The 18th Annual Outsound New Music Summit will happen at the Community Music Center, its long-time home. The festival kicks off on July 21st with the free, hands-on Touch the Gear workshop, followed by six nights of live music with pre-concert talks, featuring a diverse roster of artists. 41 of this years musicians reside in the San Francisco Bay Area. Local saxophonist Francis Wong and dancer Lenora Lee will explore the immigration experience of Chinese Americans during the era of Chinese Exclusion, as well as contemporary human trafficking, and the impacts of war in Asian American communities. Oakland-based composer Polly Moller Springhorn will present the world premiere of her three-movement graphic score, Tomography Fortunae - a work for seven musicians named Tom. Local avant-jazz stalwarts Jason Levis and Lisa Mezzacappa, also known as duo B, will lead their 13-member duo B experimental Band. William Winant and Zachary James Watkins, eminent figures in Bay Area contemporary music, will come together to play as a duo. Local saxophonists Beth Schenck, Kasey Knudsen, Phillip Greenlief, and Cory Wright will provide dense harmony as Social Stutter. Local alto saxophonist and Outsound founder Rent Romus will present the latest incarnation of his project Deciduous, featuring saxophonist Keith Kelly, and on a night of art-rock, Bay Area bandleaders Jon Bafus and John Shiurba will present sets by Gentleman Surfer and Vegan Butcher. ...
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The 18th Annual Outsound New Music Summit will happen at the Community Music Center, its long-time home. The festival kicks off on July 21st with the free, hands-on Touch the Gear workshop, followed by six nights of live music with pre-concert talks, featuring a diverse roster of artists. 41 of this years musicians reside in the San Francisco Bay Area. Local saxophonist Francis Wong and dancer Lenora Lee will explore the immigration experience of Chinese Americans during the era of Chinese Exclusion, as well as contemporary human trafficking, and the impacts of war in Asian American communities. Oakland-based composer Polly Moller Springhorn will present the world premiere of her three-movement graphic score, Tomography Fortunae - a work for seven musicians named Tom. Local avant-jazz stalwarts Jason Levis and Lisa Mezzacappa, also known as duo B, will lead their 13-member duo B experimental Band. William Winant and Zachary James Watkins, eminent figures in Bay Area contemporary music, will come together to play as a duo. Local saxophonists Beth Schenck, Kasey Knudsen, Phillip Greenlief, and Cory Wright will provide dense harmony as Social Stutter. Local alto saxophonist and Outsound founder Rent Romus will present the latest incarnation of his project Deciduous, featuring saxophonist Keith Kelly, and on a night of art-rock, Bay Area bandleaders Jon Bafus and John Shiurba will present sets by Gentleman Surfer and Vegan Butcher.
At a time when gentrification has already driven thousands of artists and musicians and their audiences out of the Bay Area, it is ever more urgent for Outsound Presents to continue fulfilling its mission by supporting, showcasing, and honoring those beyond categorization, audacious souls who stubbornly remain. The 18th Annual Outsound New Music Summit is a concentrated celebration of the music and its listeners, still independent and volunteer-run in a time of corporate takeover of the Citys music scene and a swiftly homogenizing City culture. The Summit boasts nearly two decades of curatorial experience but the sounds of its artists are still new, challenging, defiant, and uncompromising.
SCHEDULE
Sunday, July 21, 5-8pm: Touch the Gear Expo
This hands-on, kid and family-friendly exposition is free and open to the public and is sure to excite and foster the spirit of discovery for all ages. During the evening attendees get to roam among the exhibition getting a hands-on experience of sound producing gear, computers, instruments and inventioneverything from oscillators and electronics to planks of wood with strings attached. All attendees get to ask questions, make sound and experience how the instruments work in an environment that demystifies technology while inspiring creativity. Free Admission, all ages.
Tuesday, July 23, Q&A 7:30pm, Music 8:15pm: The Social Stutter Quartet is lead by composer/altoist Beth Schenck. The group blurs the line between strictly written chamber music and soaring free jazz. Masters of texture and nuance, the quartet features alto saxophonist Kasey Knudsen, and tenor saxophonists Phillip Greenlief and Cory Wright all of which have a keen awareness of how to support and push one another's creative boundaries.
Opening will be The duo B. Experimental Band (dBxB) is an improvising all-star Bay Area orchestra co-led by bassist Lisa Mezzacappa and drummer Jason Levis. Their new endeavor, launched in December 2018 at Temescal Art Center in Oakland, CA is a 13-member ensemble that plays compositions by Levis and Mezzacappa exploring the thrilling boundaries between composed and improvised musical worlds.
Wednesday, July 24, Q&A 7:30pm, Music 8:15pm: Vegan Butcher assembled by guitarist John Shiurba interpret original music and somniloquy. The lyrics are culled from the early-morning, half-asleep ramblings of the composer, while the music employs the signature January Scale. The band includes bassist Wil Hendricks (Califone), drummer Suki OKane (Thingamajigs, She Mob) and vocalist Angela Coon (Ninewood, Toychestra) along with Shiurba on guitar. Opening will be Gentleman Surfer. Difficult to categorize, and drawing upon a wide range of influences, anywhere from Captain Beefheart and King Crimson, to film and video game music, Classical, Jazz, Punk, the collective sound is both tight and loose simultaneously.
Thursday, July 25, Q&A 7:30pm, Music 8:15pm: Internationally acclaimed musician/composer Andrea Centazzo, blends his percussion playing on a set of over 200 instruments, with electronics, computer sequencing and digital sampling, bringing to the listener the emotion of a new sonic adventure in jazz, world and contemporary avant-garde music. Opening will be saxophonist/composer Francis Wong and dancer/choreographer Lenora Lee. They have been working together for over 20 years creating both fully improvised works as well as works that integrate composition, choreography, and improvisation. The themes that they are particularly known for are the immigration experience of Chinese Americans during the era of Chinese Exclusion, as well as contemporary social justice issues such as human trafficking, and the impacts of war in Asian American communities.
Friday, July 26, Q&A 7:30pm, Music 8:15pm: The William Winant / Zachary James Watkins Duo create improvised landscapes playing percussion and electronics. Interested in the sensitive relationships between their respective instrumental colors, the two explore radical form, dynamics and timbre in real time. Opening Tomography Fortunae is a three-movement graphic score for seven musicians named Tom, by Polly Moller Springhorn. The intention of this piece is to combine the Fortunate Numbers with ritual movement and improvisation to bring all the musicians and the audience good fortune. Musicians must go by the name Tom, either officially on their birth certificate, informally as a nickname, or temporarily for the duration of the performance.
Saturday, July 27, Q&A 7:30pm, Music 8:15pm: Vinny Golias music is dramatic and often freely improvised but it also has organized sections, covers a variety of moods and ideas, and balances solos with colorful ensembles that contain important contributions from each of the musicians. The players constantly react to each other and Golia, whether on his low or high instruments, is always in top form and will feature ROVA saxophonist Steve Adms, and Los Angeles based percussionist Tina Raymond and bassist Ken Filiano. Opening will be Rent Romus Deciduous, an ongoing multi regional project originally formed by Columbus Ohio pianist Gerard Cox and curated by SF Bay Area saxophonist Rent Romus based on the mutual bridging of those who share a creative tenacity, history and transitory nature of improvisation. The music travels through free wheeling plots development, enriched with worldly modalities and extended soloing and will include special guest saxophonist from Phoenix Arizona Keith Kelly.
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