A confluence is when two or more flowing bodies of water meet to become one – waters that had their own ecosystems can join to make new systems greater than the sums of their parts. “Confluence 1” is the first of a prospective concert series based on this concept, inviting Seattle’s most adventurous musicians to collaborate in small sets exploring exciting avenues of contemporary music. Performers are given full freedom to program and perform 10-15 minute segments, and the combined program is varied, enriching and unrepeatable.

This inaugural concert features pianist Jennifer Chung, multi-instrumentalist Peter Nelson-King, trombonist Greg Powers, cellist Mary Riles, clarinettist Jenny Ziefel, and composer/performer Aaron Keyt, who will be premiering his own compositions. Other featured composers include Friedrich Cerha, James Dapogny, Jeremy Gill, Jordan Nobles, Justin Rizzo-Weaver, and Jinrayr Shahrimanyan. The program takes performers and listeners through three continents and a large spectrum of living styles and techniques, from mathematical precision to meditative improvisation.

A night of euphonious and elevating ambient electronic music with focus on the trippier side. Thoughtful and engaging with layers and textures to dip in and out of. Visuals and colors provided by Mokedo will enhance the space and take you deep into different moods, spaces and time.

Tim Westcott, visiting from Portland, records and performs as wndfrm. Tim’s work is often characterized by processed field recordings, tonal minimalism, a wide dynamic range and an inquisitive, patient ear.

The cavernous and beautiful project of renowned DJ and Further Records headmaster Chloe Harris, Raica walks a fine musical line between lucid animation and blurred darkness.

Cam MacNair uses field recordings, modular synthesis, piano, bass flute, bowed guitar, and other processed sounds to create their music. Inspired by movements in nature and the human juxtaposition to it, Cameron aims to capture its moments in stasis, in full acceptance of its beauty.

Mollie Bryan (Mokedo) has spent years cultivating light shows and enriching lives with color all around Seattle and beyond. Her artistic endeavors span across painting, video mapping, and sculptural light exhibits. Mollie’s art seeks to encapsulate and transmit the profound happiness that arises from working with the ethereal elements of light, color, and nature, enveloping the viewer in pure joy and wonder. Her thoughtful and skillful approach transforming buildings, parks, places, and spaces transcends reality.

PRAN is trombonist Greg Powers performing the deeply meditative style of Dhrupad. Since his Fulbright to India in 1988, Powers has continued his study of the ancient Dagarbhani tradition both here and in Mumbai with Ustads Zia Fariduddin Dagar, Jeff Lewis, Uday Bhawalkar and Bahauddin Dagar. He is a pioneer in adapting this ancient tradition to the trombone and strives to manifest the unstuck sound.

Two Seattle bands with deep ties to the city’s new and experimental music scenes, Tom Baker Quartet and Kin of the Moon, will present an evening of acoustic, improvised music to explore the mystical resonances of the Chapel Performance Space. 

Short sets by each band will be followed by a third set with all seven performers: Heather Bentley (viola), Kaley Lane Eaton (banjo), Leanna Keith (flute), Tom Baker (acoustic guitar and dobro), Jesse Canterbury (clarinets), Brian Cobb (acoustic bass), Greg Campbell (percussion). 

Droneroom is the nom de strum of Blake Edward Conley, a certified Kentucky Colonel and the self-professed Cowboy of Drone. Conley has demonstrated his ability to drift, twang, and sear over the course of numerous releases (including …The Other Doesn’t, Neon Depression, Negative Libra, Whatever Truthful Understanding, and Rusted Lung) across various labels (Somewherecold, Desert Records, Marginal Glitch, Echodelick, and Ramble Records (AU)), and has been noted as part of the forefront of the burgeoning Ambient Country movement, featured on the Ambient Country podcast and Bandcamp.com’s Ambient Country for Beginners.

On guitar and various drone instruments, Adam Troy will be performing deconstructed versions of songs from his latest ep Latents, as well as new material that has been composed for this showcase. Always seeking irony and ambiguity in sound, Troy’s music resides somewhere between gesture and anti-gesture. He has an MA in music composition from Mills College where his studies were focused on ritual practice and perceptual manipulation through music. Aesthetically, Troy’s music plots a crooked path between hostile ambience and affectionate post-rock.

skunk ape is elliott hansen holding and bending sound. skunk ape is made of blood and copper and breath and magnetic tape. skunk ape is music to watch plants die to.

Corpse Pose is the ambient guitar project of Stephan Blount. The namesake coming from the final meditation in yoga, the sounds are meant to inspire renewal, routines, perspectives and reflections. Stephan will be performing his first fully improvised piece “Perseverations in C Minor.” Bad to the Drone will serve as a release for the droneroom/corpse pose split on Heathen Fawn Recordings.

Dez’Mon Omega Fair hosts an unfolding installation, a poetry bath, a performance, and a reading; an experience in expressive art.

The event is a studio visit in motion. Dez’Mon will read new writing. We’ll view and organize paintings together. We’ll meditate into a bath of sound and poetry. There will be an opportunity for the audience/viewer/participant to draw and write themselves. This is an immersive installation as well, so we’ll be using the entire space. Feel free to bring a pillow, mat, or blanket to make yourself a soft island while listening. There will be some seating for those who need but be prepared to be, gently, activated. 

Born in Tehran (Iran), Farzia Fallah is currently based in Cologne, working internationally with various orchestras, ensembles, and musicians. She’s lived in Germany since 2007, having studied composition at the Hochschule für Künste Bremen and at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln, as well as the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg. She has been a fellow of Deutsches Studienzentrum in Venice, Archiv Frau und Musik in Frankfurt, as well as Künstlerdorf Schöppingen, Künstlerhaus Lauenburg, and Künstlerhof Schreyahn.

Ms. Fallah’s music has been premiered internationally at renowned festivals such as Wittener Tage für Neue Kammermusik (DE), Ultraschall Festival Berlin (DE) Acht Brücken Festival Cologne (DE), Transart Festival Bozen (IT), Aldeburgh Festival (GB), and Bludenzer Tage zeitgemäßer Musik (AT). A recipient of many awards, her music was recently on a portrait CD by the WERGO label in cooperation with Edition Zeitgenössische Musik.

This evening her work is performed by Seattle musicians Carrie Shaw (voice), Sarah Santos (voice), Sarah Pyle (flute), Luke Fitzpatrick (violin), and on pre-recorded video by Ensemble S201: Heni HyunJung Kim (Bass Clarinet), Robert Wheatley (Cello), Filip Eraković (Accordion).

Curated by Naeim Rahmani for Nonsequitur‘s NonSeq series.

NYC composer/performer Charles Rudig and Aaron Michael Butler perform duos for no-input mixer and electric vibraphone with support from A. F. Jones and Noel Kennon.

Charles Rudig often composes for limited sonic and material resources, pairing new music ensembles with obsolete consumer technologies such as the Game Boy and the SK-1 sampler. He has written for new music powerhouses such as the Mivos Quartet, Hypercube, Contemporaneous, and the Jack Quartet. In the concert he will be joined by Aaron Michael Butler for a set of improvised duos for electric vibraphone and no-input mixer. 

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, or pedal steel. Al is currently involved in several projects, including ‘what’ and Telescoping. Past projects include MANKINDA 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.

Noel Kennon is a composer and artist whose work often deals with the physical qualities of sound such as the mathematical (or theoretical) forms of pitch space in relation to the harmonic series, difference tones, and the sonority of volume or rather the sonority of space both enclosed and open (on any scale) as well as nominating the socio/environmental effects and phenomenon of sounding in space such as the purpose and politics in engaging strangers along with other unhelpful pursuits. All the while stumbling toward an expression of the sound of that which is not struck in the search of a way to reach compassion to address our collective unending suffering.

In celebration of the upcoming 90th birthday of my teacher, friend, collaborator, editor, provocateur, sometime landord, and closest among the virtual symposium of my senior colleagues, Benjamin Boretz, I will perform a generous selection of his works for solo piano, including (“…my chart shines high where the blue milks upset…”), the piece that grabbed hold of me at our first encounter back in about 1979, dragged me across the continent for two years of study, and which has permeated my thinking about music ever since. It promises to be an evening of deeply thoughtful intensity, nearly 50 years in preparation. I earnestly hope to see you there.

81:80 is a group that explores the passage of time through the use of microtonality and improvisation. The versatile group features Ha-Yang Kim (cello), Luke Fitzpatrick (violin/adapted viola) and Jeff Bowen (electric guitar). 81:80 seeks to create new timbres that evoke a sense of wonder. Their performance of Mothra is an extended microtonal set that traverses the far reaches of sonic possibilities.

(image: Andrew Kim)