An ensemble featuring Noel Kennon, Dave Knott, Eric Lanzillotta, Carl Lierman, Michael Shannon, and David Stanford on various instruments acoustic and electronic performing graphic and text compositions by Dick Higgins, Robert Horton, Dave Knott, Takehisa Kosugi, Eric Lanzillotta, Mieko Shiomi, and David Toop.

Originally formed in August 2006 to perform a student composition by Sune Smedeby, Eye Music has continued to focus on playing graphic scores since that time. Graphic scores are written musical compositions that rely on visual information rather than standard notation to convey musical ideas. Often these scores are as beautiful to look at just as they are intriguing to play. In addition to graphic scores, Eye Music also plays text scores which consist of verbal instructions for music making. In all cases, the scores used by the ensemble allow for a certain amount of openness in interpretation. These are musical pieces selected for the possibilities they inspire. They often require improvisation on the part of each performer because much can be interpreted differently each time a piece is played. However, they maintain a sense of form in one or more areas making the pieces a group activity in reaching a common goal. The openness of these compositions allows Eye Music to draw its membership from a wide range of musical backgrounds, instrumentation, and musical skill. Whenever possible, the ensemble works with guest composers on their pieces to gain a greater appreciation for possible approaches and considerations in performance of these works.

Invisible Composers Lab brings composers and musicians together, across generations, to create luminous, new creative works. The laboratory’s mission is to collaborate, fuel curiosity, and experiment in a supportive, non-hierarchical environment that welcomes inspiration from new music, improvisation, jazz, film scoring, rock, classical music and the wide sonic world. Fueled by discussions and interactive workshops over many months, each ICL Session includes workshop performances to open the collaborative conversation to listening audiences.

The ICL co-founders (composers BC Campbell and Paul Matthew Moore) adventures in music have brought them to KEXP, The Royal Room, The Moore Theater, Cannes, PBS’s American Masters, The Smithonian, The Paramount, The Seattle Symphony Youth Workshop, and Sasquatch Music Festival to name just a few. They are thrilled to be joining forces to create new possibilities at The Good Shepherd Chapel.

The work and collaborations of clarinetist/composer William O. Smith and artist Virginia Paquette Smith will be celebrated with an exhibition of paintings and a wide-ranging concert of experimental music and jazz, including a structured improvisation for clarinet ensemble composed by Virginia after Smith’s passing, with performers including James Falzone, Stuart Dempster, and many others.

William O. Smith (1926–2020) and Virginia Paquette Smith, who passed away in 2022, first met in 1973 and were married for 42 years, living in Seattle, supporting each other’s artistic endeavors, and collaborating through art and music until their last day together. “Bill & Virginia” honors their life and work through recorded video performances, live experimental clarinet pieces written by and inspired by William O. Smith (as he was known in classical circles), a set of jazz tunes written by Bill Smith (his name in jazz and to his friends), and an exhibition of paintings by Virginia.

About the paintings:

Curated by Carol Whittaker, a former student of Virginia’s, this one-night only exhibition of Virginia’s paintings will include works from throughout her prolific career, spanning periods of realism, abstraction, and experiments with different materials. Of particular note is the family-favorite version of her Birds of Paradise series. The paintings exhibited here are drawn from family and personal collections, with several having been recently shown at the Mercer Island Community Center.

About the music:  

Bill and Virginia’s earliest formal collaboration was Slow Motion for electric clarinet with computer graphics (1987), which will be shown in a recorded performance by Christopher Mothersole. In 1993 Bill and Virginia collaborated on 86910 for clarinet and digital delay at the Cliff Michel Gallery in Seattle. This piece was a transparent spiral construct inspired by Da Vinci’s Codex Sketches of the shape of moving water. Bill’s notation is painted on the spiral, and he walks through this transparent vortex as he plays the piece forwards and then backwards upon itself. Video of Bill’s 1993 performance will be shown.

A team of clarinetists (Jesse Canterbury, Mary Kantor, Beverly Setzer, and Rachel Yoder) will play movements of Smith’s landmark work Variants, the pioneering 1963 work of extended clarinet techniques. Rachel Yoder and Jeffrey Cohan will play Smith’s Jazz Set for Flute and Clarinet (1974), the first of several “Jazz Set” pieces, all combining rhythms and style of jazz with pitch content driven by set theory. Canterbury will play Smith’s Epitaphs (1993) for double clarinet – a work for two clarinets played simultaneously, with text from the ancient Arcadian poet Anyte of Tegea.

Local musicians pay their respects to Smith with original works. Stuart and Renko Dempster perform a tribute piece with temple bells; Rachel Yoder plays her Aspects/Respects for clarinet with audio of Bill’s voice, and James Falzone does a solo improvisation dedicated to Bill.

After a jazz set by frequent collaborators of Bill’s — clarinetist James Falzone, percussionist Greg Campbell, and bassist Brian Cobb — the night concludes with a structured improvisation for clarinet ensemble composed by Virginia after Bill’s passing in 2020.

Presented by Vera Project.

Since 2001, widely acclaimed violinist and composer Jessica Moss has been a force of depth in contemporary experimental music. First as a central member of Thee Silver Mt. Zion, until the legendary chamber-punk outfit went on hiatus in 2016, and in the years since as a solo artist, releasing four acclaimed albums on Montreal’s unshakeable Constellation Records. Also a sought-after collaborator, she has worked with (amongst many others): Vic Chesnutt, Carla Bozulich, Patti Smith, Jem Cohen, Jim White, Guy Picciotto, Big•Brave, Melissa Auf Der Maur and Mary Margaret O’Hara. 

Her most recent releases, Galaxy Heart (2022) and Phosphenes (2021), are ambitious summations of her work to date: profoundly emotional, expansive musical experiences that draw on post-classical, ambient metal, Eastern European folk, drone, and a myriad of traditions in between. Through her history as a solo performer, Moss has developed an inventive approach to building sonic environments where instrumentation and vocalization are treated as interconnected strands, woven together into aural tapestries. How Moss employs this process to faithfully recreate her multidimensional compositions as they exist on record has long been the central appeal of her performances.

Seattle Guitar Circle, an 8-piece acoustic guitar orchestra, brings “Simple Songs” to the Chapel (Ives, Corea, Satie, Coltrane, Brouwer, Monk, Fripp, Sakamoto) with very special guest Julie Slick.

Seattle Guitar Circle was founded in 1993 by Steve Ball, Bill Rieflin and Bill Van Buren. For 30 years, they have been playing eclectic, polyrhythmic prog chamber music arranged for large acoustic guitar ensemble all over the Seattle area. Seattle Guitar Circle has many related sub-groups such as Tuning the Air (7 years of weekly shows at Fremont Abbey), Tiny Orchestral Moments (7+ years of workshops and live shows) and Argentina’s Electric Gauchos, recording and performing in Seattle since 1997.

This international community was initially born via Robert Fripp’s ‘Guitar Craft’ workshops that began in 1985. Each SGC performance is a combination of tightly-arranged chaos, layered guitars ‘circulations’ – where each guitarist plays one note at a time in evolving melodies.

SGC performs collaborative repertoire for layered guitars and voices including structured improvisation that sounds composed and composed collaboration that sounds improvised. This 2023 ‘Simple Songs’ performance brings to life new arrangements of pieces by Charles Ives, Chick Corea, Erik Satie, Hanai Rani, John Coltrane, Jon Brion, Jonny Greenwood, Leo Brouwer, Meredith Monk, Robert Fripp, Ryuichi Sakamoto – as well as new work from composers within the core SGC team.

Julie Slick will open (with special surprise guests) and collaborate with the SGC. Julie is a virtuoso bassist and composer known for her wide array of unique tones and substantial melodic invention. Throughout her career, she has developed a distinctive voice through international performances and recordings with acclaimed first class musicians in global progressive rock and jazz communities. She currently tours and makes albums with the Adrian Belew Power Trio and her own bass duo-fronted band, EchoTest. As of 2022, Julie has joined Jerry Harrison and Adrian Belew’s Remain in Light project, celebrating the music of the Talking Heads. In 2023 she performed with her fellow RIL cast, jam/funk group Cool Cool Cool to support shows across North America.

She has also collaborated/appeared on stage with: the Crimson ProjeKct (featuring Tony Levin and Pat Mastelotto), Les Claypool, Danny Carey, Victor Wooten, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, Robert Fripp, Stewart Copeland, Alice Cooper, Ann Wilson, Jon Anderson, Wynonna Judd, Lzzy Hale, Vicki Peterson, Mike Keneally, Marco Minnemann, Petra Haden, Kris Myers, and more.

Doors open at 7:30.

Anto & the Zen Artists (Anto Ferrante, Valerie Holt, Amy Denio, Rachel Nesvig, Nonda Trimis, Ty Alevizos, Brad Dutz) bring to the Chapel Performance Space a tapestry of sounds that create a relaxing and meditative atmosphere. 

Anto & the Zen Artists will perform Sogno (dream) the debut album by Anto Ferrante. Sogno is a dharma album that will invite you to open your heart and embrace being human by allowing and witnessing your emotions gently with love and compassion. Sogno is made of inspirational, meditative, healing and relaxing music.

Anto Ferrante is an Italian composer, guitarist, singer & song-writer who lives in Seattle. Composing in English, Italian and Sanskrit, his lyrics express his heritage (Italian) and life journey in Italy and the West Coast of the United States as well as his love of Buddhism and Eastern philosophies. His multi-instrumental songs are instinctual and melancholic with roots in the Mediterranean. He uses music composition as a therapeutic and contemplative practice to awaken his heart and hold his emotions with compassion. Through his music and hosting house concerts, Anto wishes to inspire others to explore and express their creativity, embodiment and emotions, and to provide a message of hope.

Doug Russell and Kirill Nikolai present solo and collaborative works for large format modular synthesizers and tape.

Doug Russell is a guitarist and improvisor based in Seattle. He studied music at Wesleyan University under Alvin Lucier, Anthony Braxton and Ron Kuivila before forming the Los Angeles-based free noise group Open City with Peter Kolovos and Andrew Maxwell. Open City operated from 1997 to 2006.

Kirill Nikolai is a Seattle-based musician and composer. He has released both solo and collaborative works on Tonefloat (NL), Fluid Audio (UK), Apollolaan Recordings (UK), Reverb Worship (UK), and Ho Hum Records (UK). 

James Falzone presents his Renga Ensemble, a longstanding group with revolving players and instrumentation in different locales, interpreting multi-part vocal music from Lithuania known as Sutartinės. 

James Falzone: clarinet, penny whistles, shruti box
Heather Bentley: viola
Tom Baker: electronics, theremin, guitar
Neil Welch: saxophones
Omar Willey: spoken word
Robin Holcomb: piano
Jacob Zimmerman: saxophones and clarinet
Greg Campbell: drums and horns

The BadMovieTrio is James DeJoie’s newest musical adventure. Furthering  the explorations of a “pianoless” group, the BadMovieTrio unapologetically delves into each individual member’s sound within the broader context of the trio itself. Through composition and improvisation, the trio strives to create a unique and uncommon sound. From atonal to heart-breaking melodies and back again, the BadMovieTrio aspires to take an unparalleled music journey.

James DeJoie: Woodwinds
Chris Symer: Bass
Greg Campbell: Percussion

DeKirÖpp is a group dedicated to rhythm. Without over-reliance on (perhaps sentimental) harmonic structures, we seek to find the true basis of music through vertical harmony and rhythmic drive. Never losing sight of melody, each player is at once an accompanist and soloist. The improvisation is based on melody and form with the freedom of non-judgmental experimentations. DeKirÖpp is a recent selection in the prestigious “Jazz in the Second Century” Earshot Jazz presentation.

James DeJoie: Woodwinds
Steve Kirk: Trombone
Brian Oppel: Drums

Please join us for this unique program of premieres and new music by local composers from Kitsap and Pierce Counties, featuring contemporary chamber works for voice, ukuleles, piano, guitar, bass, and brass. Electronic multi-media music will also be featured.

Participants include composers Sheila Bristow, Clement Reid, and Carson Farley. Performers Elaina Lewis, Walter Kovshik, Krissy Villaruz, John Wells, and Tommy Hawthorne will make this a varied and memorable evening.