Tom's Place
3111 Deakin Street Berkeley
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Tania Chen (piano) works by Lawrence Crane, Chris Newman and Tania Chen
Andrew Raffo Dewar (reeds) with Tom Djll (tpt), Tom Nunn (perc) and Tim Perkis (elec)

Tania Chen is a pianist, experimental musician, free improviser and sound artist, working with pianos, keyboards, found objects, toys and vintage and lo-fi electronics.

She regularly performs contemporary piano works in the UK, Europe, USA and Japan, concentrating on American and British experimentalists an their influencers (so lots of John Cage, Michael Parsons, Chris Newman, along with Shoenberg, Webern, Satie and Scriabin.) She is equally known for her passion for free improvisation, performing alongside and collaborating with musicians that include Steve Beresford, John Edwards, Lol Coxhill, Alan Tomlinson, Roger Turner, John Butcher, Rhodri Davies and Terry Day.

At this concert she will be playing piano works by Lawrence Crane, Chris Newman and herself (among others, I think.) She's been sensational every time I've heard her, and I expect no less this time.

Composer, improviser and saxophonist Andrew Raffo Dewar, born in Argentina, was a fast-rising presence in the Bay Area's improvised music community before leaving to take up a position at the University of Alabama. When he appeared at Tom's Place last year, his new "Ekphrasis Suite" was a sensation. Tonight he'll be improvising with a coterie of Bay Area notables: homebrew percussionist Tom Nunn, synthesizer maven Tim Perkis and trumpet abuser Tom Djll.

Reviewers have said about Andrew: "Though he's a noted composer of chamber music, Dewar's flutters and wails show that he's no slouch when it comes to heavyweight sax playing either." As a performer, he has been described as having "complete control of the instrumental nuances," and being "inherently clever [and] intuitively rational," with "uncommon sensitivity." Approaching the soprano saxophone as "a piece of metal capable of making sounds", Dewar's conception at times "sounds almost electronic in the way it pulsates", leading one writer to comment that "you don't have to know what that means to appreciate that this will not be a traditional sax solo."

Cost: Free, donations accepted.

Audio samples in which musicians at this event play:

Videos featuring musicians playing at this event