07/23 @ 8:00pm - Blevin Blectum + Volume II (Thorpe, Chavez, Burgon, Moore)

Bevin Kelley (Blevin Blectum)

She began work on a PhD in Computer Music and Multimedia in Brown University’s Multimedia and Electronic Music Experiments (MEME) department in the Fall of 2009.

As an improviser, Thorpe has performed with Chris Brown, Chris Cogburn, Rob Cambre, David Dove, Annette Krebs, Maggie Nicols, Liz Tomme, Bhob Rainey, Pauline Oliveros, Mike Bullock, Gino Robair, and Miya Masaoka among others. She was a 2008-featured performer at San Francisco’s Activating the Medium festival, performing with Zbigniew Karkowski, Anti-Matter, and Ulrich Krieger, and at Issue Project Room’s Floating Points festival, 2008, where her multi-channel composition Nautical Twilight was premiered.

As a founding member of Mercury Rev, Thorpe composed, performed, recorded, produced and toured with the band, from 1989 through 2001, earning numerous critical accolades and a gold record for 1998′s Deserters’ Songs. With Mercury Rev, Thorpe found herself sharing the stage with Bob Dylan, Hole, Spiritualized, Pavement, High Llamas, Dinosaur Jr., My Bloody Valentine, Porno for Pyros, Hum, Cat Power, Ride, Sonic Boom, Sonic Youth, and more.

Moore
Stephan Moore is a composer, performer, audio artist, and sound designer in New York City. His creative work centers around the collection and use of real-world sound, the creation and perception of sonic environments, and technological manifestations of improvisation and interactivity. Many of his performances and installation artworks make use of large, multi-channel arrays of his Hemisphere speakers. He performs regularly with Scott Smallwood in the electronic duo Evidence, and with a variety of musicians, live-video artists, and dancers. He has created custom music software for a number of composers and artists, and has taught college-level courses in composition, sound art and electronic music at several schools. He is currently the Sound Engineer and Music Coordinator of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, and one of its core musicians.

Burgon
Multi-instrumentalist Shelley Burgon is best known for her improvisatorial work using harp and laptop. She is a member of the chamber group Ne(x)tworks and the band Stars Like Fleas. Shelley has performed her music for series such as the the MATA Festival, Issue Project Rooms Points in a Circle, free103point9 Wave Farm and Summer Winds. In May 2009 she was honored to premiere a new piece for the Merce Cunningham Hudson Valley Project at the Dia:Beacon. Shelley holds an MFA in Electronic Music from Mills College. She can be heard as a collaborator and guest on many labels including Hometapes, Skirl, Tzadik and Ipecac. She is inspired by Maryanne Amacher and is currently at work on a solo electronic record.

Chavez
Born in Peru, avant-turntablist Maria Chavez currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.

Chavez’s work is focused on short solo electro-acoustic sound pieces using a collection of new and broken needles that she calls “pencils of sound” and a selection of records, which provide the palette. Many of her live sound installations have focused on the paradox of time and the present moment, with many influences stemming from improvisation in contemporary art.

Her work has been recognized by the Jerome Foundation, which awarded her the Emerging Artist Grant by New York’s Roulette Intermedium in 2008. In 2009, she became a recipient of the Van Lier Fellowship which is generously offered to young sound artists by The Edward and Sally Van Lier Fund of the New York Community Trust.

She has traveled extensively, sharing the stage with Pauline Oliveros, Alan Licht, Phil Niblock, and Otomo Yoshihide to name just a few. She has performed in venues including the Contemporary Arts Museum in Bordeaux, France; the Akademies der Kunste in both Vienna and Berlin; and Sonoteca in Lima, Peru. She was an artist in residence in 2008 with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company and the DIA:Beacon Museum and recently performed for Christian Marclay and the Whitney Museum of American Art in NYC as part of Christian Marclay: FESTIVAL.