Mezzo-soprano Melissa Plagemann premieres two song cycles for voice and piano: The Burning Harp, by Forrest Pierce, is set to poetry by Rumi, and a cycle by Seattle composer Sheila Bristow, exploring dance and movement in poetry.

Praised for her “clear, burnished voice” and “mezzo rich with an alto’s strength and a soprano’s shining top edge” (Tacoma News Tribune), Melissa Plagemann’s busy performing schedule spans the stages of opera, oratorio, chamber music, and ensemble performances. The 2016-17 season sees her return to Seattle Opera for performances of Janacek’s Katya Kabanova (Zena), and to the Tacoma Symphony for performances of Handel’s Messiah. She also sings the role of Una in Sterling Tinsley’s children’s opera St. George and the Dragon, a recital of American song with the Regency Voices of Pacific Lutheran University, performances of Nutcracker and West Side Story for Pacific Northwest Ballet, and previews of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel (witch). Melissa teaches on the faculties of Pacific Lutheran and Western Washington Universities.

Sheila Bristow is a church musician, accompanist, and composer living in Tacoma. She is the Organist & Choirmaster at Episcopal Church of the Redeemer, an Affiliate Artist at Pacific Lutheran University, and a freelance opera rehearsal pianist. She holds degrees in music composition from Cornish College of the Arts, where she studied with Bern Herbolsheimer as a Kreielsheimer Scholar, and the University of Washington, where she served as a graduate student accompanist while earning her MM in organ performance. She is currently studying composition with John Muehleisen. Sheila finds her primary compositional inspiration in poetic texts. Her choral works have been performed by the Cascadian Chorale, The Medieval Women’s Choir, Pacific Lutheran University’s Choral Union & University Singers, Pacifica Children’s Chorus, Seattle Pro Musica, and the University Unitarian Church choir. Sheila’s art songs have been featured in concerts sponsored by Pacific Lutheran University, Vancouver International Song Institute, and the Washington Composer’s Forum.

Three distinctive voices in the fields of experimental sound utilizing the human voice, electronics, violin and trumpet to explore the realms of pure sound, noise and concepts of music beyond genre. WARNING: PART OF THIS PERFORMANCE INCLUDES STROBE LIGHTS.

John Krausbauer will be performing an extended-durational piece for amplified violin, voice and synth, utilizing high volumes, just tunings and stroboscopic lighting, to create an immersive experiential sound environment.

C. Spencer Yeh will perform on amplified violin, exploring an array of self-taught techniques through minimalist compositional frameworks.

Greg Kelley will present a single piece for amplified trumpet, including non-standard techniques and electronic processing capitalizing on The Chapel’s unique acoustics to create an immersive soundfield.

John Krausbauer is a music maker currently living in Los Angeles. He has performed his music in a multitude of settings – from basements and rock clubs to colleges and art galleries. Numerous recordings of his work have been released on independent labels in both the US and Europe. In recent years his focus has been on his solo work, involving ritual endurance happenings with voice and violin, accompanied by synth and strobes; his compositions, mainly concerned with sytems-based phasing constructions; the Ecstatic Music Band, a collective exploring just tunings with amplified strings at high volumes and long durations, with stroboscopic lighting; The Essentialists, a country-blues-boogie-raga guitar/violin duo; and most recently the formation of the “M”inimalist psych-punk group, Night Collectors. Trance-Psychedelia is the aim and goal, thru experiential-architectural sound environments.

C. Spencer Yeh was born in Taipei Taiwan and is currently based in Brooklyn New York. Yeh’s sonic practice first developed within the autodidactic and u venturesome strategies of the American and International underground, most prominently with his project Burning Star Core. Preferring the distinction of “working with sound and music” over more familiar nominations of “musician,” Yeh considers not only timbre, texture, and temporality as material considerations, but the construction of genre, audience, and lore as part of the listener/consumer’s experience. Having amalgamated numerous artistic mediums and roles over his numerous endeavors, Yeh’s formative infatuation with noise and improvised music could still be regarded as his most unadulterated expression – a bespoke array of facilities and parlance on a foundation of unconventional musical pedagogy.

Greg Kelley began studying the trumpet at age 10. He attended the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, where in addition to studying the Conservatory curriculum, he also immersed himself in a deep study of avant-garde and experimental music, eventually coming to the conclusion that his musical focus fell outside of the academic sphere. After his studies, Kelley moved back to his native Massachusetts, quickly insinuated himself into the local avant-garde circles and soon commenced a period of intense travel and collaboration, bringing him throughout North America, Europe, Japan, Argentina & Mexico. In 2014, he relocated to Seattle. He has appeared on over 90 recordings and plays in a number of long running groups including Nmperign (with Bhob Rainey), the BSC and Heathen Shame (with Wayne Rogers & Kate Village of Major Stars). Other collaborators have included Jandek, Keiji Haino, Donald Miller (Borbetomagus), Anthony Braxton, Kevin Drumm, Christian Wolff, Pauline Oliveros, Joe McPhee and Lionel Marchetti. In addition to playing the trumpet, Kelley has also recorded music using electronics and musique concrete elements, sometimes utilizing trumpet-based sound sources, other times not.

Clifford Dunn is a flutist/composer/software developer living in Seattle. He seeks to always push the boundaries of his flute capabilities and utilize the most advanced and esoteric technology available to create unapologetic and intense music that will make you think. His influences range from heavy metal and rock and roll, Japanese Onkyo, jazz, and classical music. He has performed throughout Europe, the USA, and Canada as a soloist and collaborator.

Patrick Neill Gundran has been performing live as a guitarist in the Pacific Northwest under the name Uneasy Chairs for the past 4 years, focusing entirely on free improvising and experimenting with sound. As well as performing solo, he has also been an active live collaborator with a diverse community of musicians and artists with backgrounds ranging from jazz, classical, rock and roll, electronic, noise as well as Butoh dance. An interest in various approaches to meditation and Buddhist philosophy informs his playing, listening and approach.

Concert Imaginaire is a Seattle-based chamber ensemble founded in 2011. The group records, performs concerts, and gives new music workshops at colleges and universities in the Pacific Northwest. Our core ensemble is Becca Baggenstoss, percussion; Ruthie Dornfeld, violin; Evan Robertson, bass; Lewis Thompson, piano; and David Hahn, guitar/music director. In tonight’s concert we will be joined by soprano Sarah Joanne Davis who gives the world premiere performance of Chippewa Songs, a cycle with Native American lyrics composed for and dedicated to the North Dakota Water Protectors. Mezzo Katie Weld will be singing Aria Anum J, a dramatic song about the enjoyment of marijuana. The title piece of the program will feature the Orango-Tango dancers – one man, one, woman, one orangutan. Filling out the program will be Slogan, also a world premiere performance, for narrator and ensemble. The piece examines the true meaning behind political slogans. The excellent visuals accompanying the performance tonight are assembled by Leo Mayberry.

Concert Imaginaire’s debut CD, Fortune’s Wheel will be available for purchase at the door. If you would like to book Concert Imaginaire for a concert or workshop, or would simply like further information about us, please contact our manager Rigtig God.

Seattle based cellist and composer Lori Goldston plays solo amplified cello in honor of her friend, visual artist, musician and poet Geneviève Castrée, whose death in 2016 left a gigantic hole in many hearts. Facebook Event Page

Cursive is a new chamber group specializing in performing unjustly neglected modern classical works with a shifting ensemble, making each program unique not only in its instrumentation but in its mixture of composers, styles and moods. With each program you’re guaranteed to hear works that you’ve never heard before and may never hear again.

Our newest program, Tall Wind, is built around a stunning early work by Cambodian-American composer Chinary Ung for the unusual combination of voice, flute, oboe, guitar and cello, and extrapolates on the richly shifting mental and emotional landscape of changing seasons. As with all our programs the repertoire stretches across many decades, with the oldest being the 10 Blake Songs of Ralph Vaughan Williams from the late ’50’s, and the most recent being the haunting Aether by the Canadian Jordan Nobles. The program is also balanced to showcase each of the instruments in different combinations, giving each player a chance to shine and giving the audience a lushly-colored instrumental experience.

The players are flutist Colleen McElroy, leader of the Emissary Quartet; oboist Ursula Sahagian; guitarist Michaud Savage of the Seattle Composers Alliance; cellist Mary Riles of the North Corner Chamber Orchestra; and led by vocalist/trumpeter Peter Nelson-King of Brass Band Northwest and Ensign Symphony and Chorus.

Gift Tapes/DRAFT presents a night of experimental electronic music featuring Matt Carlson, Jeff Witscher, and Jason E Anderson – for the second installment of its 2017 program at the Chapel. Making his first Seattle appearance since the release of The View from Nowhere (Shelter Press), Portland’s Matt Carlson will perform a 4-channel piece for modular, synth and voice. Jeff Witscher (Rene Hell) will perform a computer music composition set to video. Local sound artist and Gift Tapes/DRAFT head Jason E Anderson will perform computer-controlled synthesizer.

Matt Carlson is an electronic music composer from Portland, Oregon. He works with analog modular synthesis, voice, computer, field recordings, and improvisation to construct dense clouds of surrealistic electroacoustic sound phenomena. His most recent work includes “The View from Nowhere”, a text-sound LP for the French label Shelter Press, and “Aakash”, a collaborative LP with vocalist Michael Stirling and guitarist Doug Theriault. He also performs with bass clarinetist Jonathan Sielaff as Thrill Jockey artists Golden Retriever.

Jeff Witscher was born in 1983 in Long Beach, California and currently manages his own cleaning company Vincent’s Expert Cleaners in Portland, Or. He has recorded under a few different names, Rene Hell perhaps being the most known. He is an avid chess player & spends most of his time working, cleaning & reading. He focuses on sound composition utilizing his computer attempting strong narratives with accompanying videos for his live performances. He’s currently working on Cob Music & reclaiming his position atop fantasy basketball. Recent solo recordings include Bifurcating a Resounding No!, 2014; Meclu, 2013; Vanilla Call Option, 2013.

Jason E Anderson is an artist from Seattle whose work includes performance, recorded works, video, installation, and music for dance. He creates sound using synthesis, acoustic recordings, programming and text. His work emerges from the traditions of experimental music and sound art. Anderson performs and records music under his own name, as Spare Death Icon, and in performance art/music/film hybrid LIMITS with dancer/choreographer Corrie Befort. He is an active performer, an organizer/producer of performance events in the Pacific Northwest, and he publishes the recorded work of his contemporaries on his experimental music record labels Gift Tapes and DRAFT. Anderson’s recorded work can be found on these labels, as well as Locust, Digitalis, Aguirre (Belgium), SicSic (Germany), Börft (Sweden) and many others.

Seattle Modern Orchestra celebrates the centennial of American composer Robert Erickson and the 80th birthday of legendary Seattle trombonist and composer Stuart Dempster. Erickson (1917–1997) crystallized the American pioneering spirit in music. He was one of the first American composers to explore Schoenberg’s twelve-tone system, experimented with custom-made percussion instruments and instrumental extended techniques, and worked extensively with sounds recorded on tape with or without live performers. The three works on this program give a glimpse into this underrated American artist. Erickson will be paired with another pioneer, Stuart Dempster, whose motto is to “put ‘play’ back in playing music.” SMO will feature both pre-composed and improvised works of his, including a world premiere written for SMO, titled S.M.O.R.E.S. There will be an interview with Dempster at 7:30.

Austin Larkin presents music entitled Metal Cups of Different Hues, realized with 21 musicians.

Metal Cups of Different Hues is a field of tiles, a field of bells, a choir of bells, megaphones, forged gongs tuned to the harmonic series, tempered piano and violin. Material qualities of sound sources and structural aspects of the sounds are unified, bringing focus to the corporeality of the music and interaction of place.

Honey Noble is a singer-songwriter project headed by songwriter and vocalist Katie Jacobson. Front woman Katie Jacobson writes in any and every style. Sometimes seriously sexy synth pop, sometimes rhymes about going to school, sometimes 70s love songs, sometimes a pizza dance party. This band loves to shake it up. Katie’s thoughtful lyrics and powerful singing tie everything together marrying seriousness with humor at every moment. On this gig they will be doing a theatrical performance, part concert and part play titled “The Monster”.

Opening is Carbon Quartet, a saxophone foursome that performs some of the most exciting and dynamic quartet music on the planet. From jazz to classical to Latin, Carbon Quartet will tackle anything. Rulon Brown on soprano sax, Nick Torretta on alto sax, Kevin Nortness on tenor sax and Chris Credit on baritone sax.