* As Poor as the Earth-- Marie Carroll x Tessa Ellis, Inverse and Obverse, Smith Lee x Angevine

Some say that the clay in the ground is not good for planting, that the resistance to defacement is a poverty. Yet when I look around in the places which do not posses the eye of the industrialist and his sheds of hens and hogs, his biplanes saddled with glysophosphate- the verdantness is apparent. Are our weeds not herbs? The black walnut ever fragrant her bounty open to all. 

It is an honor for this music, this being, this becoming to be as poor as the earth, maybe then we can be reminded that we are verdant, that our roots reach deep into each other and the blessed shells. We posses nothing in each moment but the ability to create the next, maybe then we can find ourselves.  

Carroll x Ellis

Marie Carroll will be performing a 10ish minute solo improvisation before being joined by Trumpeter Tessa Ellis. The combination of koto and trumpet is meant to emphasize the intensity and uniqueness of timbre, breath vs plucking, intermingling of forces which should fall intriguingly on the ear. 

Marie Carroll- Koto 

Tessa Ellis- Trumpet 

Inverse and Obverse 

Phenemonolgically inspired improvisation which seeks to reach deep into its own self. It is music with sweetness, sadness, ferocity, it presses into the chiasm waiting to be pushed back into own knowledge, our knowledge, a proportionally disambiguation of force from which we can emerge.  

Aaron Pond- Horn

Bert Harris- Contrabass

Max Glazier- Percussion

Matteo McDonnell- Accordion 

Matt Smith Lee x Pete Angevine 

Pete Angevine is one of Philadelphia's great treasures, percussionist in the Special What, administrative mastermind, student of world and free musics, his knack for creating special moments is unparalleled.  He is brought into this fold by Matt Smith Lee, reedist, sweetness, and all around thinker and tinkerer at the edge of Philadelphia's experimental music scene. Smith Lee is 1/3 of the ever-flowering Totally Automatic. 

Matt Smith Lee- Alto Sax, Bb Clarinet, Bass Clarinet

Pete Angevine- Drums/Percussion

Bios-

Marie Carroll is an experimental composer-improviser, cellist, and koto player based in Connecticut. Her work is influenced by natural phenomena and spectralism, and explores themes of liminality and transience. She regularly performs across the Northeastern US, and has also played in Tokyo, Berlin, and London. Marie's work has been performed by Hub New Music, the Schallfeld Ensemble, the Parker Quartet, Transient Canvas, Ensemble Pamplemousse, Philipp Stäudlin, and Rane Moore. In 2020, she completed her undergraduate degree at Harvard, where she studied composition under Claire Chase, Chaya Czernowin, Felipe Lara, and Hans Tutschku. In 2022, she completed her graduate degree at the New England Conservatory, where she studied composition under John Mallia and Stratis Minakakis. She is currently a graduate student at Wesleyan University, studying under Paula Matthusen and Ron Kuivila.

Tessa Ellis is a freelance trumpeter and a founding member of Arcana New Music Ensemble. She has collaborated across genres with Amos Lee, Thurman Barker, and several Philly-based bands. As an orchestral musician, she’s performed with ensembles such as the Rochester Philharmonic, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, and the Allentown Symphony. She won first place in two divisions of the National Trumpet Competition and was a finalist in the 2016 Ellsworth Smith International Trumpet Solo Competition. Tessa teaches at Swarthmore College and Settlement Music School. She studied with David Bilger at the Curtis Institute of Music, where she earned a B.M. (2017) and a Community Artist Fellowship Diploma (2018). In 2021, Tessa was an inaugural grantee of the Young Alumni Fund at Curtis. With the grant, she completed an ADHD coach training program and is now supporting neurodivergent musicians as a coach.

Aaron  Pond is a musician, concert promoter, and community organizer active in  Philadelphia. His improvisational practice is drawn from early  atonal music, the playful spirituality of the AACM, and a South Florida childhood spent in synagogues and swamps. His scholarly pursuits center the universal aesthetic structures of spirit possession and the marking  power of ritual. Aaron wishes to find himself in the turbulent seas of  sensation. You can find him performing in his many bands (BORBS, Inverse and Obverse, Argyle Torah, Toro Bravo, and Boldt Fog) and with the wonderful deziens of Philly's Dance Community.