NOW ​Improvisation Workshops Spring 2022

Online - for 15 players & 5 observers

Saturdays 1pm - 2:30pm PST

February 19 - April 9, 2022

Public Online Concert!  April 9: 3 - 4 pm PST

find out more about the Webinar concert here

FREE with NOW Membership, Donations gratefully accepted (here).

Please register for every workshop you want to attend. These workshops will be presented on Zoom (they will not be recorded) and will be presented by a different facilitator each week. Find out more about each workshop facilitator below.

Since 1978, the New Orchestra Workshop Society (NOW) has presented music improvisation workshops, offering space for exploration and participation. Our workshops are for improvisers of all levels of ability and ranges of experience, regardless of gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, age, race or religion. We protect privacy in our workshops and adopt the We Have Voice Collective Code of Conduct.  Read more about NOW workshop policies here.

February 19 - Lisa Cay Miller

photo: Guy Van de Poel

Presently living on the unceded Territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam peoples, Lisa Cay Miller (she/her) is an improvising pianist and composer who loves to create in the moment. Dr. Lisa Cay is the Artistic Director of the NOW Society, and is so honoured to have been part of the NOW workshops for a number of years.

February 26 - Ute Wassermann

photo: Michael Vorfeld

Ute Wassermann tours the world as an improviser, she realises audiovisual voice performances / installations and compositions for soloists and ensembles. At the core of her research is an ongoing and uncompromised exploration of her voice. Ute Wassermann´s otherworldy singing transcends the human voice. She sings multidimensional sculptural sounds oscillating between electronic, animalistic, inorganic and human qualities. Sound environments are an important source for her imagination. Ute creates imaginary acoustic habitats in which her chameleon like voice is tuning in with composed or found soundscapes. Her methods to extend and alienate the voice include the use of bird whistles, lo-fi electronics, resonators, field recordings and different types of microphones. Her performances engage with everyday objects or self invented instruments for voice which can take shape as acoustic costumes.

March 5 - Mankwe Ndosi

USA/Tanzania

Mankwe Ndosi is celebrated for a sound and practice that spans genres and disciplines: celebrating influences from Jazz and African legacies, Hip Hop and Soul, performance art, theater, public art and improvisation. She performs nationally and internationally and has appeared with Nicole Mitchell, Ballake Sissoko, Bridge #9, Sharon Bridgforth, Laurie Carlos, Ananya Dance Theater, Brother Ali, Atmosphere, and AACM stalwart Douglas Ewart. Ndosi is a Culture Worker – using creativity to nurture community, ancestors, and earth.

"I consider myself a Culture Worker – an artist using creative practice to nurture and be useful to my community, my ancestors, and my planet."

March 12 - River (Cassandra) Blondin-Burt

River (Cassandra) Blondin Burt is a Dene/Metis performance artist, and plant-medicine worker. Their work is grounded in the exploration of healing through co-creation with earth and story. River believes that the radical act of being in-relation with our other-than-human-relations is an act of political and personal rebellion, and a pathway for transformative collective and personal healing. They live on the traditional territory of the xwməθkwəyəm̓ , Sḵwxw̱ ú7mesh, and Selíl̓w̓ itulh.

“Through a deepening relationship with the land-body we call Earth, I explore a regenerative art and creation praxis that allows me to move through myriad contemporary settler-colonial social structures and ideologies with intent, and curiosity.”

March 19 - Douglas R. Ewart

photo: Chelese Ewart

Perhaps best known as a composer, improviser, sculptor and maker of masks and instruments, DOUGLAS R. EWART (born in Kingston, Jamaica and currently living in Minneapolis, MI) is also an educator, lecturer, arts organization consultant and all around visionary. Mr. Ewart encourages and celebrates--as an antidote to the divisions and compartmentalization afflicting modern life-the wholeness of individuals in culturally active communities.

March 26 - Clyde Reed

Clyde Reed has performed at International Jazz Festivals in North America and Europe including the Vancouver Jazz Festival, the Toronto Jazz Festival, the Chicago Jazz Festival, the Berlin Jazz Festival and the Lisbon Jazz Festival. Clyde’s only academic publication related to music, 'Free improvisation as a path dependent process' (joint with Jared Burrows) was recently published in George E. Lewis and Benjamin Piekut, eds., Oxford Handbook of Critical Improvisation Studies, Volume 1, Oxford University Press.

April 2 - Adrian Avendaño

photo: Alisha Weng

Adrian Avendaño (1993) is an emerging sound artist, musician and recordist based in Surrey / Vancouver, Canada [unceded First Nation territories]. Recent projects include Parallel 03 with experimental music duo ENDLINGS (Raven Chacon and John Dietriech of Deerhoof) alongside musicians of the Vancouver creative music community. He was the recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts: Digital Originals funding initiative working with Chilean sound artists Tebo Henriquez and Bastian Diaz. Port Parallels – Acoustic Meridians was remote collaboration exploring open-source hardware and software to develop methods of interpreting graphic and animated scores. He was a performer and composer for John Brennan’s Rudiments for Hexadrome performance and installation project for the 2021 Vancouver International Jazz Festival. He currently plays with Gamelan Bike Bike and will be studying traditional Korean drumming with Dr. Peter Joon Park.

April 9

Rehearsal with workshop participants (private) 1 - 2:30

Public online performance 3 - 4