Che Chen

Last updated

Che Chen is a New York-based composer and multi-instrumentalist, best known as a central figure in the group 75 Dollar Bill. [1]

Chen has collaborated with several influential avant-garde and improvisational musicians like Jorge Boehringer (Core of the Coalman), Rolyn Hu, Chie Mukai, Tori Kudo, Tetuzi Akiyama and Tony Conrad. [2]

Chen grew up in a family of Taiwanese immigrants in the DC suburbs of Maryland. [2]

In 2008, Chen began improvising regularly with fellow Brooklyn avant-rock improviser Robbie Lee, a collaboration that lasted for several years and first surfaced as the limited-release album Begin and Continue! (2008). Lee and Chen’s album The Spectrum Does (2017) was originally recorded in 2011. The album credits Lee with flute, tarogato, melodica, great bass recorder, electronics, percussion and Chen with violin, harmonium, bass recorder, tape machine, electronics, percussion. [3]

In 2010, Lee and Chen joined Dutch minimalist composer and lutenist Jozef Van Wissem in his project Heresy of the Free Spirit, playing music described by the Chicago Reader as “a sublime mixture of country blues, old-time mountain music, and minimalist drone that features Van Wissem playing his lute with a slide.” [4] The trio recorded an album in 2011, A Prayer for Light.

Chen was a member of the band True Primes before 75 Dollar Bill, initially a duo with drummer Rick Brown, formerly of V-Effect and Curlew. [5] Sasha Frere-Jones described 75 Dollar Bill's music as displaying "a certain kind of formal fullness and technical freedom," which he said has helped introduce jazz to a new generation. [5]

Chen studied Moorish music in Mauretania with Jheich Ould Chighaly in 2013. [6]

75 Dollar Bill's first full-length album, Wooden Bag, was released in 2015 by Other Music Recording Company. [7] Their second album, Wood/Metal/Plastic/Pattern/Rhythm/Rock, was released in 2016 on the Los Angeles-based label Thin Wrist. [8]

Related Research Articles

Jim Jarmusch American film director, screenwriter and actor

James Robert Jarmusch is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, producer, editor, and composer. He has been a major proponent of independent cinema since the 1980s, directing films such as Stranger Than Paradise (1984), Down by Law (1986), Mystery Train (1989), Dead Man (1995), Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999), Coffee and Cigarettes (2003), Broken Flowers (2005), Only Lovers Left Alive (2013), and Paterson (2016). Stranger Than Paradise was added to the National Film Registry in December 2002. As a musician, Jarmusch has composed music for his films and released two albums with Jozef van Wissem.

<i>...I Care Because You Do</i> 1995 studio album by Aphex Twin

...I Care Because You Do is the third studio album by electronic musician Richard D. James under the alias Aphex Twin, released on 24 April 1995 by Warp. Containing material recorded between 1990 and 1994, the album marked James's return to a percussive sound following the largely beatless Selected Ambient Works Volume II (1994), and pairs abrasive rhythms with symphonic and ambient elements. The cover artwork is a self-portrait by James.

Tape loop Audio recording technique

In music, tape loops are loops of magnetic tape used to create repetitive, rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound when played on a tape recorder. Originating in the 1940s with the work of Pierre Schaeffer, they were used among contemporary composers of 1950s and 1960s, such as Steve Reich, Terry Riley, and Karlheinz Stockhausen, who used them to create phase patterns, rhythms, textures, and timbres. Popular music authors of 1960s and 1970s, particularly in psychedelic, progressive and ambient genres, used tape loops to accompany their music with innovative sound effects. In the 1980s, analog audio and tape loops with it gave way to digital audio and application of computers to generate and process sound.

Bill Callahan (musician) American singer-songwriter and guitarist

Bill Callahan is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist who has also recorded and performed under the band name Smog. Callahan began working in the lo-fi genre of underground rock, with home-made tape-albums recorded on four track tape recorders. Later he began releasing albums with the label Drag City, to which he remains signed today.

Karl Hans Berger is a jazz pianist, composer, and educator.

Arthur Russell (musician) American musician

Arthur Russell (born Charles Arthur Russell Jr.; May 21, 1951 – April 4, 1992) was an American cellist, composer, producer, singer, and musician from Iowa, whose work spanned a disparate range of styles. Trained in contemporary experimental composition and Indian classical music, Russell relocated to New York in the mid-1970s, where he became associated with Lower Manhattan's avant-garde community as well as the city's disco scene. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Russell produced a considerable collection of material, including several underground dance hits under aliases such as Dinosaur L and Indian Ocean, but his difficulty in completing projects resulted in a limited amount of released output; World of Echo (1986) was his only solo pop album to be released during his lifetime.

Lee Konitz American jazz musician

Leon Konitz was an American composer and alto saxophonist.

Warne Marsh American tenor saxophonist

Warne Marion Marsh was an American tenor saxophonist. Born in Los Angeles, his playing first came to prominence in the 1950s as a protégé of pianist Lennie Tristano and earned attention in the 1970s as a member of Supersax.

<i>Internal Wrangler</i> 2000 studio album by Clinic

Internal Wrangler is the debut studio album by British indie rock band Clinic. It was released on 1 May 2000 through Domino Records.

Jozef van Wissem Dutch musician

Jozef van Wissem is a Dutch minimalist composer and lute player based in Brooklyn. In 2013 van Wissem won the Cannes Soundtrack Award for the score of Only Lovers Left Alive at the Cannes Film Festival.

<i>Speechless</i> (Fred Frith album) 1981 studio album by Fred Frith

Speechless is a 1981 solo album by English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith of the group Henry Cow. It was Frith's third solo album, and was originally released in the United States on LP record on The Residents' Ralph record label. It was the second of three solo albums Frith made for the label.

James Blackshaw English guitarist

James Blackshaw is an English, Hastings-based fingerstyle guitarist and pianist. Blackshaw primarily plays an acoustic 12 string guitar and has been compared to Bert Jansch, Robbie Basho, John Fahey, Jack Rose, and Leo Kottke. He has released albums on the labels Celebrate Psi Phenomenon, Barl Fire Recordings, Static Caravan, Digitalis Industries, Important Records, Tompkins Square, and Young God Records.

<i>Cheap at Half the Price</i> 1983 studio album by Fred Frith

Cheap at Half the Price is a 1983 solo album by English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith. It was Frith's fifth solo album, and was originally released in the United States on LP record on The Residents' Ralph record label. It was the third of three solo albums Frith made for the label.

Live electronic music is a form of music that can include traditional electronic sound-generating devices, modified electric musical instruments, hacked sound generating technologies, and computers. Initially the practice developed in reaction to sound-based composition for fixed media such as musique concrète, electronic music and early computer music. Musical improvisation often plays a large role in the performance of this music. The timbres of various sounds may be transformed extensively using devices such as amplifiers, filters, ring modulators and other forms of circuitry. Real-time generation and manipulation of audio using live coding is now commonplace.

Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments with the basic elements of the genre. Artists aim to liberate and innovate, with some of the genre's distinguishing characteristics being improvisational performances, avant-garde influences, odd instrumentation, opaque lyrics, unorthodox structures and rhythms, and an underlying rejection of commercial aspirations.

Sonic Protest music festival

Sonic Protest is a yearly music festival in France focused on left field music genres like experimental rock, electroacoustic music, improvised music, noise and avant garde music.

"Gone" is a song by American hip hop artist Kanye West from his second studio album Late Registration (2005). Produced by West and featuring guest vocals from fellow rappers Cam'ron and Consequence, the track contains samples of "It's Too Late" as performed by Otis Redding.

<i>The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete</i> 2014 compilation album by Bob Dylan and the Band

The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete is a compilation album of unreleased home recordings made in 1967 by Bob Dylan and the group of musicians that would become the Band, released on November 3, 2014 on Legacy Records. It is the ninth installment of the Bob Dylan Bootleg Series, available in the six-disc complete set and a two-disc set common to the rest of the series entitled The Basement Tapes Raw.

75 Dollar Bill is a musical duo formed in New York City in 2012. Its members are Che Chen (guitar), formerly of True Primes, and Rick Brown (drums), formerly of V-Effect and Curlew. Sasha Frere-Jones described their music as displaying "a certain kind of formal fullness and technical freedom," which he said has helped introduce jazz to a new generation. Other critics have noted that their music shows signs of Mauritanian influences, because Chen studied Moorish music in that country with Jheich Ould Chighaly in 2013. Their first full-length album, Wooden Bag, was released in 2015 by Other Music Recording Company. Their second album, Wood/Metal/Plastic/Pattern/Rhythm/Rock, was released in 2016 on the Los Angeles-based label Thin Wrist.

Robbie Lee is a New York-based composer and multi-instrumentalist. He specializes in improvisation, incorporating historical and early music instruments, in the intersection of experimental, classical and jazz music. Lee also releases music under the name Creature Automatic.

References

  1. Frere-Jones, Sasha (22 September 2016). "The Irresistible Chaos of 75 Dollar Bill". Village Voice.
  2. 1 2 "The Famous Elsewhere Innovator's Questionnaire: Che Chen of 75 Dollar Bill". The Famous Elsewhere. September 30, 2019.
  3. "Che Chen & Robbie Lee — The Spectrum Does (Audiomer)". dusted. Retrieved 2018-08-10.
  4. "Heresy of the Free Spirit, Jozef Van Wissem". Chicago Reader. Retrieved 2018-08-10.
  5. 1 2 Frere-Jones, Sasha (22 September 2016). "The Irresistible Chaos of 75 Dollar Bill". Village Voice. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
  6. Ratliff, Ben (11 February 2014). "Blending Moorish Tradition With a Do-It-Yourself Credo". New York Times. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
  7. "Wooden Bag". Other Music Recording Company. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
  8. Scott, Tim (5 August 2016). "75 Dollar Bill Are the Masters of 15-Minute Jams Featuring A Plywood Box Getting Battered With a Mallet". Noisey. Vice. Retrieved 8 November 2016.