In celebration of his birthday, trumpeter and composer Ray Larsen presents a special set of music with his chamber sextet, Reasons Why. Featuring some of the most high-profile and in-demand improvisers in the region, this group has not been able to appear for over a year. The band plays Ray’s compositions which gravitate between lush harmonic textures and dense melodic interplay, along with plenty of improvised departures that bring each performance to new territory. Reasons Why is:

Ray Larsen – trumpets
Leanna Keith – flutes
Conner Eisenmenger – trombone
Maria Scherer Wilson – cello
Wayne Horvitz – piano
Bonnie Whiting – vibraphone and percussion

To open the concert, saxophonist and electronic wind synth artist Greg Sinibaldi, who recently relocated back to the Pacific Northwest from Brooklyn, will present one of his massive and immersive electro-acoustic solo performances.

An improvisation concert honoring late dance innovator Steve Paxton with collaborative performances by seasoned musicians and dancers using Contact Improvisation duets, ensemble play, video and audio recordings.

This concert brings freshly seasoned dance and music improvisers from Seattle and abroad to replay, discover and spread the gravity of late dancer extraordinaire, Steve Paxton, who famously said “…being essentially objective, Newton ignored what it feels like to be the apple…”

Paxton’s query regarding the small dance of standing, “Can it be smaller?” steers the Contact Improvisation style duet SMALLER by Karen Nelson and Nica Portavia in collaboration with multi-instrumentalist Evan Strauss and cellist Lori Goldston. The performers give their current answer as they explore the gigantic space found even within the most seemingly predictable outcomes.

“Tribute of Small Dance” includes a viewing of the 1989 video “Goldberg in Vermont,” voice recordings, and scrubby clips of Steve to fuel a creative recall played by an ensemble of performers including SMALLER joined by local performers Alia Swersky, Hannah Rice, Christian Swenson, Aaron Swartzman, Scott Davis, Casey Adams, and small dancing others. The urge is to bring a smidge of Steve’s many legacies, pointings, gestures, and queries consciously into this living moment.

Two evenings featuring recent works by composer Tom Baker and others, to honor the passing of guitarist Mark Hilliard Wilson‘s mother, who passed away in 2022.

Thu. Jan. 16 – Wilson premieres Reflections on a Glacier (2023) by Seattle composer Tom Baker. Wilson commissioned this piece, and will feature it in a solo guitar concert along with First Nation composer Pascal Sasseville Quoquochi’s Totems, works by Renaissance titans Josquin De Pres and Diomedes Cato, as well as pieces by Gyorgy Kurtag and Graeme Koehne. 

Fri. Jan. 17 – Wilson will present Baker’s Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Glacier (2023), a work that grew out of material from the commissioned guitar piece. It is scored for mezzo soprano (Maria Mannisto), alto flute (Sarah Bassingthwaight), viola (Rose Hashimoto), tenor saxophone (Evan Walker), and guitar. The text for this 13-movement song-cycle is based on a poem by Craig Santos Perez. In this chamber work, the solo guitar piece inserts itself between each song, as a kind of Greek Chorus, reflecting on each song and poem.

The concert explores themes of permanence and decay, of love and loss. 

The commission came from a desire to commemorate the life of Wilson’s mother Celia Wilson, who passed away April 14^th 2022. She was a ballet dancer, then choreographer, and Children’s Theater director in San Francisco, as well as in Payette, Weiser, and Boise, Idaho. She was incandescent, living loud, large and with so much joy, though when alone with family, close friends or working with children in plays, she could be quite sober and intimate.  

The theme of titanic and magnificent objects created between 60 million and 2.9 billion years ago disappearing entirely due to our present practices of living and working is a worthy subject in its own right. But it also beautifully serves as a metaphor for the incomprehensibility of losing a loved one. We know it’s going to happen – to all of us – and yet it can still surprise us when the time comes. And scientists have given us so much evidence clearly indicating that we are changing the planet in ways that will make it harder, or impossible, to sustain the myriad of species and of life as we know it. Yet in the face of this imminent unfolding, we have to ask: will we be surprised when the time comes?

Two evenings featuring recent works by composer Tom Baker and others, to honor the passing of guitarist Mark Hilliard Wilson‘s mother, who passed away in 2022.

Thu. Jan. 16 – Wilson premieres Reflections on a Glacier (2023) by Seattle composer Tom Baker. Wilson commissioned this piece, and will feature it in a solo guitar concert along with First Nation composer Pascal Sasseville Quoquochi’s Totems, works by Renaissance titans Josquin De Pres and Diomedes Cato, as well as pieces by Gyorgy Kurtag and Graeme Koehne. 

Fri. Jan. 17 – Wilson will present Baker’s Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Glacier (2023), a work that grew out of material from the commissioned guitar piece. It is scored for mezzo soprano (Maria Mannisto), alto flute (Sarah Bassingthwaight), viola (Rose Hashimoto), tenor saxophone (Evan Walker), and guitar. The text for this 13-movement song-cycle is based on a poem by Craig Santos Perez. In this chamber work, the solo guitar piece inserts itself between each song, as a kind of Greek Chorus, reflecting on each song and poem.

The concert explores themes of permanence and decay, of love and loss. 

The commission came from a desire to commemorate the life of Wilson’s mother Celia Wilson, who passed away April 14^th 2022. She was a ballet dancer, then choreographer, and Children’s Theater director in San Francisco, as well as in Payette, Weiser, and Boise, Idaho. She was incandescent, living loud, large and with so much joy, though when alone with family, close friends or working with children in plays, she could be quite sober and intimate.  

The theme of titanic and magnificent objects created between 60 million and 2.9 billion years ago disappearing entirely due to our present practices of living and working is a worthy subject in its own right. But it also beautifully serves as a metaphor for the incomprehensibility of losing a loved one. We know it’s going to happen – to all of us – and yet it can still surprise us when the time comes. And scientists have given us so much evidence clearly indicating that we are changing the planet in ways that will make it harder, or impossible, to sustain the myriad of species and of life as we know it. Yet in the face of this imminent unfolding, we have to ask: will we be surprised when the time comes?

A serene evening balancing electronic and string sounds. Otolithia from Portland will make their Seattle debut. Relax in ambient immersive layers of shifting textures and tones. Bring a pillow, mat, or blanket to make yourself comfortable while listening.

Otolithia is an experimental, ambient, and improvisational duo featuring Tatiana Muzica (vocals, flute, electronics) and Josh Faber-Hammond (koto). The name is a fusion of the words ‘otolith’, a calcium carbonate structure in the inner ear imparting equilibrium, and ‘lithia’, or lithium water, which reduces depression and stabilizes moods in those who drink it. They hope their music can help the listener feel more balanced as well.

María Dolores A. Matienzo is a composer, poet, and archivist living on Duwamish land. Her recent works explore ritual, sensory experience, immaterial labor, and memory and memorialization. She has performed experimental music for over 20 years under her own name and as Black Tent and maría de los dolores. She publishes her work on her imprint, Imprecision Art. Her work has also been published by Travesties?!, Fantômes, and American Tapes. she’s buoyant, her first score for ensemble performance, premiered October 24 at Base: Experimental Arts & Space in South Seattle.

Ruth Davidson has been performing on their own and as part of Moraine, in addition to numerous other projects. They will be presenting solo cello.

Seattle Civic Poet Shin Yu Pai shares poems written during her poet laureateship for the city, with music from Leanna Keith (flute and voice), Susie Kozawa (found object-instruments), Steve Peters (field recordings), and Kyle Hanson (accordion). Join us on the longest night of the year for a meditative evening of poetry and improvised music. Bring a blanket and pillow if you wish.

Both Chet Corpt and Sean Gaskell have traveled to what might be described as “The University of Kora”, i.e., the city of Brikama in The Republic of the Gambia. There, two adjacent compounds housed two of the all-time greats of the West African kora, Alhaji Bai Konte and Alhaji Malamini Jobarteh. The former had passed some years earlier, but Malamini carried on an active role in teaching and playing even during his retirement years. A former Minister of Culture, Malamini was the perfect ambassador for this music and certainly left his mark on both players. For both, this training is foundational.

A performance of Mandinka-based music requires a great deal of interpretation and improvisation. It is an 800 year old oral tradition that has no need for the standardization of it’s songs. The student must learn from the beginning to actively participate in the shaping of any musical performance at any level.  Both players believe that while a foundation is necessary, one is inevitably thrown back on what one knows about performance and expression, as an American musician. Through creative experimentation, the hope here is to create an American kora tradition, thereby helping to establish West African Mandinka sound art practice as universal.

Otodojo (Maro Kariya, PhD)  is a Detroit-based audiovisual artist who wishes to use multimedia to connect and motivate people towards changing systems that threaten environments. They weave together sonic stories through field and object recordings, processed vocals, contact-miked materials, and layers of synthetic sounds inspired by the natural world and imagined bio-cybernetic futures. Their music has been released with labels such as Acid Camp, Mesma, Perimeter Junk, Qeone, Unimatrix Zero, and their album ‘Amphibious / Aural Spirits’ on The Bunker NY has been named one of the best albums of 2023 by MixMag. In 2018, they launched ‘Microtones’ (microtones.info), an electronic music collective in Ithaca, NY which aims to help community building through music.

Omari Jazz Addae, electing to simply go by Omari Jazz in his creative endeavors, is a composer, sound designer, and producer based in Portland, OR. Simultaneously prolific and measured in his output, the 29-year-old polymath is well-known by fans for his consistently sporadic releases of compositions. In 2020, fans were rewarded in the form of album Dream Child, a 13-track sonic exploration of ritual and the collective subconscious (among other themes) that Bandcamp’s editorial staff described as ‘one of the most immersive beat tapes in recent memory.’ In 2024, Jazz released the eponymous album Black Decelerant with collaborator Khari Lucas aka Contour on RVNG International – a label celebrated for stewarding boundary pushing works by contemporary songwriters and composers. The album was favorably received by critics, appearing in the Wire Magazine, MOJO, and a number of other domestic and international publications. Using a combination of live-looping, triggered samples and synth/piano improvisations, no two sets are the same from Jazz. His NonSeq debut promises similar exploration, oscillating swiftly through sharp electronic passages and dream-like collage.

Based in Seattle, Asa Nakagawa is an intuitive player and self-taught experimental, ambient, electronic musician who began their practice in the early 2010s. They have used a variety of equipment over the years, but have a penchant for grooveboxes and FM synthesis. Aside from writing music, they like to field record, spend time in/around the forest and bodies of water, and make visual art spanning disciplines. They released their debut EP Hex on You in April 2021, and are currently writing and recording their first full length record. For the final NonSeq event of 2024, considering the incompatibilities between labor and grief, Asa will invoke esoteric Buddhist teachings they learned this year, using sound to share teachings that cannot be transmitted using language.

Curated by Connie Fu for Nonsequitur’s NonSeq series.

Red Pants Collective, made up of father/daughter duo James Falzone and Giordana Falzone, join forces with chamber ensemble Kin of the Moon, featuring Kaley Lane Eaton, Heather Bentley, and Leanna Keith, for an evening of improvised movement and sound. Joining the ensembles will be movement artist Hannah Rice.

Red Pants Collective
James Falzone: clarinet, penny whistle, piano, shruti box
Giordana Falzone: movement

Kin of the Moon
Kaley Lane Eaton: banjo and voice
Heather Bentley: viola
Leanna Keith: flutes

Special Guest
Hannah Rice: movement

Seattle Guitar Circle closes out 2024 with an engaging set of music featuring our most fundamental technique of group circulation, and are delighted to collaborate at last with Mark Hilliard Wilson and his Seattle Guitar Orchestra.

Seattle Guitar Circle is a multicultural guitar ensemble founded in 1993, representing an international community of music and education founded with Guitar Craft in 1985. Its members and composers hail from many different ensembles, including both the League and Orchestra of Crafty Guitarists, Tiny Orchestral Moments, the Atomic Chamber Ensemble, Electric Gauchos, Los Angeles Electric 8, and Guitar Circle New England, among many others. Featuring music from the world of classical, folk, bluegrass, rock, and the avant-garde, every performance is a unique event for the audience, the musicians, and the music, with a multiplicity of new and timeless moments. In addition to performances in the Seattle area, its members can also be found hosting monthly open seminars at Phinney Community Center, teaching at residential and online Guitar Circle courses, and actively engaging with the community through education and collaboration.

Mark Hilliard Wilson has an engaging approach to teaching and programming concerts that draws from the deep well of history. Founding the Seattle Guitar Orchestra in 2000, he became the cathedral guitarist at St. James Cathedral of Seattle in 2006. Wilson has taught at Whatcom Community College, Bellevue College, Rosewood Guitar, and is currently at the Holy Names Academy; his compositions are published by Seconda Prattica and performed widely. Recently, he premiered a concerto written for him in 2023 by Ukrainian composer-in-exile Oleg Boyko; 2023 also saw the release of the music of Nigeria’s Taiwo Adegoke for guitars, which also featured cellist Abbie Eads. In April 2025, he will perform the 1951 Heitor Villa-Lobos Guitar Concerto with the Port Townsend Symphony, under the direction of Tigran Arakelyan. In 2024, Wilson released a set of videos based on his ongoing collaboration with Boyko; he also worked with the Seattle Classic Guitar Society to commission Boyko’s Secret Life of Trees for the Seattle Guitar Orchestra, which was recorded and filmed at St. James Cathedral.

The Seattle Guitar Orchestra was founded in 2000, after having met at the Seattle Classic Guitar Society Holiday Concert in December 1999. It is now 24 years later, and they have performed at every SCGS Holiday Concert since, along with performances at Benaroya Hall for the Day of Music Concerts, many of the Northwest Guitar Tests, and much more.