2022 productions:
Kin of the Moon + Strange Interlude =
STRANGE MOON
New works, deep-rooted collaborations, Six premieres by (mostly) Seattle composers
March 5, 2022, Chapel Performance Space
Sponsored in part by Nonsequitur
Meet our composers:
Sarah Bassingthwaighte
Composer, flutist, and educator Sarah Bassingthwaighte is an acclaimed member of the contemporary classical music scene, a music lecturer and clinician, and an award-winning composer who has taught, performed, and had her pieces performed in England, Iceland, Russia, Canada, Mexico, and the US. Her compositions have five times been awarded the national award, the NFA Newly Published Music Award, in 2013-2020. This coming August, she will be Composer-in-Residence in Sweden, at the Visby International Centre for Composers (VICC). Her compositions have been performed by the Northwest Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Northwest, the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra, the Sound Ensemble, the Ecco Chamber Ensemble, and members of the Iceland Symphony, among others. Her solo CDs include Songs from the Caucasus, Stalks in the Breeze and Flute Meets Machine, and she and Mark Wilson recorded Around the World and Through Time as the ensemble Sirocco. The British journal Pan Magazine acclaims her “hypnotic and rich sound” and goes on to say “The tone quality is full of depth and power. Bassingthwaighte seems to have a particular talent for communicating the message of contemporary pieces,” which are “performed with polish and virtuosity.” She is the author of the full-length book Flute Meets Machine, and has been awarded the Stan Chu Essay award. Dr. Bassingthwaighte teaches composition, orchestration, wind ensemble and flute at Seattle Pacific University in Seattle, Washington.
Wayne Horvitz
Wayne Horvitz is a composer, pianist and electronic musician who has performed extensively throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and North America. He is the leader of the Gravitas Quartet, Sweeter Than the Day, Zony Mash, The Four plus One Ensemble and co-founder of the New York Composers Orchestra. He has performed and collaborated with Bill Frisell, Butch Morris, John Zorn, George Lewis, Robin Holcomb, Fred Frith, Julian Priester, Michael Shrieve and Carla Bley, among others. Commissioners include the NEA, Meet the Composer, Kronos String Quartet, Seattle Chamber Players, BAM, and Earshot Jazz. Collaborators include Paul Taylor, Liz Lerman, Bill Irwin and Gus Van Sant. He has been the recipient of numerous awards including two MAP grants and the NEA American Masterpiece award. Recent compositions include The Heartsong of Charging Elk based on the novel by James Welch and 55: Music and Dance in Concrete: a site-specific collaboration with dancer Yukio Suzuki and video artist Yohei Saito. He is the music programmer for The Royal Room, a performance venue in Seattle, Washington, and a professor of composition at the Cornish College of the Arts.
Nebal Maysaud
Nebal Maysaud is an award-winning queer Lebanese Druze composer based in the Washington DC area. A recipient of the first Kluge Young Composer’s Competition and the James Ming Prize in Composition at Lawrence University, Maysaud converges Western and Middle Eastern classical music styles to explore questions of faith, identity, and power.
Their music has been performed by the Alexandria Symphony Orchestra, Juventas New Music Ensemble, and Lawrence University Wind Ensemble and Opera Department; and also featured in Art Song Lab 2016 and the District New Music Conference 2018.
They have contributed articles about diversity and classical music to NewMusicBox and convened community music workshops at YallaPunk 2019. Maysaud studied with composer Mark Camphouse before entering the studios of John Benson, Andrew Cole, Dirk D’Ase, Joanne Metcalf, and Asha Srinivasan. They hold a B.M. in Music Composition from Lawrence University.
Michaud Savage
Michaud Savage is an artist born and raised in Seattle, Washington. His work centers on the fault-lines of genre, medium, and contemporary society. Incredibly eclectic, his influences and musical background reach across early to contemporary classical, jazz, pop, tango, rock, blues, Latin folkloric musics, sound art, noise, and beyond.
Michaud studied at the Cornish College of the Arts with Emily Doolittle, Jim Knapp, and Michael Nicolella. Michaud’s studies beyond Cornish include time at The Evergreen State College, where his studies with Terry Setter, Ben Kamen, Arun Chandra, and Sean Williams included an emphasis in Consciousness Studies and Music.
Michaud’s relationship with music began early on, singing in a choir and later playing in a youth orchestra. With the help of his grandfather he began playing guitar when he was 11, and quickly adopted this as his main instrument. Throughout high school, Michaud played in the school jazz band on both bass and electric guitar. Towards the end of this time, he started playing with rock and experimental music troupes, deepening his roots and expanding into more challenging territories. Shortly thereafter, Michaud began to develop his work with the classical guitar and moved to South America to pursue a study of music, specializing in folkloric and indigenous music. Michaud returned to the United States and continued on to form a series of bands and ensembles in the roles of composer, songwriter, guitarist, and vocalist.
Abbey Blackwell
Abbey Blackwell is a multi-faceted double and electric bassist in Seattle, WA. She is a member of many musical scenes in Seattle’s music community, including the improvised, rock, classical, and jazz spheres and was recently awarded the Earshot Golden Ear Emerging Artist of the Year Award.
Her compositions feature hummable tunes hovering over softly shifting counterpoint.
Abbey holds a master's degree in Jazz and Improvised Music and a bachelor’s of music in Double Bass Performance from the University of Washington.
James Falzone
Clarinetist, composer, and improviser JAMES FALZONE is an acclaimed member of the international jazz and creative music scenes, a veteran contemporary music lecturer and clinician, and an award-winning composer who has been commissioned by chamber ensembles, dance companies, choirs, and symphony orchestras around the globe. James performs throughout North America and Europe, appears regularly on Downbeat magazine's Critics' and Readers' Polls, and was nominated as the 2011 Clarinetist of the Year by the Jazz Journalist Association. Educated at Northern Illinois University and New England Conservatory, James is also a respected educator and scholar and has been on the faculty of The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Deep Springs College, North Central College, and was a fellow at The Center for Black Music Research. At present James is the Chair of Music at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, Washington. Learn more about James Falzone and his work at his website: www.allosmusica.org