Seattle marimbist and producer Erin Jorgensen is joined by inimitable musicians Rachel Nesvig (Hardanger fiddle), Leanna Keith (flute), Aaron Michael Butler (percussion & sound manipulation), Steve Peters (field recordings), and Kevin Blanquies (lights) for a one-night-only-4-hour-improvisational musical nod to Summer Solstice. Underpinned by the hypnotic undertones of a five-octave marimba and dream-inducing vocals, this evening will shift and change with the addition and subtraction of flute, strings, and percussion and the beautifully changing natural light in the magical Chapel space. Stay for the whole evening or come and go as you please. Prepare to aggressively chill and receive a literal vibrational upgrade. Audience is encouraged to bring pillows or blankets for maximum meditation.

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: At the request of the performers, masks are required. 

Mangal is an experimental ensemble conceived by mrudangam artist and composer Rajna Swaminathan, gathering artists across disciplines and locales to collaboratively improvise while pushing the boundaries of their creative process. In English, the word mangal refers to an assemblage of mangroves, which form a chaotic, non-hierarchical rhizome. In Sanskrit, mangal describes harmonious or sacred timing. This imagery of entanglement and serendipity guides a creative space of encounter, transformation, and expansion. This performance brings together a cohort of Seattle-based artists — Zahyr Lauren, Carlos Snaider, Neil Welch, and Ha-Yang Kim — and contributions from visiting artists, including Rajna Swaminathan, Anya Yermakova, and Caroline Davis.

This iteration of Mangal is presented with support from The Ocean Memory Project, a collaborative network of researchers across the sciences, arts, and humanities dedicated to exploring the intersections of Ocean and Memory, as a new field of scholarship and creative expression. In the days leading up to the performance, the artists will gather for a short creative residency at the Chapel Performance Space, interfacing with oceanographers and environmental scholars, and meditating on oceanic modes of creating and remembering through immersion, dissipation, and opacity. 

Rajna Swaminathan is an acclaimed mrudangam (South Indian percussion) artist, composer, and scholar. Described as “a vital new voice” (Pop Matters), Rajna’s artistic trajectory blossomed through a search for resonance and fluidity among musical forms and aesthetic worlds. Since 2013, she has led the New York-based ensemble RAJAS, writing expansive, boundary breaking music for herself and like-minded improvisers, spanning multiple musical approaches. As a composer, Rajna has received commissions from the LA Phil, Chamber Music America New Jazz Works, and Bang On A Can Marathon, among others. She holds a PhD in Music (Creative Practice and Critical Inquiry) from Harvard University, and degrees in Anthropology and French from the University of Maryland, College Park. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Music (Integrated Composition, Improvisation, and Technology) at UC Irvine’s Claire Trevor School of the Arts. 

Curated by Carlos Snaider for Nonsequitur’s NonSeq series.

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: For the safety of performers and audience, all audience members will be required to show proof of vaccination and wear masks covering nose and mouth.

Naeim Rahmani, classical guitarist and Artistic Director of the Seattle-Isfahan Project, has commissioned new works by three Iranian composers living outside of Iran (Anahita Abbasi, Farziah Fallah, Parisa Sabet) and three Seattle composers (Jeff Bowen, Huck Hodge, Yigit Kolat) to draw attention to the water crisis that is happening now in Iran, particularly the drought that is affecting the Zayandeh-Roud, the river that gave birth to the city of Isfahan.

In the last decade, Iran has experienced severe drought tied to climate change. In Isfahan this has been most noticeable in the parched riverbed of the Zayandehroud river. The once flowing river cut across the landscape and carved timeless memories in people’s minds. The “Empty River of Life” ran under the historic bridges and for more than 400 years, the Se-o-se pol (Bridge of 33 Arches) made its motion and power visible. While the bridge is standing, the river is no longer running as it used to. One day it’s flowing and the next day it is literally gone. The future of the river, like the future of the country, is uncertain. This project is intended to both pay homage to the river and to raise people’s awareness about the drought and its impacts.

The project title 33 refers to the 33 arches that make up the most famous bridge across the river. As in the previous Seattle-Isfahan project, the compositions will again incorporate poetry, this time from the Iranian contemporary poet Sohrab Sepheri, whose poetry is closely tied to nature and man’s interaction with it. The ensemble includes Abbey Blackwell (bass), Jeff Bowen (guitars), Luke Fitzpatrick (violin/viola), Naeim Rahmani (guitars), Laure Struber (piano), and Neil Welch (saxophone).

Presented by Nonsequitur.

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: For the safety of all present, audience members are required to wear a mask covering nose and mouth.

Jeff Greinke is a renowned composer of ambient, electroacoustic, and experimental music. Having a degree in meteorology, weather has remained a central theme of his heavily atmospheric work, which blends electronic and acoustic instruments and textures to produce multi-layered soundscapes that are at once haunting and inviting. Deeply informed by his time living in the desert outside of Tucson, his most recent release is Noctilucent (Spotted Peccary). He’ll present a solo set of electronic and sample-based music with projections of his new video work, and play a short duo set with longtime friend and collaborator Rob Angus.

Rob Angus builds kinetic ambient soundscapes using a variety of acoustic instruments to generate sounds that are manipulated, layered, and sent out into a multi-channel surround-sound system. He will perform three new pieces with video projections.

Greinke and Angus met at Penn State where they started composing and performing together. In 1982 they moved to Seattle and began playing in clubs and festivals, working with a variety of musicians in various bands and projects. Their work as a duo was documented on the classic album Crossing Ngoli (Ear-Rational, 1992). Greinke moved to Arizona in 2003, and is excited to return to his former home for his first Seattle show since 2016.

COVID-19 protocols: Wearing a mask covering nose and mouth is strongly encouraged.

A culinary artist of audio food, sous chef (Antoine Martel) uniquely blends modular synths, classical & film inspired pianos, strings, and horns as well as experimental sounds & music concrete style sampling, mixing together both highly composed an totally improvised pieces in an attempt to explore vast cosmic landscapes of undiscovered sounds. Sous chef has been creating for almost a decade now, crafting a wide variety of musical experiences and experiments. Over the last few years, the project has been refined from a chaotic solo brainstorm to a more focused vision of what sous chef can be. This will be the debut performance of the new material. The old stuff has been slowly and quietly removed from the internet, creating the space for a re-birth. Come see what new creations this audio chef has been cookin’ up.

Beanieskimask is Victory Nguyen, who plays with High Pulp and Eams. Channeling emotions and musical storytelling with woodwinds and electronics. Open to being inspired and influenced by all music and art. Derek Blackstone is a living composer. Who produces sound by acoustic and electronic means. Who creates soundscapes for movement and installation. Who reaches sonic heights with the pious duo UNITY GARNISH. Together they will enter a boundless sonic playground under the supervision of the Great Creator, guided by Intuition, and entrusted to spontaneous Creation. The duo have moved toward transcendental musical expression since time immemorial and are thrilled to make their debut performance at the Chapel.

Curated by Carlos Snaider for Nonsequitur’s NonSeq series.

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: Masks are recommended.

Jason Kahn (Zürich) and Alan F. Jones (Tracyton, WA) will perform in support of Jason’s ongoing US tour, with two solo sets each and one duo set for an evening of dynamic modular synthesis and prepared pedal steel guitar.

Jason Kahn was born in New York, in 1960. An artist, musician, and writer. He lives and works in Zürich. His work with electronics involves chaotic feedback systems and placing his body in the circuit ow. Grabbing open leads with the hands makes and breaks circuits, causing the synthesizer to overload or momentarily collapse. Various contact microphones, electromagnetic inductors, and the synthesizer’s own output via a mixing board are used to modulate the parameters of the synthesizer. This results in a very dynamic system, often difficult to control, but allowing great expressivity — much like any acoustic instrument, but electronic. As an electronic musician, guitarist, vocalist, and percussionist, Kahn collaborates with many international musicians in the context of free improvised music. Jason has performed and exhibited work around the world.

A.F. Jones is a Dallas-born, Washington-based musician, composer, and sound designer. His live sets are fully improvised, emphasizing the use of guitar, lap steel, and pedal steel. Al is currently involved in several projects, including ‘what’, Telescoping, and Buck Young. As a sound designer and filmmaker, his most recent film is the acclaimed What Is Man and What Is Guitar? Keith Rowe. He runs the Laminal mastering studio and curates the Marginal Frequency performance series and record label of the same name.

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: For the safety of all present, audience members are required to wear a mask covering nose and mouth.

Inverted Space Ensemble concludes its return in bold fashion. Featured on this program are the Seattle premieres of Vera Ivanova’s Children’s Games and Linda Bouchard’s Liquid States featuring special guest Paulina Michels. The group will also perform Arnold Schoenberg’s magical Pierrot Lunaire, featuring special guests Daria Binkowski, Rose Bellini, and Emerald Lessley. 

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: For the safety of all present, audience members are required to wear a mask covering nose and mouth.

Inverted Space Ensemble returns with the first of 2 consecutive concerts.  The first concert will feature Philip Glass’ Music in Fifths, Kerrith Livengood’s Scrawl Etude and Julius Eastman’s Stay On It.  This concert will feature special guests Daria Binkowski, Ania Sundstrom and Abbey Blackwell. 

COVID-19 PROTOCOLS: For the safety of all present, audience members are required to wear a mask covering nose and mouth.

Multi-instrumentalist Peter Nelson-King and guitarist Mark Hilliard Wilson are coming together for a unique, adventurous program of contemporary works and improvisation. The pairing of classical guitar with brass instruments, voice and keyboards is an unlikely one, but the musicians have found brilliant contemporary works that explore the fullest sonic possibilities of the featured instruments, and explore even further with an extended, genre-defying improvisation on the second half. Featuring a world premiere work by Carson Cooman written especially for Peter Nelson-King as well as works by Kirk-Evan Billet, Frank Campo, Donald Crockett, and Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon, this one-night concert will be an unforgettable musical event.

Peter Nelson-King is active playing trumpet and piano in various groups and events in Seattle, and teaches those instruments at the Kirkland Academy of Music. He is also a composer as well as a published poet and music writer, and self-published the historical poetry anthology The New Pagans.  

Mark Hilliard Wilson is known for his work creating a space over the last 23 years for classical guitarists to make music together in the Seattle Guitar Orchestra and his performances as cathedral guitarist at St. James Cathedral in Seattle. He has toured across Canada and the US, as well as along the Camino de Santiago and throughout Catalonia.

COVID-19 protocols: Wearing a mask covering nose and mouth is strongly encouraged.