New Zealand flutist Alisa Willis is an active freelancer in NZ and Australia with a long-held interest in new music and free improvisation. Having studied in the USA, Germany and NZ with John Wion, Janet Arms, Robert Aitken and Uwe Grodd, she has performed with the new music ensembles Karlheinz Company, VorEcho, Chronophonie and Aleantoric 5. Alisa performs regularly with the New Zealand Symphony and Auckland Philharmonia Orchestras and has just finished touring Australia with OzOpera. She loves words, spoonerisms and puns.
Bettina’s performing habits suggest she’s leading a double life: For the last few years she has been thoroughly enjoying travelling in order to play with the Queensland, Tasmanian, Adelaide, Christchurch and Singapore Symphony Orchestras as well as Orchestra Victoria as an orchestral oboist.
What many might not know about is her passion and obsession for New Music. While living in Germany, Bettina performed with regularly with new music ensembles including Ensemble Modern and ensemble chronophonie in many of the world’s finest concert houses, including the Lincoln Centre, Barbican Centre and Konzerthaus Berlin.
Bettina studied in Germany with renowned oboists Heinz Holliger and Hans Elhorst with the assistance of a German Government scholarship. Prior to this she completed a B.Mus.(Hons) under tutelage of David Nuttall. She is hoping the thesis she recently submitted is good enough to receive a Master of Music which was undertaken with the supervision of Eve Newsome and Dr. Stephen Emmerson.
Bettina is also a highly experienced and dedicated teacher and loves introducing her students (gently) to the world of experimental music.
Adam is a composer and multi-instrumentalist, having been involved across many different scenes within Melbourne and beyond since 1990. In 2004, Adam received a Special Award from the Freedman Foundation. For the 2006 Melbourne Fringe Festival, a special Retrospective of Adam’s work was held – featuring over 200 musicians in 40 configurations over three weeks. Musicians Adam has worked with include: Ernest Ranglin, Nigel Kennedy, Peter Brotzmann, Odean Pope, The Mavis’s and CW Stoneking.
Current ensembles include: Adam Simmons Toy Band, Adam Simmons Quartet, Origami, New Blood, Nick Tsiavos Ensemble, BOLT Ensemble, Embers, Tania Bosak’s Beijao, Steve Purcell’s Pearly Shells, Big Fela, and Collider.
Adam is releasing the debut CD for his new project, Origami, on Oct 13 at Northcote Uniting Church.
Invited to participate in the collaborative exhibition “SMS – Szczecin/Melbourne/Szczecin” by artist and friend, Jarek Wojcik, Adam was encouraged to present something very different to his musical performances. In response to this Adam developed the idea of his music box assemblages, drawing from his musical aspirations and aesthetic sense to inform a more physical form of expression. As a visual artist, Adam has been in several group shows since Oct 2009, with his debut solo exhibition at Catherine Asquith Gallery in July 2010. Adam’s work has just been selected as a finalist for both the Hutchins Art Prize and the Deakin Small Sculpture Award.
Tower of Babel (selected for 2010 Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize)
Óscar complemented his classical musical education in Spain with performances as bass guitarist in various rock bands.
In 1999 he continued bassoon and composition studies in Germany and performed with numerous ensembles, including Ensemble SurPlus and Basel Sinfonietta. He was a founding member of new music group “ensemble chronophonie”.
His compositions have been performed by duo contour, ensemble recherche and the Tiroler Ensemble fur Neue Musik, among others.
Since moving to Australia in 2006 Óscar has been performing regularly with Orchestra Victoria, the Melbourne, Queensland, Tasmanian and Adelaide Symphony Orchestras, Melbourne Chamber Orchestra, Camerata of St. John’s and Clocked Out. He is also a sought after teacher and he tutors at the USQ McGregor Summer School.
Naima Fine Fine lives in Naarm on unceded sovereign Kulin nations land. They studied composition at Qld Conservatorium and have an Honours degree in ecology. They’re a 5th+ generation musician: their grandma Joanne Fine was accepted into the London Academy of Music alongside Joan Sutherland and Don Burrows, but couldn’t take it up because they didn’t let married women study there. Naima’s favourite instruments to write music on are old family pianos.
Naima’s creative practice embraces composition, ecology, and activism. They work across artforms, explore multi-media processes and outcomes, collaborate on circus and theatre shows, and occasionally produce their own concerts.
Last year Naima had a work commissioned and premiered in L.A.; did sound design for Sydney Mardi Gras’s sold-out theatre production, The Bed Party; was artist in residence at Tilde New Music Festival; did performative live composition at La Mama Musica and the Copy That Copy Cat Festival; and had a work analysed in Routledge Press’s The Digital Score: Musicianship, Creativity, and Innovation.
Naima’s music has been performed and exhibited in shows, concerts and festivals across Australia, New Zealand, The U.K., China, and the U.S..
Naima loves queer feminist sci-fi, queercore punk, bicycling, and playing in Riff Raff Radical Marching Band
Daniel Armstrong is a photo-media / installation artist and tertiary lecturer. His current research explores relationships between photography and astronomy with a specific interest in how scientific imaging both falters and succeeds at the edge of representation and relationships of the body to space and visualisation of the cosmos. He is also interested in the historical relationships between photography and astronomy, the lens and the telescope and the cultural and philosophical implications of these relationships.
In 2010 he composed and performed a series of installations for light, stained glass architecture and classical guitar; titled Sacred Heart; as part of the In Situ Inhabit project at the Abbotsford Convent.
In 2009 he undertook an Australia Council residency at the Lowell Astronomical Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.
It was during this residency that his moving score was derived.
He lives in the rural Victoria where he spends his nights imaging the dark skies with homemade, primitive cameras and telescopes. He is currently undertaking a fine art PhD titled, The Heavens and The Heartbeat at RMIT University.
Musician, composer, actor and author. Ed Ferris is versatility. After completing a Bachelor of Music, majoring in clarinet performance, in 2009, Ed is now completing a Bachelor of Creative Arts at the University of Melbourne.
Ed is a founding member of the ‘Tea-tree-oh’ trio; exponents of contemporary Australian compositions and has given many world premier performances with the group.
Former Principal Clarinet with the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra, Ed now divides his time between teaching, playing with his gypsy-folk band ‘Eyal & the Skeleton Crew’ and writing.
In 2012, Ed is hoping to continue clarinet studies at home or abroad and to release his first short story collection ‘ Cat and Mouse’ through University of Melbourne press.
Cat Wilson is a theatre director, and new media artist specialising in video installation. Her videos utilise time-lapse to explore rhythm and perception and she collaborates with other artists to produce process videos of their practice. She has had installations as part of the Gertrude projection festival (2009), Kodak Salon at the Centre for Contemporary Photography (2010) and earlier this year collaborated with tapestry artist Michelle Hamer on her show Dangling Carrots at Craft Victoria.
In 2003 Cat completed the Graduate Diploma of Dramatic art – Directing at the VCA. Since then she has worked as assistant director with Julian Meyrick for the MTC production The Memory of Water by Shelagh Stephenson, and as director/dramaturg on several theatre productions including, Unholy Site, written and performed by Jacklyn Bassanelli, Still Waiting by Alexandra Collier and On intoxicated Ears written and performed by Alex Ben Mayor.
She was General Manager at Actors Centre Australia in Sydney for three years (2000 – 2003) During which time she was also co-producer for A Bit On The Side a monthly performance event for which she also worked as a writer and director for the one off theatre pieces created.
Amy Bastow (b. 1985) was born in a small rural town in outback Australia. Amy is a 1st class honours graduate and scholarship recipient from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.
Amy began her professional life as a classical musician and composer, writing music for many of the country’s leading professional ensembles, including the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the Australian String Quartet and The Song Company. Amy’s concert works premiered at many major events, festivals and venues throughout Australia and internationally, including the ISCM World New Music Days, the National Composers’ Forum, the Performing Australian Music Competition in London, the Melbourne Fringe Festival and the Auckland Fringe Festival.
Amy now spends the majority of her time composing music for film, television and advertising. Amy is currently the composer for Channel 7′s drama “Winners and Losers” (series 3) and is also currently writing music for James Cameron’s latest 3D feature documentary, Deep Sea Challenge. Amy was a finalist for the APRA PDA Screen Music Award this year. Amy currently works from her studio in Melbourne and can be spotted scooting around the city on her little red Vespa!
Peter Joseph Head is a songwriter and composer. He studied music composition at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne and the Kyoto City University of the Arts in Japan. He has written music in many genres and styles including indie & pop songs, experimental electronic music, contemporary art music and film scores. He posts songs to his “Status Update Songs” audioblog site and leads a band called the Actor Buddhists.
3 Shades Black 