RIO Drop-In Centre

Annie Gosfield (born 1960, in Philadelphia) is a composer based in New York City. She has led ensembles performing her work at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall as part of the yearly Bang on a Can Festival, the Taktlos Festival in Zurich and Basel, New Music Marathon in Prague, Festival Solo in Switzerland, and three of the Knitting Factory’s “Radical New Jewish Culture” festivals curated by John Zorn. Ms. Gosfield studied piano with French jazz pianist Bernard Peiffer and Horowitz student Alexander Fiorillo, and studied composition at North Texas State University and the University of Southern California. She has received grants and commissions from the NEA, the Rockefeller Foundation, Meet the Composer, The Crosstown Ensemble, the American Music Center, Arts International, The American Composers Forum, The Siemens Corporation. The Djerassi Foundation, The Jerome Foundation, and Harvestworks/Studio Pass.

Ms. Gosfield’s work The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory was recorded by the Bang on a Can All-Stars for Sony Classical, on their CD “Cheating, Lying, Stealing”, premiered at Lincoln Center in New York, and performed at The Israel Festival, The Adelaide Festival, Warsaw Autumn, and throughout Europe (1995-99). Her own performance of The Manufacture... received honorary mention at Prix Ars Electronica 97. Other performances include the premiere of In Rides the Dust by Agon Orchestra at the New Music Marathon in Prague (1996), premiered in the U.S. by Bang on a Can’s “Spit Orchestra” at the Kitchen, New York (1997). She was commissioned by New York’s Crosstown Ensemble and The American Composers Forum to compose Lost Night, a work for chamber orchestra and sampler premiered at New York’s Tribeca Hall (1995). Brooklyn, October 5, 1941, for solo piano and baseballs, was composed in honor of the 100th anniversary of the unification of the five boroughs of New York, and premiered at Lincoln Center in 1997, with subsequent performances throughout the U.S., Europe, and South Africa by pianist Guy Livingston.

Gosfield’s recent Tzadik CD Burnt Ivory and Loose Wires, features compositions for altered and detuned piano, recorded by Gosfield and her ensemble during a residency at Harvestworks Studio, NYC. The CD also features Brawl, a new work written for the Rova Saxophone Quartet. Upcoming and recent projects include releases on New World and CRI; a Siemens Kultur Programm “Artists on Site” award to create a work that combines music and industry during a six-week residency in Nürnberg; a new work for the Swedish chamber ensemble “Pearls Before Swine” to be premiered at the ISCM World Music Days (2000); a commission for the Harry Partch instruments from Newband; a video work commissioned by The American Composers Forum; and a new work for string quartet and percussion quartet, Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery, that was premiered at San Francisco’s Other Minds Festival in March, 2000. This work has been released on a studio recording by the TDAZIK label. She continues to collaborate with guitarist Roger Kleier, and leads her own ensemble performing her own work throughout the U.S. and Europe, performing at international festivals in 1999 including Musique Action Internationale (Nancy, France); Festival Musique Actuelle (Victoriaville, Canada); and City of Women (Ljubljana, Slovenia).

Gosfield has performed and/or collaborated with John Zorn, Elliott Sharp, Nurit Tilles, The Rova Sax Quartet, Ikue Mori, David Moss, Marc Ribot, Davey Williams, LaDonna Smith, and her long-time partner Roger Kleier. She played in the tenth anniversary of John Zorn’s “COBRA,” and has also performed his piece Xu Feng. Ms. Gosfield has been involved in a wide variety of projects such as collaborating in the music for Christopher Walken’s HIM at the Public Theater in New York; creating music for installations with artist Manuel Ocampo; and performing in free improvisation ensembles. Annie’s work has been featured on German radio (Sudwest Funk, Radio Free Kassel, and SFB Berlin), and on U.S. radio in live performances for NPR and Pacifica stations.

Annie Gosfield has created a body of work that includes large–scale compositions, chamber pieces, electronic music, video projects, and music for dance. Her work often explores the inherent beauty of non–musical sounds, and is inspired by diverse sources such as machines, destroyed pianos, warped 78 records, and detuned radios. She uses traditional notation, improvisation, and extended techniques to create a sound world that eliminates the boundaries between music and noise, while emphasizing the unique qualities of each performer. Annie lives in New York City and divides her time between performing on piano and sampler with her own group and composing for many ensembles and soloists.

Gosfield held the Darius Milhaud Chair of Composition at Mills College in Oakland, California, in Fall, 2003 and 2005. She has received fellowships from the McKnight Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, the Siemens Foundation, and the Djerassi Foundation, and has received grants and awards from the NEA, the American Composers Forum, the Jerome Foundation, the American Music Center, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, U.S. Artists at International Festivals, Meet the Composer, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Argosy Foundation, and the Yvar Mikhashoff Trust for New Music, among others. She studied composition at the University of Southern California and North Texas State University, and studied piano with jazz pianist Bernard Peiffer and Horowitz protégé Alexander Fiorillo.

Annie's music has been performed and/or commissioned by many musicians and ensembles, including Joan Jeanrenaud, Fred Frith, William Winant, Felix Fan, The Bang on a Can Allstars, The Flux Quartet, The Miami String Quartet, The Penderecki String Quartet, The Silesian String Quartet, The California Ear Unit, ROVA, Newband (on The Harry Partch instruments), Relache, Talujon Percussion, So Percussion, The Pearls Before Swine Experience, Present Music, Zeitgeist, The European Music Project, Marco Cappelli, George Kentros, David Cossin, Andrew Russo, Blair McMillen, Guy Livingston, Avian Orchestra, Agon Orchestra, Spit Orchestra, The Crosstown Ensemble, the West Australia Symphony Orchestra's New Music Ensemble conducted by Roger Smalley, and many others.

Festivals that have featured Gosfield's music include Warsaw Autumn, The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival (as composer in residence), Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (U.K.), The Venice Beinnale, Bang on a Can Festival (Lincoln Center, New York), ISCM World Music Days (Luxembourg), Festival Musique Actuelle (Victoriaville, Canada), Musique Action (Nancy, France), The Taktlos Festival (Zurich and Basel), Company Week (New York), Tampere Jazz Happening (Finland), Wien Modern, The Israel Festival, The Adelaide Festival, Muzik3 (San Diego), OtherMinds (San Francisco), the Schleswig–Holstein Festival (Germany); Settembre Musica (Milan), Time of Music Festival (Viitasaari, Finland), MATA (New York), and three of the Knitting Factory's "Radical New Jewish Culture" festivals curated by John Zorn. Annie's work has been performed at many venues worldwide, including Alice Tully Hall, the Miller Theatre, Merkin Hall, Walter Reade Theater, the Anchorage under the Brooklyn Bridge, Tonic, the Knitting Factory, Roulette, The Stone, and Experimental Intermedia, (New York City); Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco); Monday Evening Concerts (Los Angeles); Walker Art Center (Minneapolis); Teatro Olimpico (Rome); Théâtre de la Ville (Paris); Ujazdowski Castle (Warsaw); The Hermitage (Saint Petersburg); and many other spaces.

Active as a performer and improviser, Gosfield has played with Derek Bailey, Joan Jeanrenaud, Roger Kleier, John Zorn, Fred Frith, Chris Cutler, William Winant, Ikue Mori, Scanner, Marc Ribot, Min Xiao Fen, Joey Baron, Jim Pugliese, Christine Bard, Sim Cain, David Moss, Davey Williams, and LaDonna Smith. Annie's compositions have been used by numerous choreographers and dance companies, including Karole Armitage, Susan Marshall, Robin Stiehm, Ginger Thatcher, Milwaukee Ballet, Oregon Ballet Theater, Simone Clifford Dancers (Australia), Didy Veldman with Skanes Dansteater, Ballet Gulbenkian (Portugal), Gruppen Fyra (Finland), and Ballett der Staatsoper Hannover (Germany), at venues in the U.S., Europe, and Australia, including BAM's "Next Wave" festival, the Joyce Theatre, Jacob's Pillow, The Duke Theatre on 42nd Street, The Adelaide Festival Centre, and The Venice Biennale.

Annie's discography includes three solo releases on the Tzadik label, as well as compositions on Sony Classical, CRI, Harmonia Mundi, Wergo, Caprice, Cantaloupe, Rift, EMF, Innova, Atavistic, ORF, Recommended, and Starkland. In 1999 Gosfield created Shoot the Player Piano, a six–minute video for an imaginary orchestra of aged mechanical musical instruments. The video was commissioned by the American Composers Forum for the Sonic Circuits Festival, and has been played at film festivals in the U.K. and Slovenia, as well as at the Berkeley Film Archives, Rockefeller Center, and colleges throughout the U.S.

Annie's most recent Tzadik CD, "Lost Signals and Drifting Satellites" features four recent pieces drawn from her extensive work for soloists and ensembles. The CD demonstrates her very personal approach to contemporary classical music, at once noisy, melodic, and atmospheric. Compositions include The Harmony of the Body–Machine, composed for ex–Kronos cellist Joan Jeanrenaud; Lightheaded and Heavyhearted, performed by the Flux Quartet; Lost Signals and Drifting Satellites, for violin and satellite sounds, composed for George Kentros; and Mentryville, performed by the composer on prepared piano.

Annie's 2001 Tzadik CD "Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery", features music inspired by factory sounds, including EWA7, performed by Roger Kleier (guitar), Ikue Mori (electronics), Sim Cain and Jim Pugliese (percussion) and Gosfield (sampling keyboards); and Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery, performed by The Flux Quartet and Talujon Percussion Quartet. EWA7 was composed in 1999, during a six–week residency in the factories of Nuremberg, Germany, where Gosfield recorded and researched the sounds of machines and industrial environments as the recipient of the Siemens Kultur Programm's "Artists on Site" award. The concert–length piece was originally composed for a site–specific performance in a factory in Nuremberg, and incorporates sampled machine sounds, percussion played on industrial found metal, altered electric guitar, machine‚inspired rhythms, ambient noise, and the recycled sounds of many factories. EWA7 was subsequently performed at Warsaw Autumn, Tampere Jazz Happening, Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville, the Anchorage under the Brooklyn Bridge, the Exploratorium (San Francisco), and Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Flying Sparks and Heavy Machinery, a double quartet for strings and percussion, was also inspired by her experiences in the factories of Nuremberg. It was originally commissioned for the Other Minds Festival (San Francisco), and has been performed at Warsaw Autumn and throughout the U.S. and Canada.

Gosfield's first solo CD, "Burnt Ivory and Loose Wires", focuses on work inspired by detuned and destroyed instruments. The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory recreates the wild card tunings of destroyed pianos and prepared pianos; Four Roses features microtonal scordatura for cello with detuned piano; and Blue Serge incorporates a raucous lexicon of analog synth sounds. Performers include ROVA saxophone quartet, cellist Ted Mook, guitarist Roger Kleier, percussionists Jim Pugliese and Christine Bard, and Annie Gosfield on sampling keyboards.

Ms. Gosfield's composition The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory was recorded by the Bang on a Can All Stars for their Sony Classical CD "Cheating, Lying, Stealing" and "Bang on a Can Classics". It was premiered at Lincoln Center in New York, and performed at Wien Modern, The Israel Festival, The Adelaide Festival, The Venice Biennale, Warsaw Autumn, Settembre Musica, and throughout the world (1995–2006). Her own performance of The Manufacture... received honorary mention at Prix Ars Electronica. The Manufacture of Tangled Ivory has also been performed by Present Music, Zeitgeist, Relache, Agon Orchestra, and Gosfield's own ensemble.

Upcoming projects include a concerto for electric cello and acoustic cello for Felix Fan and the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kent Nagano, a multi-media opera inspired by the radio transmissions of the Danish Resistance in World War II, and a new work for pianist Lisa Moore.