Monday 20 March 2023, 8pm
Keir GoGwilt is a violinist, scholar, and composer based in New York City. His work combines historical research and collaborative experimentation across a range of musical styles and genres. Known as a "formidable performer" (New York Times) with an "evocative sound" (London Jazz News) and "finger-busting virtuosity" (San Diego Union Tribune), he has soloed with groups including the Orchestra of St. Luke's, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Chinese National Symphony, Orquesta Filarmonica de Santiago, and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project. As a founding member of the American Modern Opera Company (AMOC), he has performed original, collaboratively-devised music, dance, and theater works at the 92nd st Y, Luminato Festival, PS 122 COIL, Stanford Live, the American Repertory Theater, Carolina Performing Arts, the Momentary, and the Ojai Music Festival. His recompositions of renaissance and medieval music with violinist Johnny Chang have been released on Another Timbre; his improvising duo with bassist Kyle Motl has been noted for their "rhapsodic gestures" (The New Yorker) and "keen musical intellects" (The Wire). GoGwilt earned his PhD in Music (Integrative Studies) from UC San Diego in 2021, where he received the Chancellor's Dissertation Medal for the Division of Arts & Humanities. As an undergraduate at Harvard he studied Literature, and was awarded the Louis Sudler Prize in the Arts. His research has been published in Current Musicology, Naxos Musicology, MDW Press, and the Orpheus Institute Series.
Violinist-composer Johnny Chang engages in extended explorations surrounding the relationships of sound/listening and the in-between areas of improvisation, composition and performance. Based in Berlin from 2009 -2020, Chang relocated to his home country Aotearoa New Zealand in 2020.
Johnny is part of the Wandelweiser composers collective and in 2018, initiated a new framework for the presentation of creative research and performances, "Partitions & Resonances", aimed at encouraging collaborations between the varied disciplines of composition, musicology, historical research and performance. He currently collaborates with: Peter Ablinger, Jürg Frey, Antoine Beuger, Sam Dunscombe, Keir GoGwilt, Catherine Lamb, Klaus Lang, Mike Majkowski, Phill Niblock, Michael Pisaro-Liu, Derek Shirley, Germaine Sijstermans, Taku Sugimoto, Eric Wong.
As composer and performer, his articulated performances have been featured in: Staatsoper/ OperaLab//DAAD Mikromusik/MaerzMusik (Berlin), Donaueschingen Musiktage, DNK Days/Sonic Acts Festival/Muziekgebouw (Amsterdam), Gaudeamus (Utrecht), Insub.Festival/cave12 (Geneva), Cafe OTO (London), Moment Musicaux (Aarau), Dampfzentrale (Bern), Q-O2 workspace (Brussels), Wandelweiser Klangraum (Düsseldorf), Klang im Turm (Munich), Minimal Jukebox (Los Angeles Philharmonic), Pardon To Tu (Warsaw), Umlaut Festival (Berlin & Paris), Audio Foundation (NZ) to various music series/venues in Berlin such as Staatsoper unter den Linden, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, KINDL Centre for contemporary art, ausland, Labor Sonor, Sophiensaele and Quiet Cue.
Celeste Oram is a composer from Aotearoa New Zealand whose works encompass instrumental writing, song & speech, electronics, visual media, theatre, and improvisation. Celeste’s work has been recognised by the 2017 CANZ Trust Fund Award, nominations for the 2020 & 2014 SOUNZ Contemporary Award, and the 2016 Kranichstein Composition Prize from the Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music.
Celeste's works have been made via the support & performances of musicians & ensembles including the Royal Danish Ballet & Orchestra, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, NZSO National Youth Orchestra, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group (UK), NZTrio, Fonema Consort (NY), Arcus Collective (NY), Longleash (NY), wasteLAnd (LA), Autoduplicity (LA), Steven Schick (CA), Stephen de Pledge (NZ), Callithumpian Consort (Boston), Song Company (Sydney), Sydney Piano Trio; and presented at festivals including the Darmstadt Summer Courses, the New Zealand International Arts Festival, SICPP at the New England Conservatory, soundSCAPE festival (Maccagno, Italy), and the Melbourne Fringe Festival.
A lifelong choral musician, Celeste has served as director of the University of California San Diego Chamber Singers, and assistant director of the San Diego Women’s Chorus. She has performed with chamber choirs including Pro Arte Voices (San Diego), the Graduate Choir (Auckland), and is a founding member of Neotectonic, an Auckland vocal ensemble specialising in both early and contemporary music.
