Program notes continued: more info about the performers.
Scroll down for bios, links and discography.
PERFORMER BIOS:
Dafna Naphtali is a singer/electronic-musician/sound-artist/composer who writes custom computer programs for live sound-processing of voice and other instruments, multi-channel audio, musical robots, and audio-augmented reality soundwalks (“Walkie Talkie Dreams”). Discography includes many CDs/albums with the duos on DUOS++OCTET 4/24/23 at Roulette, “Landmine” Kathleen Supové on Disklavier, on “Ear to Ivory”, (Starkland), and “What is it Like to be a Bat?” with Kitty Brazelton (Tzadik). “Audio Chandelier: Polyélaios” sound sculpture, a collaboration with metalsmith/designer Ayala Naphtali, exhibited on Governor’s Island (May-August 2021). http://dafna.info/ dafnalula.bandcamp.com
more Audio Chandelier multichannel sound projects: https://dafna.info/multi-channel-sound/
Walkie Talkie Dreams audio-augmented reality soundwalks: http://walkietalkiedreams.org/
Jen Baker – trombone / multiphonics (“Clip Mouth Unit” duo with DN)
Jen Baker, trombonist/composer collaborates with artists all over the world in site-specific mixed media performance, concert halls, solo and chamber commissions. As an improviser she is featured on the soundtrack to Werner Herzog’s Oscar-nominated Encounters at the End of the World. She has performed internationally in festivals and has toured with Arijit Singh, Karole Armitage, and Mansour, and new music ensembles S.E.M., TILT brass, and the mobile ensemble Asphalt Orchestra (founding member). Her book, Hooked on Multiphonics aides composers and trombonists in understanding and executing the deep complexities of multiphonics. https://jenbakersounds.com/ https://jenbaker.bandcamp.com/
Gordon Beeferman – organ/piano/toy piano (CD “Pulsing Dot” with DN) is a composer, pianist, and improviser based in New York City. An eclectic and omnivorous musician who straddles numerous genres, he has created and performed innovative opera, chamber and orchestra music, avant-jazz, and numerous collaborations with choreographers, writers, and video artists. His varied projects include an Organ Trio; Other Life Forms, a quartet; and Music for an Imaginary Band, a septet—“a commanding avant-jazz ensemble” (Time Out New York). “Four Parts Five,” an extended work for his new quintet, was released on Innova Recordings in 2015 – “Packed with humour, mischief, and an urge to dance” (The Wire). Beeferman has composed two operas with librettist Charlotte Jackson: “The Enchanted Organ: A Porn Opera” and “The Rat Land,” praised as “complex and daringly modern” by The New York Times. https://www.gordonbeeferman.com/ https://gordonbeeferman.bandcamp.com/
Chuck Bettis – electronics / throat (“Chatter Blip” duo with DN) was raised in the fertile HarDCore soil, nourished within Baltimore’s enigmatic avant garde gatherings, and blossoming in NY’s Downtown Musical tribe. His unique blend of electronics and throat has led him into various collaborations with great musicians from around the globe. He has performed or recorded with John Zorn, Fred Frith, Jamie Saft, and Afrirampo , Ikue Mori, Nautical Almanac, Audrey Chen, Yellow Swans, Toshio Kajiwara, Mossenek with Mick Barr & Colin Marston, plus a long history of punk bands he was in (most notably the experimental punk band Meta-matics as well as the enigmatic All Scars). https://chuckbettis.com/ Chatter Blip duo has two releases most recent is Microcosmopolitan (2020).
Ras Moshe Burnett – saxophones, flute (“Fusebox” duo with DN debut CD 2021)
Saxophonist Ras Moshe Burnett was born and bred in Brooklyn. He gained his early musical sensibilities from his family upbringing and later played in community jazz orchestras, spending his formative years in venues such as the East (in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn), where so much creative music was happening in the 1970s and 1980s as a part of the broader upwelling of African American cultural expression in the area. By the late 1980s, he was playing professionally in free jazz and reggae contexts. He has since emerged as an important saxophone voice on the scene through his formation of the Music Now Ensemble, his quartet in his own name, his duo with bassist Shayna Dulberger, in Bill Cole’s Untempered Ensemble (since 2009).
Hans Tammen – electronics, guitar, Hans Tammen (“endangered guitar”) works in innovative ways with mechanical preparations and for guitar (at times including brushes, small stones, a small electric fan, a cigarette lighters, an Ebow and chopsticks) and Max/MSP sound processing, with further control via the use of pitch-tracking and and a rotating cast of gestural controllers (at one time an infrared-controller to capture some of his head motion during performance). Tammen’s approach has evolved as well and since the mid-2000’s also incorporates Max/MSP in his Endangered Guitar projects. Dafna and Hans collaborate on many things since they met in 1998, and started performing together in their duo “Mechanique(s)”, but only a few (musical) releases, most recent is “Fenestrae” on Nachtstück) https://tammen.org/.
https://hanstammen.bandcamp.com/
Edith Lettner – saxophones, duduk is a musician and painter, has interests that lie primarily in jazz, improvised music, African music and music from diverse regions in the Middle East. She plays alto and soprano saxophone and duduk, an Armenian woodwind instrument. She performs and records internationally with numerous unique artists and bands.Her frequent collaboration with musicians from other cultures and artists from other art genres has made her an incredibly versatile artistic personality.
Her CD “We Q” with Dafna Naphtali in 2020 also features her painting “Communication.”
http://edith-lettner.net/
Andrew Drury – is a drummer, improviser, composer, bandleader, presenter and educator/ Originally from Seattle, Andrew mentored with Ed Blackwell for nearly a decade and has since worked and played with great musicians, dancers, and creative folks, well-known and obscure, in 30 countries and on many recordings. In addition to ongoing work with Dafna, Jason Kao Hwang, Earl Howard, JD Parran, Lesley Mok, and others, he is currently finishing a recording by The Forest percussion quintet, and a feature-length art film featuring his videography and music by his tentet. Andrew started the Soup & Sound series in his house in 2009 and directs Continuum Culture & Arts, a non-profit organization that runs cultural programs putting international artists in contact with vulnerable and historically marginalized communities in New York, Seattle, New Hampshire, Los Angeles, and San Diego. https://www.andrewdrurymusic.com/
DUOS++OCTET Discography:
DISCOGRAPHY:
Fusebox (Gold Bolus Recordings 2021)longtime duo Naphtali (live processing of reeds, voice) & saxophonist Ras Moshe Burnett
We Q (Clang Label, 2020) live-processing/electronics voice/saxophone/duduk duo Dafna Naphtali with Edith Lettner
Microcosmopolitan (Contour Editions, 2020) duo voice/electronics artist Dafna Naphtali / Chuck Bettis
https://chatterblip.bandcamp.com/
Fenestrae (Nachtstück, 2019) Mechanique(s) duo- Hans Tammen gtr/electronics & Dafna Naphtali electronics/voice
Pulsing Dot (Clang, 2017) live-processing voice/piano duo with pianist Gordon Beeferman
Index of Refraction (Acheulian Handaxe, 2016, naucleshg 2015), duo w/ percussionist Luis Tabuenca (Barcelona) https://handaxe.org/album/index-of-refraction
Silver Shift (Bandcamp, 2016) solo electroacoustic/vocal works
Chatter Blip (Acheulian Handaxe, 2009) duo with voice/electronics artist Chuck Bettis
https://chatterblip.bandcamp.com/
Mechanique(s) live at Logos (Acheulian Handaxe, 2002) w/ Hans Tammen (endangered guitar, US/Germany), Martin Speicher (saxophone, Germany);
What is it Like to be a Bat? (Tzadik/Oracles 2003) – “digital punk trio” w/Kitty Brazelton & Danny Tunick (4 Stars, All Music Guide) https://kittybrazelton.bandcamp.com/album/what-is-it-like-to-be-a-bat