MATA Interval 2.3 Composers

Eric km Clark

Lisa R Coons

Bryce Dessner

ghys2

Joshua Lopes

Accomplished violinist, composer, and improviser Eric km Clark has performed throughout the world, with the majority of his shows taking place in Los Angeles, Toronto, and New York City. Originally from Victoria, Canada, Mr. Clark first moved to the US in 2004 to study at the California Institute of the Arts and with the late James Tenney. He spent the last two years in Brooklyn performing in various ensembles before relocating to LA this past summer. Mr. Clark has collaborated in performance with many of the world's most innovative artists and ensembles, including Han Bennink, Michael Gordon, Guy Maddin, Ensemble Sospeso, and the Silver Orchestra. He is a member of the California EAR Unit, Red Light New Music, Object Collection, Passenger Fish, Skakk Rocket, and the newest member of the Kadima String Quartet. His playing has been released on Innova, New World, Tonehole Music, and Sundialtech. A regular contributor to the new music scenes around North America, Mr. Clark’s compositions have been performed in many renowned venues, such as RedCat, Mass MoCA, the Music Gallery in Toronto, the Berkshire Fringe Festival, Theatre La Chapelle in Montreal, and the Ontological Hysteric Incubator in New York City. Mr. Clark is also excited to have recently co-founded with composer Michael Winter “The Wulf.”, an experimental concert venue located in downtown LA.Growing up around equipment and metalworking on a farm in northeast Missouri, Lisa R. Coons acquired a special affinity to noise composition, found sounds and abstract art. She studied composition with Dr. James Mobberley and Dr. Chen Yi at the University of Missouri-Kansas City during her undergraduate degree and received her Masters in Composition from SUNY Stony Brook. Presently a graduate student at Princeton University, her work has expanded to include the construction of percussion sculptures from scrap metal and discarded machine parts and a series of pieces for instruments with turntables. She received the 2005 ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composers Award for her string quartet Awkward Music and is a member of the New York-based composers collective, The Collected.Bryce Dessner performs regularly as guitarist for The National. He has also toured extensively as a composer and guitarist for the improvising new music quartet, Clogs. The National's recent concerts include headlining shows in the BAM Opera House and the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in the UK, as well as a stadium tour with REM. Bryce is also recording and touring with songwriter Sufjan Stevens and the composer Michael Gordon. He has also toured as guitarist with Bang on a Can and composer Philip Glass. As a composer, his music has been featured recently by WNYC's New Sounds Live at Merkin Hall, as well as live performances on the BBC 3, France Inter, and Dutch National Radio. He recently made his feature film debut as score composer for the indie-film Turn the River. Bryce was also recently awarded a Jerome Grant from the American Composer's Forum to support a commission from The Kitchen. Bryce is the founder and artistic director for the 2008 Music Now Festival in Cincinnati, Ohio and is the musical director for a new theater/installation by acclaimed visual artist Matthew Ritchie at the South Bank Centre in London.Florent Ghys is a composer and double bassist from Bordeaux, France. In addition to writing for traditional ensembles, he creates his beautifully intricate music through studio multi-tracking, and solo performance with loops and electronics.

Joshua Lopes, a citizen of New Jersey is establishing himself as a guitarist, bassist, composer and educator.Graduating cum laude from William Paterson University with a Bachelor's degree in jazz studies, Joshua studied guitar with Gene Bertoncini and Paul Meyers and composition with John Link and Kevin Norton. A core member of Dither, he is also the bassist for the Brooklyn based experimental sextet Kyklos and guitarist/composer for Tell the Audient Void, a mean-spirited jazz-fusion quartet.

Paula Matthusen

Wil Smith

Paula Matthusen is a composer, currently based in Brooklyn. She writes both electroacoustic and acoustic music and realizes sound installations. In addition to writing for a variety of different ensembles, she also collaborates with choreographers and theater companies. She has written for diverse instrumentations, such as run-on sentence of the pavement for piano, ping-pong balls, and electronics, which Alex Ross of The New Yorker noted as being "entrancing". Her work often considers discrepancies in musical space—real, imagined, and remembered.Her music has been performed by Alarm Will Sound, International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), orchest de ereprijs, Ballett Frankfurt, noranewdanceco, Kathryn Woodard, Diesel Lounge Boys, and Jody Redhage. Her work has been performed at numerous venues and festivals in America and Europe, including Merkin Concert Hall, WAX, Judson Dance, Joyce SoHo, the Construction Company, Das TAT, the Aspen Music Festival, Bang on a Can Summer Institute of Music at MassMoCA, Aural Tick Festival, the Gaudeamus New Music Week, SEAMUS, NWEAMO, and the Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival. She performs frequently with the electroacoustic duo ouisaudei, Groundwave New Music Collective, Object Collection, and recently winter company. Awards include a Fulbright Grant, ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composers' Award, First Prize in the Young Composers' Meeting Composition Competition, the MacCracken and Langley Ryan Fellowship. Matthusen has also held residencies at create@iEar at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, STEIM, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts. Matthusen received her Ph.D. for New York University - Graduate School of Arts and Science, and is currently Professor of Music Technology at Florida International University.Wil Smith is a composer and improviser based in Brooklyn, New York. His music spans traditional and popular styles, integrating electronics, theatrics, and improvisation. Wil performs regularly on keyboards and laptop with his experimental band Passenger Fish, for which he is currently writing a multimedia rock opera. Three scenes from the opera-in-progress were recently showcased at The Flea Theater's "Music with a View" series, curated by pianist Kathy Supove. Other recent performances include the California EAR Unit's "Premieres" concert at the REDCAT Theater in Los Angeles, the Electronic Music Foundation's "Lab" series in New York, and the "12 Nights" new music series in Miami.  Wil has attended the Czech-American Summer Music Festival in Prague and the Bang on a Can Summer Music Institute, and received his masters degree in composition from the Manhattan School of Music in 2005 where he studied with Julia Wolfe.