Gordon Beeferman: Piano, James Ilgenfritz: Bass, Michael Evans: Drums and Percussion
Pianist and composer Gordon Beeferman’s work spans chamber and orchestral music, improvisation, opera, and collaborations with dance and other arts. He leads two avant-jazz ensembles which perform his compositions: Music for an Imaginary Band, a septet, and the quartet Other Life Forms. He has performed at the Vision Festival, Roulette, ISSUE Project Room, Bowerbird, the MATA Festival, and elsewhere. His compositions have been performed by diverse ensembles including the New York City Opera, Momenta Quartet, and Berlin’s Quartet New Generation recorder collective. His chamber opera The Rat Land (“complex and daringly modern” – NY Times), written with librettist Charlotte Jackson, will receive its stage premiere in 2014; they are currently at work on their next collaboration, The Enchanted Organ: A Porn Opera.
Michael Evans is an improvising drummer/composer whose work investigates and embraces the collision of sound and theatrics, combining ordered systems with intuitive choices of sound, and making use of found objects, homemade instruments, the theremin and various digital and analog electronics. He has worked with a wide variety of artists nationally and internationally including David First, EasSide Percussion, Fast Forward, Fulminate Trio, Ghosts Of The Holy Ghost Spermic Brotherhood, Alexander Hacke (Einsturzende Neubauten), Susan Hefner, Gordon Monahan, Evan Parker, William Parker, Psychotic Quartet, LaDonna Smith and Peter Zummo.
Brooklyn composer, bassist, and educator James Ilgenfritz has been active in creative music since the late 90s. His work has been praised in Time Out New York, All About Jazz, and Downbeat Magazine. Recent performances include work with Lukas Ligeti, Pauline Oliveros, John Zorn, and Anthony Braxton. James has received grants and residencies from Issue Project Room, the American Composers Forum, and OMI Arts Center. In New York he has performed at The World Financial Center Winter Garden, Symphony Space, the New Museum, and Roulette. Other notable appearances include The Kennedy Center in Washington DC, Edgefest in Ann Arbor, MI, and the Vancouver International Jazz Festival. In 2011 James was Artist-In-Residence at Issue Project Room in Brooklyn, and produced his first opera, “The Ticket That Exploded”, based on the William S. Burroughs novel of the same name.
