→ Examiner.com review of
Biggi Vinkeloe Roughtet's kick-off 04 May show:
here— Set 1, 2pm: Unfolding modernist string structures by Adam Fong & Brent Miller
Well-known for their savvy arts business model and the crisp, organized execution that has made San Francisco's Center For New Music an avant-arts model throughout the county, Adam and Brent have also long worked together musically as members of the composers' collective The Collected.
A room never to miss at the summer solstice Garden Of Memory event at Oakland's Chapel of the Chimes is the one that has Brent and Adam playing — or rather, unfolding — their luminous and beautifully spacious duet pieces.
Their command of extended electro-acoustic string technique, elegant economy of means, and transcendent sonic design create a listening focus of strong clarity like a form of light for the ears.
Brent Miller is a composer, performer, and arts administrator based in San Francisco. He studied composition at the University of Arkansas with Robert Mueller and University of Missouri-Kansas City with James Mobberley and Paul Rudy. Recent projects include works for Rova Saxophone Quartet, violinist Eric km Clark (EAR Unit), Dither Electric Guitar Quartet, and Sqwonk. He has received grants from Zellerbach Family Foundation and American Composers Forum to fund his work. Brent is active in the arts administration field, managing Rova:Arts, a non-profit organization that supports Rova Saxophone Quartet. He's also worked with Other Minds, helping to produce the annual Other Minds Festival.
Adam Fong is an active cultural entrepreneur, and a composer, performer and producer of new music. He has helped build two innovative arts service organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area: Emerging Arts Professionals (Co-Founder & Director) and the Center for New Music (Co-Founder & Executive Director). Fong received the MFA in Music Composition at California Institute of the Arts, where he studied with James Tenney and Wadada Leo Smith. As Associate Director of Other Minds (2006–2012), he produced six editions of the annual Other Minds Festival, dubbed the “premier new music festival on the West Coast” (Los Angeles Times), and many special projects including the CD reissues of Conlon Nancarrow’s Studies for Player Piano and The Complete Music of Carl Ruggles, tribute concerts to Ruth Crawford Seeger, Henry Cowell, and Dane Rudhyar, a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Fluxus, and the American Premiere of 18 Microtonal Ragas based on Solo for Voice 58 by John Cage. Adam's own compositions have been performed internationally in Auckland, London, Berlin, Tübingen and Darmstadt, at many US universities, and throughout California, by performers including the two-piano team Dennis Russell Davies and Maki Namekawa (滑川真希). Adam has lectured on experimental music, received international publication of his scholarly and creative work, and serves on numerous advisory boards, panels, and committees at the local and national level.
— Set 2, 3pm: The
Biggi Vinkeloe Roughtet
Swedish/German sorceress of avant / jazz wind energy, and veteran of stellar collaborations with Roberto Bellatalla, Alberto Braida, Chris Brown, Lisle Ellis, Marco Eneidi, Ken Filiano, Gianni Gebbia, Vinny Golia, Giancarlo Locatelli, Miya Masaoka (正岡みや), Barre Phillips, Gino Robair, Cecil Taylor, Peeter Uuskyla, and Marie Wärme, among many others,
Biggi Vinkeloe will réprise her long-standing collaboration with Bay Area master drummer
Donald Robinson, whom Coda Magazine has described as a "percussion dervish", and among whose most notable collaborators are Alan Silva, Anthony Braxton, Oliver Lake, Glenn Spearman, Larry Ochs, Bobby Few, Raphé Malik, and Joe McPhee.
Laptopist/pianist Joe Lasqo's special interests include applying AI techniques from expert systems, natural language processing, & computational linguistics to music; and the intersection of traditional Asian musics with modernism. He's a regular member of Aaron Bennett’s Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra & Jim Ryan’s Green Alembic, his own Renga-kai (連歌会) & Mukaiji-kai (霧海箎会) ensembles, & has played / recorded with musicians such as: Bruce Ackley, Steve Adams, Viv Corringham (London/NYC), Beth Custer, Thomas Dimuzio, Vinny Golia, Phillip Greenlief, Ron Heglin, Darren Johnston, Thollem McDonas, Lisa Mezzacappa, David Michalak, Tom Nunn, Suki O'Kane, Simon O'Rorke (NZ), Teddy Rankin-Parker, Rent Romus, Joe Snape (UK), Lucie Vítková (Czech Rep.), Jack Wright, & Pamela Z, & many others.
Showing dazzling technique and incisive taste in recent Bay Area concerts with Steve Adams, Gilbert Isbin, Sten Sandell, & Gino Robair, Scott Walton is a bassist whose music negotiates the terrain between jazz, free improvisation, and the classical avant-garde. Active in a variety of ensembles, current projects include duos with lutenist Gilbert Isbin, and with saxophonist/flautist Steve Adams; trios with dancer Ellen Webb and singer Cecilia Engelhart, with vocal artist Anna Homler and trombonist Michael Vlatkovich, and The Skerries, with guitarist Bill Horvitz and drummer Tom Hayashi; a quartet with Michael Vlatkovich, guitarist Tom McNalley, and percussionist/drummer Garth Powell; and ad hoc ensembles with electronic/computer musician Tim Perkis. He has performed or recorded with Alex Cline, Wadada Leo Smith, Vinny Golia, Myra Melford, Nels Cline, George Lewis, John Carter, Bobby Bradford, Anthony Davis, John Abercrombie, Davey Williams, Toshiko Akiyoshi (秋吉敏子), Clifford Jordan, and Philip Gelb, among many others.