Tiffiny Costello (aka Housekeys) creates ambient dreamscapes designed to leave space for feeling, thinking, drifting, and disappearing. Tiffiny layers sounds on top of sounds with keyboards, guitars, and pedals, as well as recorded sounds from the field: be it city sounds, audio captured during hiking and exploring in nature – anything interesting is of interest to Tiffiny. Composing the most during dark periods of grief, depression, and hopelessness, Tiffiny uses music as a coping skill, an outlet. You can find her music on BandCamp and SoundCloud.

Jellyfish is an improvised ambient drone composition created by layering sounds on top of each other by way of long-tail delay and reverb effects played live. Nothing heard was changed after the recording, it was mixed down as-is. I love using different sounds from my keyboard, like Mellotron, strings, piano, and Wurlitzer, and then running them through a chain of pedal effects to create an emotionally sonic atmosphere, where each chord is decided on in the moment, and the preceding sound influences what comes next. Emotional response is always my goal. I want to feel something while composing, and I want others to feel something while listening or experiencing my music.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Ahmad Yousefbeigi is an inspired and sought-after percussionist/vocalist from Kurdistan. Ahmad’s versatility, love of cultural exchange and collaboration has co-founded Yesod in 2010, an acoustic, avant-garde improvisational collaboration. In 2017 he became a member of the band The Crown and released their first vinyl record in 2018. He has performed at the Chapel many times with YESOD, Amy Denio, and Arrington de Dionyso.

In my live-raw recording-music performance I tried to present some songs which each one reminded me of certain memorable times in my life. The first song reminded me of my Pish-Dastgah (Iranian-Radif system) teacher, Dr. Hussein Omoumi. Second piece in memory of my dear friend who I have his memories with is Yusef Nouroozi. Third, fourth and fifth pieces are Kurdish songs which reminded me of my rich Kurdish culture/heritage. The sixth and seventh songs are in memory of well-known female influential poet and women’s right activist in Iran, Táhirih Qurrat al-ayn. At the end I tried to finish this music performance with two instrumental solos starting with Tonbak and ending with Kurdish Daf.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Evan Flory-Barnes merges his breadth of musical experiences to create an elegant, honest, approachable and magical sound. With deep influences in hip-hop’s boom-bap, classical music’s delicacies and rock ‘n’ roll’s power, Flory-Barnes is a fire, centralized and for any to be made warm. His current Avant-Soul Pop music features a deep love of classic soul and experimental pop, featuring talents as a bassist, composer/arranger and singer-songwriter. His songs touch on the cultivation of hard won self-love, personal sovereignty and experience relationships as both a catalyst and crucible in the developing of one’s soul and self. You can support him directly via Venmo: @Evan-Flory-Barnes, Cash App: $EvanFloryBarnes, or PayPal.

Greetings. Thank you for listening. For the past year and half I have been focusing on singing, writing songs and reconnecting with my first instrument, the bass guitar. It has been a deep joy to discover my singing voice and to dive deep into the bass guitar, while exploring the challenges of playing and singing simultaneously. I call this music Avant-Soul Pop, a merging of my love of classic soul and experimental pop. (Think Curtis Mayfield meets Björk.) On this performance, I emphasize the “avant” in Avant Soul-Pop, taking five of my songs and turning them into vehicles to explore and play within and outside the song.

1. (00:00) “Doe, Oh So Very Dear”
2. (06:13 ) “The Way Out”
3. (12:55) “Nah”
4. (20:47) “I’m Out”
5. (29:42) “Memory Lane”

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Michaud Savage is an American artist, born in Seattle, Washington. His work spans a variety of musical mediums, intrigued by the fault-lines of genre, medium, and contemporary society. Influences reach across early to contemporary classical, jazz, pop, tango, rock, blues, Latin folkloric musics, sound art, noise, and beyond.

“ACAB”

1. (00:00) WHITE BODIES TO THE FRONT
2. (08:30) THIS WAS PEACEFUL UNTIL YOU CAME
3. (14:05) THIS SHIT IS REAL PAIN
4. (20:50) EVERY DAY
5. (32:15) Peace Isn’t Passive, It Is Active.
6. (39:21) Dear Black Man, written & performed by Christopher Lee
7. (43:48) The People’s Assembly – Jesse Miller & Roxanne White

Michaud Savage: guitars, synthesizers, voice, arrangement, production
Lori Goldston: cello
Christopher Lee: poem
Jesse Miller & Roxanne White: speeches

I acknowledge that we are on the unceded ancestral lands of the Duwamish people. A people that are still here, continuing to honor and bring to light their ancient heritage.

These recordings were gathered by myself during the protests in Seattle which took place after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis by the on-duty Police Officer Derek Chauvin, with the assistance of officers J. Alexander Keung, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao.

The poem by Christopher Lee was performed days before the emergence of CHOP, and the speeches were spoken during the People’s Assembly by Jesse Miller and Roxanne White inside of CHOP. While all of these recordings are legally mine to use as they were made in a public gathering space, I was only able to contact Christopher Lee, who has allowed me to use this recording for this purpose.

The field recordings are by and large unabridged. I have chosen to remove a few audio issues, any potentially incriminating information, and to edit the speeches together, which were not successive to each other during the People’s Assembly.

To the many voices who ring out in these recordings, who risked their safety, health, and their very lives by continuing to show up at these protests during a pandemic, I say thank you and stand with you in solidarity. Together we will end systemic oppression. Defund and abolish the police, abolish the carcel state, end White Supremacy and capitalism, and reinvest in the communities who have suffered most from these power structures. 

To know more about how to ensure that Black Lives Matter here, visit Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County. For a more comprehensive list of demands from the Black community of Seattle, visit King County Equity Now. If you think the title of this collection, “ACAB,” is a bit gauche, please try reading Confessions of a Former Bastard Cop. For more on direct action, check out Real Rent Duwamish. If you want to talk about racism, check out local author and (currently #3) New York Times bestseller Ijeoma Oluo’s book, So You Want to Talk About Race. (White people, there is a discussion guide in the back of the paperback edition, also available here.)

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Monika Khot creates apocalyptic dirges combining modern classical explorations of electronic ambience with hardware-fueled industrial barrages under the name Nordra. The project has taken her across North America and Europe, performing in both the high-brow art world and in the underground rock trenches on tours with artists like SUMAC and Algiers. Her last album Pylon II is the soundtrack to a modern dance choreographed by Coleman Pester and, like her debut album, was released on the renowned experimental label, SIGE. The work was voted one of the top 20 albums of 2018 by the Wire Magazine, and it took first place in the December issue of the year in the “Best Noise and Industrial Album” category. You can directly support her by purchasing recordings at BandCamp or SoundCloud, or make donations via PayPal (magiczenmother@gmail.com).

Just over the hills, from the city

This work focuses on both the cacophonous and meditative, of creation with uninterrupted listening, and an allusion to unseen beauty, knowledge, and truth.

“Piped music lifts over choral hills and reaches for the center, the untouched side.

The sounds of the city’s interaction travels over 3 elevated knolls, close by.

The highest peak of the 3 may unveil the source.”

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Carlos Snaider is a guitarist, composer, writer and joy devotee based in Seattle. His current projects include his solo project DONDETOY, trio EarthtoneSkytone with Kelsey Mines and Chris Icasiano, and Eléré Salsa con Jazz. Venmo: @Carlos_Snaider

Thanks for taking the time to be here and explore music with me. In this mix, you will hear new compositions composed since April of 2020, including songs with guitar and vocals, improvised variations on themes performed on guitar and udu, and a multitrack song sung in Spanish.
These sounds and songs have been created in (and as a way to sustain) my personal sanctuary, which for me extends not only to my living space but also to my inner life (thoughts, feelings, vitality, essence). I humbly offer it for you to exist with as you please. The name of my performance practice is DONDETOY, which is Spanish slang meaning “where I’m at.” DONDETOY signals an open method of creating beauty and presence through alertness in mind, body and consciousness, which extends into the musical act.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Emerging from a love of early electronics, concrete/tape music, soundtracks and early new age, Norm Chambers creates worlds of sound that touch on many elements and moods, from spatially motivated ambient to aspects of minimalist composition and improvisation. Chambers utilizes an array of synthesizer equipment to achieve his sounds, in addition to field sounds and occasional acoustic elements.

In Music for Neuropathy I attempted to create a long, dizzying journey through numbing repetition and rich texture, aurally translating a complicated feeling of living with neuropathy for nine months and the strange feelings it can cause, often of phantom sensations, since the nerves are damaged in certain areas and limbs or fingers/toes are unable to move as desired. I utilized a synthesizer for percussive sounds in addition to recordings I captured out in the wild. I wanted to offer a rhythmically interesting track with some immersive atmosphere.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Yann Novak is a queer interdisciplinary artist and composer based in Los Angeles. His work is guided by his interests in perception, context, movement, and the felt presence of direct experience. Through the use of sound and light, Novak explores how these intangible materials can act as catalysts to focus our awareness on our present location in space and time.

Mountain, Fire, Holding Still originated as a durational performance/installation created by taisha paggett and I in the Outer Peristyle of the Getty Villa. The event was a meditation on death, labor, and blackness in antiquity as it relates to the contemporary body, and a performance-as-vigil for past and future lives. The sound was meant to support taisha both physically and mentally while she moved through the 38,000 square-foot space over the span of 10 hours. I hope that this exclusive reinterpretation of the original material can offer similar support to anyone looking for it while we fight for equality and justice during these isolated times.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Christian Pincock is a trombonist, composer and educator who creates and works with a wide range of music and visual art. With a firm background in jazz performance and composition, he performs original music on trombone, on electronic instruments of his own creation, and through conducted improvisation. In addition to over a decade of private teaching experience, Christian has taught and directed bands, classes and workshops at colleges, universities, public schools and arts organizations across the United States.

John O’Brien began his journey in music after receiving a set of drums as a gift from his grandfather. Since 1998, he has been active as a New York City-based drummer and percussionist, composer of small ensemble and concert works, and improviser leading and participating in a multitude of musical projects.

This collection of improvisations between Christian Pincock (valve trombone & pedal-controlled synth) and John O’ Brien (drum set) was made over the distance of 2,400 miles between Seattle and Brooklyn. JackTrip, a free protocol for sending high-quality audio over the internet with reduced latency was used to make this possible. The delay we experienced was still about 80-100ms so we had to adjust our playing to make music that would work in this situation. These pieces were selected from 2 sessions of improvised music with light to no preconceived structure in June 2020, mixed and lightly edited.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.

Bryan Lineberry is a Seattle-based sax player and sound pusher known for sonic exploration and dynamic expressionism. Gregg Miller is a Seattle-based sax player and political theorist. He admires work that combines the indeterminacy of sound(s), the openness and risk of collective improvisation, and the force of political commitment. Anjali Grant is a Seattle-based artist and architect.

Since COVID-19 began, Bryan and Gregg, like all musicians who believe in the power of practicing art in person and as part of a community, were sad because they could no longer do just that. As the weather turned warmer, we decided to meet outside and play – at a safe distance. Gregg found a lush dell in Jefferson Park in Beacon Hill. The recording captures the live event more or less as it happened with birds and wind and planes overhead, the occasional chatter of passersby. The session was recorded with field microphones with minimal post-processing. Anjali Grant did the cover art which features the topographic detail of the dell in Jefferson Park.

As if the pandemic weren’t enough, we would be remiss if we didn’t acknowledge the psychologically and politically fraught context of our playing: Say his name: George Floyd. Say her name: Breonna Taylor. Black Lives Matter.

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of previously unreleased material.