Liner notes:
Jessica Aszodi & Eli Namay.
Recorded 1/4/2018 in Chicago as a part of Aszodi's artist residency at High Concept Labs.
released November 1, 2020
Recorded by Eli Namay
Mixed by Eli Namay & Jessica Aszodi
Liner Notes:
Fifth Season is the bandleader debut of multi-instrumentalist composer and improviser Ben Zucker. Currently based in Chicago, Ben's music draws upon a varied practice combining experimental forms and styles, the product of studies and collaborations across North America and the UK. Ultimately, his concerns as a music maker are about experience, and how we come to understand the world as it unfolds in real time and place ourselves in it in new yet responsible (response-able) ways.
The music of Fifth Season, in particular, enables active collaboration and creativity through setting up improvised contexts via narrative text. By using long-form prose descriptions of gestures and textures, the forms of the music are guided yet open-ended, and content is constantly made anew in the moment. It has allowed the music to come to life in many different ways in the hands of various performers, who are able to bring their vocabularies to the fore and merge it with the "notation".
For this album, some of Chicago's most interesting up-and-coming improvisers went into the studio to realize a recording of old and new compositions, after performing the material throughout venues for experimental and creative music. Adam Shead (John... more
released June 15, 2020
Ben Zucker - Vibraphone
Mabel Kwan - Piano
Eli Namay - Upright bass
Adam Shead - Drums
Recorded and mixed by Nick Broste at the Shape Shoppe, Chicago, on July 23, 2019.
Mastered by Bill Harris.
Artwork by Ana María Bermúdez
Errata's debut album recorded March 03, 2019 at the Shape Shoppe by Nick Broste.
released May 10, 2020
Ishmael Ali - guitar & electronics
Eli Namay - upright bass
Bill Harris - drums & percussion
mixed and mastered by Errata
artwork by Errata
tracks 1,3,5, & 6 - Ali
2 - Namay
4 - Harris
Solo upright bass recorded live at Elastic Arts in Chicago, February 27th 2020.
released May 1, 2020
Recorded and Mixed by Bill Harris
Eli Namay - upright bass & album art
All music by Eli Namay except Composition No. 245 by Anthony Braxton & Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum by Wayne Shorter.
Liner notes:
I.
Even light
descends from air
to flesh
In a long lung
of thought
upon us,
Open to retain
the warmth rememberd
limb by limn
II.
Asks us
what wilderness
outside this,
that such and such
diffusion of phosphor's essence~~
'phoricin in its condensation
(sentenced to its recapitulation)~~
visits us,
sparrow-esque
like a sun-hed, stout,
burgeoning in particular,
bird-brag hailing
arabesque
from the wood
and planes outside
horizons. not up nor down but in
or out~~strong wind, a swift emerging nether
cloud pitches about the unsung note
'til held
by the head.
Founded in the Winter of 2017 Adam Shead’s Adiaphora Orchestra is a large mixed chamber orchestra performing the compositions and conductions of percussionist composer, and educator Adam Shead. The Adiaphora Orchestra, located in Chicago, IL, is comprised of the cities finest rising star improvisers from a variety of performance idioms and practices. Including a full string, brass, woodwind, auxillary, and rhythm section the ensemble performs what Shead calls “indifference music”. Adiaphora, meaning an act that is neither moral nor immoral is the basis for the music of the ensemble, performing long form pieces that have little interest in codified ways of knowing musical expression. This resistance to the codified structures of improvisation brings about a type of musical indifference, or rather a love from the ensemble for creating something that is uniquely their own, something not bound to the constructs of musical hierarchy. “Miniature Paintings and the Impossible Warehouse” is a series of pieces dealing with diametrically opposed concepts of scale. Utilizing both the concept of miniature paintings or micro scaler systems displaying the distortion of reality, and the impossible warehouse as the macro or literal representation of reality the orchestra hopes to display an honest reflection on concepts of delusion, paranoia, imitation, contentment, and interpersonal relations. The debut album from Adam Shead’s Adiaphora Orchestra, “Miniature Paintings and the Impossible Warehouse”, will be physically produced and released by Chicago based record label Amalgam Music.
Adam Shead is among the newest generation of Chicago improvisers, bringing his unique approach to the drum set to such groups as Adam Shead’s “Finding Home”, Wark/Dawid/Heinemann/Shead, Ben Zucker’s “Fifth Season”, the Stein/Shead duo, and the Adiaphora Orchestra. Shead’s background in hardcore punk, contemporary classical, jazz, and improvised music provides him with the ability to move fluidily throughout a myriad of musical styles while utilizing extended techniques, blistering speed, and dynamic control in a manner often unheard of on the drum set. Shead has performed at renowned music festivals such as The Present is Present in Amsterdam, NL, The Ann Arbor Edge Fest, Homebody Festival in South Bend, IN, and The Chicago Jazz Festival. Shead has performed alongside such luminaries as Jason Stein, Tim Daisy, Steve Swell, John Dikeman, Jasper Stadhouders, Mary Oliver, Anna Webber, Angel Bat Dawid, and Matt Piet. Shead is the founder and conductor of the twenty piece Adiaphora Orchestra and currently works as the Director of Outreach at Slate Arts and Performance in Chicago, IL.
released April 30, 2020
Recorded at Elastic Arts Foundation in Chicago, IL on September 15, 2019.
Recorded, mixed, and mastered by Bill Harris.
Adam Shead - Conduction
Johanna Brock - Violin/Voice
Scott Rubin - Viola
Erica Miller - Cello
Ishmael Ali - Cello/Electronics
Eli Namay - Double Bass
Andrew Scott Young - Double Bass
Jakob Heinemann - Double Bass
Jeff Kimmel - Clarinet
Sarah Clausen - Alto Sax/Clarinet
Chris Moore - Alto Sax/Recorders
Jake Wark - Soprano/Tenor Sax
Mark Mahoney - Trumpet/Accordion
David Fletcher - Trombone
Matt Riggen - Tuba/Trumpet
Matt Murphy - Toy Instruments
Ben Perkins - Veena
Ben Zucker - Vibraphone/Voice
Matt Piet - Piano
A ≠ A is a set of recordings and critical theory that serve as an attempt to soberly position myself in the world both culturally and politically. The writing portion of A ≠ A is an examination of the nature of symbols in relation to the human brain, how symbols constitute large scale class based societies, and what that might mean for struggles both culturally and politically. I make the case for understanding political struggle and cultural struggle as representing two distinct yet interrelated activities, each affecting the other but ultimately having distinct scopes. While the writing represents an offering in the realm of political struggle the recording is an offering in the realm of cultural struggle. Through the strategic deconstruction and reconstitution of familiar cultural symbols the recording will hopefully allow folks who are not necessarily immersed in experimental music traditions to viscerally experience the possibility for creative activity outside of the aesthetic logics of both the commercial market and the ivory tower. As well as illustrating how dominant value systems (ideology) function in a society dominated by monetary exchange value, the writing in turn critiques this kind of cultural activity as, although necessary, inadequate on its own for the liberation of humanity from both direct and abstract domination. For this project the decision to present the recording and writing side by side, but at a formal distance, is not an arbitrary one. It is based on my analysis of the distinct scopes of cultural and political struggle, and hopefully illustrates a hew type of dialectical communication that does not settle into static images for the sake of ontological comfort, or organizational or careerist expedience.
released May 17, 2018
Eli Namay - Upright and Electric Bass, Design, Engineering & Production
Alexa Rixon - Design and Printing
All music by Eli Namay except "Ducks on the Pond" (traditional) and "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (Harold Arlen & Y.E. Harburg)
"Two Europeans" was recorded at High Concept Labs
para instrumento de cuerda preparado/defectuoso
By Luis Fernando Amaya - luisfernandoamaya.com
Recorded at North Western University c. Feb 2017
A piece by Alex Grimes, recorded live at The Option Series at Experimental Sound Studio. This piece features tablature notation for the bass part, and a set of instructions on how to relate to an fixed audio track for the clarinet part.
Eli Namay - amplified upright bass
Emily Beisel - amplified bass clarinet
Entropy Ep was recorded in the Bridgeport Neighborhood apartment of Eli & Phil, spring 2015. AOtiNO was recorded in their Bridgeport practice space shortly thereafter. AOtiNO was written for the duo by Alex Grimes. It consists of decoupled physical parameters depicted on several staves for each instrument, utilizing a proprietary mix of traditional notation and line tablature.
released February 2016
Eli Namay - upright bass
Phil Sudderberg - drums & percussion
Alex Grimes - composition (An Object that is Not Oriented)
Recorded, mixed, and mastered by Eli Namay.