The return of the Return the Gift curated series (Series 2) continues with the third of four great shows with three great performing artists featuring S'Hells Gate, Heavy Arts Ensemble, and X Medianoche.


S'Hells Gate
Heavy Arts Ensemble
X Medianoche
Doors: 7:00 PM; Starts 7:30
Donation: $10-25


S'HELLS GATE:
S’hells Gate emerges from love, rage, and resistance, confronting pervasive cultural violence, genocide, and predatory capitalism through a volatile release of energy, where devotion and collective catharsis are forged into a sonic weapon against hate. They'll be joined by their projectionist, Fyusha.

Instagram: instagram.com/s__hellsgate


HEAVY ARTS ENSEMBLE:
Heavy Arts Ensemble is a collective of Bay Area musicians and media artists. Through a collage of extended melodic improvisation, live sampling, modular synthesis, live visuals, the outer edges of experimental beat culture, avant-garde jazz, drone and radical software, Heavy Arts Ensemble seeks to push deep grooves into trance-inducing states. The collective features a rotating lineup alongside core members: Joel Reber- reeds // percussion David Alvarez - reeds // percussion Tommy Wong- reeds // percussion Melanie Marie- live visuals // percussion Justin Esposito- double bass // percussion Diego Munguia- modular sampler // reeds // percussion

heavyartsensemble.com


X MEDIANOCHE:
X Medianoche is an artist & sound designer. They create multichannel feeling spaces, places to practice the erotic tool of presence through the use of sound as a prayer for a less numbed out, more available to revolutionary visions world. X designs and curates sound environments for screen, performance, visual arts & events grounded in deep body listening. They have collaborated on sound design projects with Anamika Singh at the Chazen Museum of Art, OYSTERKNIFE at Grace Cathedral and Paz G at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. In 2025, X shared a series of 4.4 works ~ Film for Listening (Treasure Map) for Ears of Moss at SutroFM and Film for Listening (Ferrofluid) at The Ever Afters Campout. Their work is made possible by god, spirit guides, angels, love, friends, teachers, time travel, strangers, music, mistakes, saturn, sound healing, synchronicities, pdfs, and probably you.

xmedianoche.com; Instagram: @experimentsatmidnight
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SixtyHurts Records presents Tashi Dorji, Kanoko Nishi-Smith, Zachary James Watkins
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The return of the Return the Gift curated series (Series 2) continues with the fourth of four great shows, with two great performing artists featuring Gamelan Encinal and Eleanora.


26 March:

Gamelan Encinal
Eleanora
Doors: 7:30/Show: 8:00 PM
Admission: $10-25


GAMELAN ENCINAL:
Gamelan Encinal is an American aluminum gamelan ensemble founded by Stephen Parris in 2014. Their focus is on the performance of new and existing works for just tuned American gamelan. The instruments used for the ensemble are inspired by central Javanese gamelans, and use the same tuning used by Lou Harrison and Bill Colvig for various gamelans they built. The instruments have been built over a number of years by Daniel Schmidt with the aid of Lydia Martin, Stephen Parris, and various students of Mills College, and members of the greater bay area gamelan community. Current members of the ensemble are Myra Chachkin, Richie Jensen, Patrick Liddell, Stephen Parris, Joel Skavdahl, and Mitch Stahlmann.

gamelanencinal.com


ELEANORA:
Eleanora is the solo project of Ellie Denison from New England. A classically trained harpist, Ellie balances composition and experimentation in introspective pieces. Her work demonstrates an intuitive sense of flow that finds a place for each feeling. Her latest album, Lamentations of An Bhean Sí, was released in early 2025 and is currently based in Oakland.

linktr.ee/eleanoraharp
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Doors That Only Open in Silence (open participation, non-hierarchical workshop in free improvisation)

Monthly series of improvisation research at Temescal Arts Center. Bring your instrument or come to listen. Movement and other disciplines encouraged. No advance notice needed — just show up.

Small groups will be randomly assembled from submitted names immediately before each group plays. Set up before 8:00 and be as ready to play as possible. We try to keep transition time between groups at a minimum. Over by 10pm.

Bring your own gear. As a rule, there are not instruments available to share. Anyone requiring amplification should bring a small amp. It’s recommended to bring an extension cable and power strip if you need power. Outlets and supplies are limited. Get in touch if you have any questions or special requests.

community agreements:
- Open and welcoming attitude.
- Respect for the space, which is an artist-run community resource. (Please show extra care for the recently refurbished dance floor.)
- Respect for other people and their instruments.
- - Be mindful of the personal space you inhabit while performing to ensure no harm is done to any people, instruments, etc.
- - Leave floor space for movement and movers. Secure your instrument when you’re not playing.

7:30 PM (over by 10 PM, see schedule below)
TAC: Temescal Art Center
511 48th Street, Oakland
Donations for the venue rental are encouraged.

7:30 - Load-in — everyone sets up simultaneously.
8:00 - Random trios (or other small groups), about 7 minutes each depending on number of participants.
9:00 - Second round of random trios.
10:00 - Sound must stop.

videos from past editions: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_HPASqyjYfIjlxrLSSkeQ6VZHDZNx9DG

mailing list: https://heule.us3.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=9cd317ce9b99ee106279105ed&id=fcc26e79a5
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