Chris Brown (born 1953) is an American composer, pianist and electronic musician, who creates music for acoustic instruments with interactive electronics, for computer networks, and for improvising ensembles. He was active early in his career as an inventor and builder of electroacoustic instruments; he has also performed widely as an improviser and pianist with groups as "Room" and the "Glenn Spearman Double Trio." In 1986 he co-founded the pioneering computer network music ensemble "The Hub". He is also known for his recorded performances of music by Henry Cowell, Luc Ferrari, and John Zorn. He has received commissions from the Berkeley Symphony, the Rova Saxophone Quartet, the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio, the Gerbode Foundation, the Phonos Foundation and the Creative Work Fund. His recent music includes the poly-rhythm installation "Talking Drum", the "Inventions" series for computers and interactive performers, and the radio performance "Transmissions" series, with composer Guillermo Galindo.
His 1992 electroacoustic work "Lava", for brass, percussion, and electronics is produced by Tzadik Records. He teaches Composition and Electronic Music at Mills College in Oakland, where he is co-director of the Center for Contemporary Music (CCM).
Miya Masaoka is an American composer, musician, and sound artist active in the field of contemporary classical music and experimental music. Her work encompasses contemporary classical composition, improvisation, electroacoustic music, inter-disciplinary sound art, sound installation, traditional Japanese instruments, and performance art. She is based in New York City.
Alvin Curran is an American composer, performer, improviser, sound artist, and writer. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and lives and works in Rome, Italy. He is the co-founder, with Frederic Rzewski and Richard Teitelbaum, of Musica Elettronica Viva, and a former student of Elliott Carter. Curran's music often makes use of electronics and environmental found sounds. He was a professor of music at Mills College in California until 2006 and now teaches privately in Rome and sporadically at various institutions.
The Hub is an American "computer network music" ensemble formed in 1986 consisting of John Bischoff, Tim Perkis, Chris Brown, Scot Gresham-Lancaster, Mark Trayle and Phil Stone. "The Hub was the first live computer music band whose members were all composers, as well as designers and builders of their own hardware and software."
William Winant is an American percussionist.
Karlheinz Essl is an Austrian composer, performer, sound artist, improviser, and composition teacher.
Timothy "Tim" George Hodgkinson is an English experimental music composer and performer, principally on reeds, lap steel guitar, and keyboards. He first became known as one of the core members of the British avant-rock group Henry Cow, which he formed with Fred Frith in 1968. After the demise of Henry Cow, he participated in numerous bands and projects, eventually concentrating on composing contemporary music and performing as an improviser.
Tim Perkis is an experimental musician and writer who works with live electronic and computer sound.
Freedom in Fragments is a studio album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It was composed by Frith in 1993 as "a suite of 23 pieces for saxophone quartet", and was performed by the Rova Saxophone Quartet between February 1999 and January 2000 in San Francisco. The album was released on Tzadik Records' Composer Series in 2002. Frith does not perform on this album.
Gino Robair is an American composer, improvisor, drummer, percussionist, and magazine editor. In his own music work, he plays prepared/modified percussion, analog synthesizer, ebow and prepared piano, theremin, and bowed objects. Robair resides in the San Francisco Bay Area, California.
Sylvie Courvoisier is a composer, pianist, improviser and bandleader. She was born and raised in Lausanne, Switzerland, and has been a resident of New York City since 1998. She won Germany’s International Jazz Piano Prize in 2022 and was named Pianist of the Year for 2023 in the international critics poll of Spanish jazz publication El Intruso. NPR’s Kevin Whitehead has encapsulated the distinctive character of Courvoisier’s art this way: “Some pianists approach the instrument like it’s a cathedral. Sylvie Courvoisier treats it like a playground.”
Lisle Ellis, is a Canadian jazz bassist and composer who is known for his improvisational style and use of electronics.
Maybe Monday is an American experimental electroacoustic improvisation music ensemble comprising guitarist Fred Frith, koto player Miya Masaoka and saxophonist Larry Ochs. The trio was formed in San Francisco in March 1997 when they performed in a concert at the Great American Music Hall. They have since toured the United States, Canada and Europe, and released three albums between 1999 and 2008.
Glenn Spearman was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He was associated with free jazz and experimental music.
Larry Ochs is an American jazz saxophonist, co-founder of the Rova Saxophone Quartet and Metalanguage Records.
Scot Gresham-Lancaster is an American composer, performer, instrument builder, educator and educational technology specialist. He uses computer networks to create new environments for musical and cross discipline expression. As a member of The Hub, he is one of the early pioneers of "computer network" music, which uses the behavior of interconnected music machines to create innovative ways for performers and computers to interact. He performed in a series of "co-located" performances, collaborating in real time with live and distant dancers, video artists and musicians in network-based performances.
Dana Reason is a Canadian composer, recording artist, keyboardist, producer, arranger, and sound artist working at the intersections of contemporary musical genres and intermedia practices.
Theresa Wong is an American cellist, vocalist, composer and improviser in the field of experimental music. In 2013 she lived in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Mystery Project is the first album by American jazz saxophonist Glenn Spearman Double Trio, which was recorded in 1992 and released on the Italian Black Saint label.
Smokehouse is the second album by American jazz saxophonist Glenn Spearman Double Trio, which was recorded in 1993 and released on the Italian Black Saint label.
Blues for Falasha is a posthumously released album by saxophonist Glenn Spearman. It was recorded on June 8, 1997, at Bay Recording in Berkeley, California, and was released in 1999 by Tzadik Records as part of their Radical Jewish Culture series. On the album, Spearman is joined by saxophonist Larry Ochs, pianist Chris Brown, bassist Lisle Ellis, and percussionists Donald Robinson and William Winant.