braxton, Tom Buckner, Roy Campbell, Nels Cline, Anthony Davis, Mark Dresser, Lisle Ellis, Vinny Golia, Charlie Haden, Earl Howard, Kang Tae Hwan, Anne LeBaron, George Lewis, Mary Oliver, Park Jae Chun, Liz Phillips, and Adam Rudolph.
A Brownsville, Texas native, Gustavo has been on faculty at the University of California (San Diego), Del Mar College/Texas A&M Corpus Christi, Korea National University of the Arts, and The University of Akron, and has given lectures and master classes at universities and symposia across the United States and abroad. Over the years, his work has benefited from the support of the Ahmanson Foundation, Arts International, the Korean Ministry of Culture, the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, National Presenter's Network, Ohio Arts Council, and the University of California. Gustavo's current projects include the Gustavo Aguilar Get Libre Collective, the Aguilar/Howard Duo with saxophonist and electronics pioneer, Earl Howard, and soNu, an electro-acoustic ensemble whose debut recording, Sounds From the Source, Downtown Music Gallery called an "intriguing gem." His discography includes solo and collaborative releases on Acoustic Levitation Records, Circumvention Music, Edition Modern, Mode Records, Mutable Music, Nine Winds Records, Samsung-Ak, Sang-Joong-Ha Music, and TaRaGa. Based in New York City, Gustavo holds the position of Music Director with Groundworks DanceTheater of Cleveland, Ohio—a position he has held since 1997—and is Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Tug, a documentary production and artist/performance collective that serves as a platform for critical creativity and energetic thinking.
http://gustavoaguilar.com
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John Bergamo was born May 28, 1940 Englewood N.J. From his early days as a drummer in New Jersey, John Bergamo has never lost his desire to expand his interest in percussion. In 1959 John attended the Lenox School of Jazz in Lenox Mass. next door to Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony. Under a scholarship, John studied drumset with Max Roach; had Percy Heath and Kenny Dorham as jazz band instructors; studied history and theory with Gunther Schuller, Marshall Stearns and George Russell; and was classmates with Ornette Coleman, and Don Cherry. In 1962 John earned an M.M. degree from Manhattan School of Music, followed by three summers in Tanglewood and time in New York City as a freelance musician.
In the fall of 1964, he joined the Creative Associates at the State University at Buffalo. This group was formed by composer /conductor / pianist; Lukas Foss, and its members included percussionist Jan Williams; composers George Crumb, Sylvano Bussoti, Mauricio Kagel, and Fred Myrow; Bassist Buell Neidlinger; oboist / saxophonist Andrew N. White III; singers Carol Plantamura, Sylvia Brigham Dimiziani, and Larry Bogue; composer / trombonist Vinko Globokar; violinist Paul Zukofsky; clarinetist Sherman Friedlander; cellist Jay Humeston; composer / pianist Michael Sahl; violist Jean Depuey; and flutist Karl Kraber. The Creative Associates at SUNY Buffalo explored the avant-garde in a wide variety of 20th Century styles, and performed regularly in Buffalo and in New York's Carnegie recital Hall. Some of the results of this group included the first book of madrigals by George Crumb, Vibone by Vinko Globokar, Passion Selon Sade by Sylvano Bussotti, and Songs From the Japanese by Fred Myrow. From this group John became involved in smaller "sub-groups" with Buell Neidlinger, Charles Gayle, and Andrew White; and a trio with George Crumb and Paul Zukofsky.
Relocating on the West Coast, John became involved in learning Tabla and other hand drums traditional to non-European cultures, and since 1970, has been coordinator of the percussion program at California Institute of the Arts. This breadth of background has led John to such diverse musical involvements as concerts with John McLaughlin's Shakti, performing in Frank Zappa's Abnuceals Emukka Orchestra, recording with , and a tour to the Soviet Union with Robert Shaw, to name only a few. John continues to be involved in contemporary music performance, studio work, and non-EuroAmerican music performance.
Incorporating many of the styles which have influenced him, John has co-founded two all-percussion groups The Repercussion Unit in 1976 with Larry Stein, Ed Mann, James Hildebrandt, Greg Johnson, Paul Anceau, and Steven "Lucky" Mosko; and The Hands On'Semble with Andrew Grueschow, Randy Gloss and Austin Wrinkle in 1997.
http://www.talmala-bergamo.com/
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Rob Esler is a percussionist dedicated to the interdisciplinary possibilities of music, media and science. He has performed throughout the world as a soloist at many electronic music festivals and venues and has written articles for several computer music organizations. Mr. Esler also regularly performs with red fish blue fish, and plays Filipino indigenous music with the Pakaraguian Kulintang Ensemble. His playing can be heard on Cantaloupe, CIEM, Tzadik and Mode Records. Robert Esler is a Pearl/Adams artist.
http://www.robertesler.com
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Julio Estrada. Born in Mexico City, 1943. His family was exiled from Spain in 1941. Composer, theoretician, historian, pedagogue, he began his musical studies in Mexico (1953-65), where he studied composition with Orbón. In Paris (1965-69) he studied with Boulanger, Messiaen and attended courses and lectures of Xenakis. In Germany he studied with Stockhausen (1968) and with Ligeti (1972) Ph. D. in Music and Musicology at Strasbourg University (1994).
He has wrote about a hundred of articles based on his research. Some have been translated into English, French, German, Italian and Japanese. He is the General Editor of La Música de México (Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas, IIE / UNAM, México 1984, ca. 2000 p.) He wrote with Jorge Gil Musica y Teoria de Grupos Finitos, 3 Variables Booleanas, with an English abstract (IIE UNAM, Mexico 1984). He has postulated a General Theory of Intervallic Classes, applicable to macro and micro-intervallic scales of duration and of pitch. In the field of the continuum he has developed new methods of multidimensional graphic register of the components of a continuum between rhythm and sound and a continuum between order and chaos, and sound and noise. El sonido en Rulfo (The sound in Juan Rulfo’s literature) is the research base for his opera Pedro Páramo.
In Mexico, since 1974 he became researcher in music at the Institute of Aesthetics, IIE/UNAM, where he was appointed as the Chair of several projects: Mexican Music History, Mexican Music Archives and Music: Interactive Computer System for Research and Composition for the study of the combinatory potential of scales. He is member of the National Scholars System of the Mexican Education Ministry since 1984 and member of the Science Academy of Mexico since 1997. He created a Composition Seminar at UNAM, where he teaches Compositional Theory and Philosophy of Composition. He has been a visiting professor at Stanford, California, San Diego, New Mexico, Musikwissenschaft Institut, Rostock, Darmstadt, Veruela, Scola Civica di Milano or the Centre de Création Musical Iannis Xenakis. In January 2001 he became research director of the CEMAMu, research center created by Iannis Xenakis. His works are mainly published by Editions Salabert, France. The French Ministry of Culture decorated him with the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (1981, 1986).
“The techniques and theories I have developed are based on mathematics and acoustics; the more neutral they remain, the better they serve the description of the imaginary: it is my ear that gives birth to my music, which becomes the accurate, almost phonographic representation, of every detail coming from my inner hearing experiences.” His music is associated to compositional research on diverse fields; i.e.: scales, Suite, piano (1960); improvisational processes: Persona, vocal trio (1969); compositional mechanos, Memorias for a Keyboard (1971); finite groups theory, Melódica, (1973), Canto mnémico (1973-83); networks theory, Canto tejido, piano (1974), Canto alterno, cello (1978), Ensemble'yuunohui, strings (1983-90); new instrumental developments, Canto oculto, violin (1977); intervallic identities, Canto naciente, brass octet (1975-78); continuum macro-timbre and space sound distribution, eolo'oolin, six percussionists (1981-90); continuum, eua'on ; rhythm-sound components polyphony, the four yuunohui (1983-90); topological continuum variations, ishini’ioni, string quartet (1984-90); continuum-discontinuum modulation, yuunohui’tlapoa, harpsichord (1994-97); Pre-Columbian ceremonial conception of music, opera Pedro Páramo : “Doloritas” (1992-).
http://www.prodigyweb.net.mx/ejulio/julio.htm
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Composer and interdisciplinary artist Sean Griffin lives and works in Los Angeles. He has developed compositional and interdisciplinary methodologies positioned at the intersection of sound and performance, creating large and small-scale concert works, collaborative sound and video installations, and film scores. His works have been presented by Los Angeles' REDCAT at the Disney Concert Hall and the Armand Hammer Museum, June in Buffalo, the Whitney Biennial of American Art 2004, Berlin's Volksbühne, Secession Vienna, London's Tate Modern, and the Festival d‚Avignon.
Griffin is a longtime collaborator with theater artist Catherine Sullivan and has developed new works with artists such as percussionist Aiyun Huang, performance artist Ron Athey, and installation artists Edgar Arceneaux, and Charles Gaines. His current work addresses rhythmic regimentation and conflicting behaviors in performances by instrumentalists, vocalists, and actors. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of California at San Diego.
http://www.seangriffin.org/
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Eclectic Australian-American musician Erik Griswold fuses experimental, jazz and world music traditions to create works of striking originality. Specializing in prepared piano, percussion and toy instruments, he has created a musical universe all his own that is "sincere" (neural.it), "playful" (igloo magazine), "colourful and refreshingly unpretentious" (Paris Transatlantic). Griswold performs as a soloist, in Clocked Out Duo (with percussionist Vanessa Tomlinson), and collaborates with musicians from diverse backgrounds as well as visual artists, writers, dancers and circus performers.
Ongoing interests in Minimalism, Jazz, Op Art, Free Improvisation, Dada, Latin percussion and Chinese traditional music have all influenced his work. Since 2000 he has pursued studies of Sichuan Opera percussion and folk music traditions during artistic residencies at Sichuan Conservatory and Sichuan University. Most recently he has created a number of new works for diverse instruments including percussion ensemble, pipe organ, and miniature music boxes.
Griswold has appeared in major international venues such as Melbourne Jazz Festival, Queensland Music Festival, London Jazz Festival, Sydney Opera House, Big Sur Experimental Music Festival, Tonic (N.Y.), The Empty Bottle (Chicago), Chengdu Arts Centre, Improvisa Festival (Barcelona), Nordic House (Reykjavic) and El Cruce (Madrid). He has recorded three solo albums, two Clocked Out Duo albums, and appears on several compilations (Clocked Out Productions, Room:40, Accretions/Circumvention, Newmarket). In addition, his compositions have been performed and recorded by adventurous musicians such as Margaret Leng Tan, Steven Schick, Anthony Burr, Topology, and Gabriella Smart.
He has received grants from the Australia Council for the Arts, Arts Queensland, and the AsiaLink Foundation. He currently teaches at Queensland Conservatorium and Queensland University of Technology and holds a PhD from the University of California, San Diego.
http://www.clockedout.org/
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Born 1953 in Basel, Switzerland, Fritz Hauser has developed his sound-language in the most diverse ways. His efforts in solo concerts, small and large groups, recordings, and multi-media projects (theatre, dance, film, radio, and architecture) have elevated the drum-set from status of ‘mere timekeeper’ to an instrument of rich possibilities. Hauser has toured throughout Europe, North America, the Middle East, China, the Baltic States, Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Japan and Australia. His commissions and performed works for drum-set solo include pieces by John Cage, Pauline Oliveros, Rob Kloet, Bun Ching Lam, Joey Baron, Patrick Demenga, Stephan Grieder, Pierre Favre, mani Planzer, Robert Suter, Warren Smith, Franz Koglmann, Art Clay, Joëlle Léandre, Urs Leimgruber, Marilyn Crispell, Christy Doran, and Lauren Newton. His percussion quartet, “Four in Time” (Pierre Favre, Fritz Hauser, Daniel Humair, Fredy Studer) performs regularly and collaborates with world-reknowned percussionists including: Kroumata, Steven Schick, Keiko Abe, Synergy Percussion, Amsterdam Percussion Group, Nexus, and Jean Geoffroy.
http://www.fritzhauser.ch
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Aiyun Huang was winner of the First Prize as well as the Audience Award (Prix du Public) at the 2002 Geneva International Music Competition; the first prize in percussion has been awarded only three times in the competition’s 60-year history. She has appeared at the Weill Recital Hall of the Carnegie Hall, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra’s Green Umbrella Series, LACMA Concert Series, Holland Festival, Victoria Hall in Geneva, Agora Festival in Paris, rESOund Festival, Banff Arts Festival, 7éme Biennale d’Art Contemporaine de Lyon, Vancouver New Music Festival, CBC Radio, La Jolla Summerfest, Musik 3, The Old Globe Theater, Centro Nacional Di Las Artes in Mexico City, and National Concert Hall and Theater in Taipei. She performs regularly with the percussion group Red Fish Blue Fish under the direction of Steven Schick, as well as Toca Loca, a group dedicated to expanding the possibilities of contemporary music. Her most recent European solo tour included cities of Geneva, Lyon, Paris, Katowice, Budapest, Bratislava, and Milan in the fall of 2004.
Born in Taiwan, Ms. Huang immigrated to Canada when she was seventeen where she pursued her studies in percussion with members of Nexus. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors from the University of Toronto, a Premier Prix from Conservatoire Nationale de Région de Rueil-Malmaison in France, a DMA degree from the University of California, San Diego. She is currently a Faculty Fellow at the University of California, San Diego.
http://aiyunhuang.com
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Percussionist and composer Matthew Jenkins is a tireless promoter of
avant-garde art and music. Frequent collaborations with composers have resulted in commissions and premiers by composers such as Jason Eckardt, Michael Finnissy, Gilbert Amy, Thomas Meadowcroft, Stephen Takasugi, Alexander Sigman, Aaron Helgeson, Lewis Nielson, and Ross Feller. In support of his efforts he has received financial assistance from the The Presser Foundation, The American Composers Forum, The Zildjian Cymbal Company, and the WHSPTO. Mr. Jenkins has been published in Perspectives of New Music and has a forthcoming publication in Percussive Notes. He has impending releases of recordings by composers Jason Eckardt and Lewis Nielson. In the past he has participated in the Akadamie Schloss Solitude Stuttgart, the Ensemble Akadamie Freiburg, Internationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt, and the Seminar for Contemporary Performance Practice - Boston. In 2000, he was awarded first place in the Heartwood Marimba Competition. As a member of red fish blue fish, Mr. Jenkins is currently working toward his graduate degree with Steven Schick at The University of California – San Diego. He received his Bachelor of Music in Percussion and a Minor in Composition from the Oberlin Conservatory where he studied with Michael Rosen, Lewis Nielson, and Randolph Coleman.
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Marianthi Papalexandri-Alexandri (b. Greece, 1974) is a composer whose music has been performed and broadcasted widely in Europe, the US and South America by some of the worlds contemporary music specialists such as: SurPlus The Volharding Orchestra, The London Improvisers Orchestra, QNG, [rout], Ictus, C. Canonici, N. Brommare, R. Davis, amongst others, in various festivals such as: ISCM/World New Music Festival, Freedom of the City, "Aspekte Salzburg", Ferienkurse in Darmstadt, The Yerba Buena Centre
for the Arts. Papalexandri has studied composition with R. Redgate at Goldsmiths College University of London. She has attended seminars tutored by composers including; B. Furrer, J. Harvey, T. de Mey, G. Apergis, J. Shöllhorn, S. Takasugi, R. Barrett, M. Lindberg, P. Lindgren, B. Sorensen, C. Kubisch, and H. Lachenmann. Papalexandri has been studying with Chaya Czernowin since 2004 and she is currently a fellow PhD student in composition at the University of California-San Diego, under the supervision of Rand Steiger. Papalexandri is also active as an improviser. Since 1999 she has performed throughout Europe and USA and Mexico with Eddie Prevost, The Scratch Orchestra, Steve Beresford, Charles Curtis, S-O Hellström, A. Rosén, S. Vincent, F. Olofsson, Myth America, Scott Walton, Mark Fernandez, amongst others. Recent commissions include pieces for the 44. Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik, and ensemble DissonArt.
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Percussion Group Cincinnati (PGC) was founded in 1979 by University of Cincinnati faculty members Allen Otte, James Culley, and Russell Burge, and is the official ensemble-in-residence at U. of Cincinnati's College Conservatory of Music. PGC is nationally and internationally acclaimed throughout America, Europe, and Asia. PGC is respected for its intimacy with John Cage's full percussion repertoire, both touring with him and commissioning his pieces. The Group cultivates close working-relationships with composers John Luther Adams (recently released JLA’s “Strange and Sacred Noise” on Mode Records), Qu Xiao-Song, Russell Peck, and Larry Austin on the Charles Ives Universe Symphony project. In the last 25 years, they have helped develop a large body of new music coming from many young international composers. Current projects include their contribution to Mode’s set of the complete music of John Cage, and a quarter-century retrospective tracing the group’s own performance history. Recordings can be found on various labels including their own, “Ars Moderno”.
http://www.pgcinfo.com/
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red fish blue fish is the resident ensemble of percussionists of the University of California, San Diego. The group serves as a laboratory for the exploration of new work for percussion and tours this work regularly. red fish blue has played in New York on the Bang on a Can Festival (at Lincoln Center and the Henry Street Settlement), the Agora Festival (Paris), the Centro des Bellas Artes (Mexico City), the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and as a regularly featured ensemble on the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Green Umbrella series. In its 2004-05 season, the ensemble was invited to present a featured concert at the Percussive Arts Society International Convention in Nashville and performed with percussionist Evelyn Glennie in the Disney Hall in Los Angeles. Recent projects include the recently released “Iannis Xenakis: Complete Percussion Works” on Mode Records.
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Steven Schick was born in Iowa and raised in a farming family. For the past thirty years he has championed contemporary percussion music as a performer and teacher. He studied at the University of Iowa and received the Soloists Diploma from the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Freiburg, Germany. Steven Schick has commissioned and premiered more than one hundred new works for percussion and has performed these pieces on major concert series such as Lincoln Center's Great Performers and the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Green Umbrella concerts as well as in international festivals including Warsaw Autumn, the BBC Proms, the Jerusalem Festival, the Holland Festival, the Stockholm International Percussion Event and the Budapest Spring Festival among many others. He has recorded many of those works for SONY Classical, Wergo, Point, CRI, Neuma and Cantaloupe Records. He has been regular guest lecturer at the Rotterdam Conservatory, and the Royal College of Music in London. Schick is Professor of Music at the University of California, San Diego and Lecturer in Percussion at the Manhattan School of Music. Schick was the percussionist of the Bang on a Can All-Stars of New York City from 1992-2002. From 2000 to 2004, he served as Artistic Director of the Centre International de Percussion de Genève in Geneva, Switzerland. Steven Schick is the founder and Artistic Director of the percussion group, “red fish blue fish.”
In 2006 Schick released three important publications. His book on solo percussion music, “The Percussionist’s Art: Same Bed, Different Dreams,” was published in May by the University of Rochester Press; “ his recording of “The Mathematics of Resonant Bodies” by John Luther Adams was released at the same time by Cantaloupe Music; and, a DVD release in collaboration with the percussion group, red fish blue fish, of the complete percussion music of Iannis Xenakis has been released by Mode Records.
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Christopher Shultis is Regents’ Professor of Music at the University of New Mexico where he has taught since 1980. In 1993-94 he was a Fulbright guest professor in American Studies at the Institut fuer Anglistik, RWTH Aachen and in 1999-2000 at the Anglistisches Seminar, Universitaet Heidelberg. At UNM, Shultis teaches courses in American music, twentieth-century music, popular music, and interdisciplinary fine arts. An active composer and creative artist, he also teaches composition for the Department of Music and team-teaches a course on interdisciplinary collaboration for the College of Fine Arts.
Highlights of Shultis’ publication record include the articles “Saying Nothing: John Cage and Henry David Thoreau’s Aesthetics of Co-Existence” (Tijdschrift voor Musiektheorie, November 1998, Vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 169-177), “Silencing the Sounded Self: John Cage and the Intentionality of Non-Intention” (The Musical Quarterly, Summer 1995, Vol. 17, No. 2, pp. 312-350), and “Cage in Retrospect: A Review Essay” (The Journal of Musicology, Summer 1996, Vol. 14, No. 3, pp. 400-423) which won a 1996 ASCAP Deems Taylor Award. His book, Silencing the Sounded Self: John Cage and the American Experimental Tradition, is published by Northeastern University Press. He is presently an Associate Editor for Perspectives of New Music.
Shultis has lectured on both musical and literary subjects in the United States, Latin America, and Europe. A selected listing includes lectures at universities in Mexico City, Heidelberg, Aachen, Bielefeld and Duesseldorf, Germany, Olomouc, Czech Republic and Lublin, Poland; lecture series appearances at the University of Maryland College Park (1995, 1997), Pennsylvania State University (1998) and the University of Virginia (1998); and conference appearances at the Society of American Music (1997, 1999) and Rocky Mountain Chapter Meetings of both the American Studies Association (1992) and the American Musicological Society (1997). In 1998, Shultis lectured on John Cage as part of the Ferienkurse fuer Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany and in 1999 gave the same lecture as a keynote address for the Belgian Society of Anglicists in Brussels, Belgium.
As a composer and creative artist, selected performances include the 1992 Percussive Arts Society International Convention, the 1993 Society of Composers International Convention, the German American Institute’s (Heidelberg, Germany) Seventh Annual Festival of Experimental Music and Literature in 1994 and the University of Illinois Composers Forum in 1995. In 1993, KNME television produced a half-hour program devoted to his creative work.
Shultis’ activities as a scholar and creative artist continually draw upon his previous work as a solo percussionist and conductor of the highly acclaimed UNM Percussion Ensemble. As Director of Percussion Studies at UNM from 1980-1996, Shultis worked closely with many composers including, among others, Ernst Krenek, Lou Harrison, Michael Colgrass and John Cage. His performance of Konrad Boehmer’s Schreeuw Van Deze Aarde for solo percussion (BV Haast, 1990) won an Edison award for best new music recording and various ensemble performances under his direction can be found on the Neuma, Wergo and 3D labels.
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The TAIKOPROJECT (founded in 2000) is an ensemble of America’s premiere, emerging taiko drummers dedicated to preserving and disseminating American taiko drumming through educational activities and public performances. The ensemble’s work balances the traditions and rich history of American taiko with a contemporary edge exploring new dimensions in taiko. The TAIKOPROJECT is the newest taiko group endorsed by the Asano Taiko Company, Ltd., one of Japan’s oldest and most prestigious taiko drum-makers. Formed in 1609, only the world’s top taiko groups play on Asano drums, such as Kodo and Ondeko-za. Only a small handful of taiko group outside of Japan have received this rare honor. Following its first tour, the TAIKOPROJECT developed collaborations with a diverse group of artists, including klezmer clarinetist Leo Chelyapov, Vietnamese pop singer Bao han, Chicano rock band Quetzal, internationally-acclaimed European DJ Tiesto, and Vancouver’s Chibi Taiko. TAIKOPROJECT: (re)generation, their latest creative effort, is a state-of-the-art theatrical production that blends taiko with storytelling, spoken word, music, hip-hop, choreography, video, multi-media, and dance.
http://www.taikoproject.com
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The limitless creativity of Vanessa Tomlinson has spawned significant contributions in the fields of solo percussion, contemporary chamber music, improvisation and performance art. As a soloist she has worked closely with influential European composers Vinko Globokar and Brian Ferneyhough and has commissioned numerous works from emerging Australian and American composers. She performs frequently with a wide array of contemporary chamber and improvisation ensembles, including Australian Art Orchestra, Elision Ensemble, Intergalactic Contemporary Ensemble and Clocked Out Duo. Ms. Tomlinson was an original member of the "red fish blue fish" percussion ensemble and has more recently founded the Australian percussion quartet Playing Fields. As co-founder of Australian-based Clocked Out Productions she has directed award-winning musico-theatrical productions, and has organized and curated influential concert series and events. Ms. Tomlinson studied at the University of Adelaide, the Hochschule für Musik in Freiburg and completed her Doctorate at the University of California, San Diego with Steven Schick. She is currently Head of Percussion at the Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University.
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Born in 1948, Bernhard Wulff hails from Hamburg Germany. He studied conducting, composition, piano and percussion in Sienna (Italy), Basle (Switzerland) and Hamburg before conducting orchestras in Germany and Latin America (Argentina, Chile, Mexico). He has directed new music ensembles performing in Europe, USA, Mexico and Japan, and has been working with the Odessa Conservatoire students' orchestra, touring with them in Germany and Switzerland. As a visiting professor, he has taught at Universities of Mainz, Basle, Mexico City, Santiago, Tokyo, Osaka, and Odessa. Before becoming a professor, he held the Vice-Rector position at the High School for Music Freiburg from 1986-1996. He is a co-founder and a member of the Board of the international public organization Association New Music (Odessa), the President of the festival Two Days and Two Nights of New Music (Odessa, 1995-2002) and the festival Roaring Hoofs (Ulaanbaatar, 1999-2002), Golden Silk-Sound-Road (Kyrgystan, 2000, 2001), and Cracking Bamboo (Vietnam, 2000).
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