 ADEY. The multi-talented Adey is a vocalist, pianist, composer, and actor. As singer/songwriter she joins the ranks of such solo female virtuosos as Tori Amos, Sarah Mclaughlan and Joni Mitchell, blending classically influenced piano composition with raw lyrical reflective intimacy. The daughter of two concert organists, and a consummate performer, she lures audiences with her textured, melodic piano and warms them with a voice as gritty with soul as it is soaring with ambiance and mystery. Adey’s independently recorded and produced debut album, Rogue, was released in 2011, followed by Vesica, released in August 2013. For the last eight years, her one-woman show has been adored at venues throughout the US, including festivals, conventions, clubs and private parties. She is the star of and composer for the forthcoming feature film “The Last Avatar” from Sacred Mysteries, out December, 2014. She is currently touring regularly in California, Oregon and Colorado. For more info, please visit www.oracle88.com |
  AHARON WHEELS BOLSTA AND THE MAGI present InternationalGeographic – international travel stories told through music – a musical performance blending reality and fiction in which the audience is invited to pick a region of the world where in turn the artists will perform a musical story with selected words (perhaps names of places, teachers, instruments, festivals….) that is based on the region’s music and folktales or inspired by our imagination and research of the place chosen. There will be a large map of the world with certain regions highlighted – many of which we have visited (including lesser known areas of North America such as Indigenous tribal lands, reservations, and ceremonies), and most of which we have studied. For info, please visit www.facebook.com/orchestraeuphonos |
 BARBARA ERAMO is a singer songwriter from Italy ( Puglia ). She was awarded a critic prize at Saremo Festival in 1998 by Michael Nyman. She released the solo cd “In Trasparenza” and recently “Emily” , an Indipendent album inspired by Emily Dickinson poems. She has collaborated with intalian musicians and sound track composers for cinema and tv: Nicola Piovani ( Oscar prize “La vita é Bella”), Luis Bacalov ( Oscar prize “Il Postino”) Pivio & Aldo De Scalzi, Andrea Guerra and Alexandre Desplat ( Oscar prize 2015 ” Grand Hotel Budapest). She works in the area of world music with Piccola Banda Ikona and she had collaborated with producer Hector Zazou for her record “Oriental Night Fever”. More info: https://www.facebook.com/Barbara-Eramo-128881350463561/timeline |
 CHARMING HOSTESS is a music ensemble at the intersection of voice, text and diaspora consciousness. Founded by Jewlia Eisenberg in 1998, their mission is to make lovely noise about complex ideas. For Art in Nature we will be singing sacred music about moving into the new year. Their most recent performance installation was The Bowls Project (YBCA 2010), based on Babylonian amulets of sex and magic. Previous recordings include Sarajevo Blues (Tzadik, 2006), settings of Bosnian resistance poetry, and Trilectic (Tzadik, 2002), a look at the political-erotic world of Walter Benjamin. ChoHo’s music has been curated into the Prague Bienalle, the Museum of Peace in Uzbekistan, and the SF Contemporary Jewish Museum. For more info, please visit www.charminghostess.com |
 CONSPIRACY OF VENUS performs The Buddha’s Parable of the Burning House, and choral piece on words by Bertolt Brecht, composed by Joyce Todd McBride. Though originally written in response to the connections between capitalism and war, this poem is reinterpreted through the lens of climate change. They perform the piece in a round, allowing audience members to experience the piece from inside our circle of sound, reciting short excerpts from seminal works on climate change. They will also sing works by Hildegard von Bingen, Pauline Oliveros, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, The Pixies, and Joyce Todd McBride. Much of the music relates to ideas about ecology, nature, the wildness within us, and our deep identity with earth. For more info, please visit conspiracyofvenus.com |
 CORNELIUS SHINZEN BOOTS. The raw bamboo flute is the ultimate contemplative instrument. Played by Zen monks in Japan for perhaps a thousand years, the sound is somewhere between a Western silver flute and wind weaving through trees. Add in a virtuosic player who is meditating on stillness and audiences cannot help but be lifted into an expansive, heart-centered contemplation of creation. In addition to the Buddhist chant and nature hymns (honkyoku) created over hundreds of years in monasteries, Cornelius Shinzen Boots experiments with blues, gospel, rock, metal, and original compositions. The resulting performance encompasses a full spectrum of energy and melody. Some sounds are uplifting, soaring and ethereal, and some are turbulent, gritty and inexplicable. For more info, please visit www.shinzenshakuhachi.com |
 DARA ROBERTS is a singer-songwriter on piano and guitar whose soulful voice spans the rich terrain between jazz, blues and transporting improvisational other-worldly sounds. You can hear more at soundcloud.com/dararoberts/tracks. She is also an Acutonics soundhealing practitioner interweaving her voice as a ‘medicinal chant.’ For more info, please visit dararoberts.com |
 DOUG MACHIZ and MAX STOFFREGEN present theiR original composition “Cañon Song,” a portrayal of the blend of sounds that emerge from an east–bay canyon around sunset; the song of a coyote; the rise and fall of rushing wind; two owls calling to each other; the rustling of Redwood branches. Using cello and piano to both portray and accompany existing environmental sounds, “Cañon Song” hopes to blur the distinction between music as produced by instruments, and the melodious natural sound produced by a healthy landscape. For more info, please visit maxstoffregen.com or www.frictionquartet.com |
 ELEKTRA SCHMIDT, pianist, teacher and curator originally from Athens, Greece. She performs as a solo artist and in chamber groups in Greece, France, the US and the United Kingdom and has had the good fortune to work with such visionaries as Marios Papadopoulos, Neil Immelman, Theodor Paraskeveku, the Ganev duo and others. After graduating summa cum laude from the National Conservatory of her native Greece, Elektra pursued her post-graduate studies in Paris at the Schola Cantorum and the Conservatoire Raoul Pugno under the guidance of distinguished pianist Lilia Boyadjieva. She received her master’s degree with First Prize and Distinction (Medaille d’Or avec les felicitations du jury). Elektra is the founder of Artist Migration, an organization dedicated to the integration and mobility of international artists. Elektra lives in San Francisco where she performs and maintains a studio practice. For more info, please visit www.artistmigration.com |
 EMMY ELK, in Music for Kids of All Ages, will be sharing songs to inspire kids in their connection with nature – some tunes will be originals, some will be covers of favorites like “Oh Shenandoah” and “My Roots Go Down.” She will sing and play guitar and ukulele and invite audience members to use her shakers & other simple percussive instruments to join in on the music in nature. For more info, please visit emilyshumway.bandcamp.com |
 ERIC CETNARSKI and DANIELLE HALL invite you to experience the healing potential of sound, voice, vibration and intention with soundembrace! In this hour-long session with Eric Cetnarski and Danielle Hall, we will experience the pure tones of quartz crystal bowls, Tibetan bowls and gongs. This will be begin with a sound ‘bath’ to relax and ground you. You’ll then be asked to explore your own beautiful sounds in a series of toning exercises. At the end we will unify in sound healing and tone the intention of love to each other, the park, and the world! For more info, please visit www.samanaayurveda.com/vifi/ or www.soundembrace.com |
 EVELIE DELFINO SÅLES POSCH will be performing ritual music. Evelie is a sacred song singer and writer, recording artist, drummer, dancer, Tibetan and Kundalini Yogini, sound and pranic healer and practitioner. Coming from a family with a long line of musical history, “Evelie was singing before she could talk,” according to her mother, a radio and club singer herself. Evelie performs with and directs Mahal, a kosmik-ethnik- ekstatik- trance-tribal fusion muzik ensemble; the Kismat-Mahal Kirtan Ensemble; the Bodhi-Gaia Ensemble and Chorus which leads antiphonal spirit chanting and other devotional music; and the Spiral Dance Chorus and Band for Reclaiming’s annual Samhain celebration. For more info, please visit www.dreamtimecircus.org/profile |
 GAUTAM TEJAS GANESHAN writes and sings music that reflects a tradition of intricate song forms, elaborate vocal improvisations, and utmost sincerity of expression. Taking their inspiration primarily from Carnatic music, as well as traditions from around the world, Gautam’s songs offer listeners a fresh experience of lyricism and immediacy. His performances give an intensely personal glimpse into the continued development of a valuable and highly cultured musical heritage. For more info, please visit gautamtejasganeshan.com |
 INTERFAITH GROUP SONG presents a musical playshop with call and response songs, harmonies, optional vocal improvisation, and community building. Each song or chant is a seed that gets started. The collective voices nurture and grow the sound, directing the shapes of musical branches, tones and colors. We build a full musical tree, and rest in silence in between each song, to integrate the harmonic afterglow into ourselves. Facilitators provide structure and a compassionate space for participants to experiment and express what is inspired by song seeds, the group container, and the environment itself. Each voice has unique purpose and wisdom, and is equally qualified to add texture and meaning to the group song. No singing experience needed. For more info, please visit www.facebook.com/InterfaithGroupSong or www.meetup.com/Interfaith-Group-Song |
 JEWLIA EISENBERG is a composer, extended-technique vocalist, lay cantor, and the founder of Charming Hostess. She is interested in the particular emotional, erotic and spiritual terrains that the voice can traverse. Her work explores the intersection of text and the sounding body, pushing for translation strategies between verbal and non-verbal languages. Collaborators include anarcholits Fantom Slobode, choreographer Jo Kreiter and filmmaker Lynn Sachs. Commissioned work includes Harmonices Mundi, an opera about Kepler’s mother, and Red Rosa, a song cycle based on the letters of Rosa Luxemburg. She has been an Artist-in-Residence at MIT and University of Denver; she has studied with sozanda Muna Nissimova, Fred Frith and Daniel Boyarin. Hobbies include class war, knitting, and smashing SUV windshields. Brooklyn born and bred, she now calls San Francisco home. For more info, please visit www.charminghostess.us |
 JOVANI. As a small child, I can recall memories of singing. The flood of emotions that accompany sound is an early imprinting for all of us. I have always felt that “my song” would have taken me ‘Some‘ place, but I never quite imagined that the way it is being expressed presently would have been so simple or as close to my heart. With grace, life has brought me full circle to this pool of innocence and purity that only children feel so freely. It is my intention that you, the listener, are uplifted, and are able to journey with that same sense of ease that I feel when connected to these other worldly, healing sounds. More info: http://www.jovani.jojoworks.com |
 KEVIN CLOUD is a respected world-music specialist and artisan woodworker with a decades-long history in the Bay Area Arts community. His resume includes several years as Technical Director at San Francisco’s ‘The Lab’, custom fabrications and stage-craft with Acme Scenery, Theatre Rhinoceros and various performance-artists, and a stint as Production Manager for Caswell Harps. Berkeley Box Works produces the finest master-quality wooden percussion instruments including cajónes Peruano, Cubano, y Flamenco, marimból, and Macedonian kaval. Mr Cloud’s Oriental music and dance troupe, The Silk Road Caravan, performs regularly at venues including the Yerba Buena Center, The Dickens Christmas Fair, the Ashkenaz, and the northern California Renaissance faire. More info: www.berkeleyboxworks.com |
 LAURA INSERRA – artistic director and percussionist. Laura is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, teacher, and artistic director. She is a classically trained musician with a strong improvisational background. She plays contemporary and world music in different projects as a percussionist, multi-instrumentalist and composer. She authors and performs music for theater, dance performances, exhibitions as well as soundtracks for movies with internationally acclaimed musicians. For many years she has been involved in the artistic direction of multi-disciplinary performances in Europe and in the US. In 2007, she founded Samavesha, an international multidisciplinary non profit performing arts organization based out of Berkeley but performing all over the world. Among her productions Art in Nature Festival, the Cave Concert and Musical Journeys concert series are the most popular. Audiences worldwide are not only mesmerized by this woman but also captivated by her virtuosity, profound musicality and the passion she brings on the stage. For more info, please visit www.laurainserra.com |
 LUCIA LILIKOI presents Vessel, a reminder of the journeys we go through to return to our source, which is water. These songs speak to our connections to water, both literally and metaphorically; the emergence from the underworld, the remembrance of our womb world, our claiming as water-bearers and potent change in our world. The music is otherworldly and they call the listener into an oddly familiar and magical place called home. For more info, please visit www.lilikoimusic.com or www.lucia.bandcamp.com |
 LUCIANO CHESSA – composer, pianist and performer. As a composer, pianist, and musical saw / Vietnamese dan bau soloists, Luciano has been active in Europe, the U.S., and Australia. He currently teaches at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and collaborates with SF’s Italian Cultural Institute. For more info, please visit wikipedia.org/wiki/Luciano_Chessa |
 MARACATU PACIFICO presents a procession with percussionist and dancers playing and dancing the Traditional Brazilian rhythm of Maracatu (from Northeast). Maracatu Pacifico is a percussion ensemble performing the music of the Maracatu traditions (and modern variations) from Pernambuco in Northeast Brazil. |
 MOTOKO HONDA is a pianist and composer who has created a distinctive sound through her holistic approach to music, and her exceptional sensitivity in relating to other art forms and technologies. Employing a “virtuoso technique paired with her intensely imaginative mind” (Susan Dirende, L.A. Splash Magazine), and with stylistic influences ranging from jazz to Indonesian music to contemporary prepared piano with electronics, Motoko’s compositions and improvisations are intended to affect the body and minds of the listener rather than simple recitations of rhythmic and harmonic themes. Called both a “keyboard alchemist” (Chris Barton, L.A. Times), and the “embodiment of a muse” (Greg Burk, Metaljazz), Motoko’s performances transport audiences on sonic adventures that transcend the boundaries and conventions of contemporary music. For more info, please visit www.motokohonda.com |
 MC EUCALIPS, through their innovative and multi-dimensional approach, presents a workshop combining elements of beatboxing and vocal percussion as well as sound and breathing techniques from nada (sound) and pranayama (breath) yoga. This approach was inspired by shamanic sound healing traditions, dance and somatic healing methods, and music. For more info, please visit www.facebook.com/beatboxwithoutborders |
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 NAMORADOS DA LUA (NDL), translated from Portuguese as “Moon Lovers” is the newest Brazilian band to hit the Bay Area. NDL showcases a beautiful blend of diverse styles, incorporating musical influences from reggae, jazz, pop, rock, and funk as well as Brazilian samba, forró, and axé Carnaval music. Their driving rhythms, fiery lyrical grooves, harmonious instrumentation, and original funk make them irresistibly danceable. For more info, please visit www.namoradosdalua.com |
 NICOLE DICKERSON, producer and musician for On 3 Dance Company. Nicole has been serving as On3’s producer since the company’s inception in 2007. She is part of the musical duo Beryl and Nicole who apply their love of pop music and songwriting to as many instruments as they can manage. Based in the East Bay, and veterans of the local theatre scene, they’ve played at venues such as the Starry Plough, Impact Theatre, Dolores Park Cafe, and living rooms. When not organizing artists and playing music, Nicole is busy saving lives as an emergency veterinary technician. More info: www.facebook.com/on3dancecompany |
 PEJMAN TADAYON (setar, tar, oud) considered one of the greater exponents of Persian Sufi music, Born in Esfahan (Iran) in 1977. At about 15 begins to study iranian instruments with masters such as Behrooz Hemmati and Ostad Mohammad Reza Lotfi. Performs in several concerts in Iran. Since 2003 lives in Italy, studies painting art at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Roma and music composition at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole. He performs in concerts and seminars on traditional iranian music and collaborates with musicians such as: Patty Pravo, Massimo Ranieri , Mauro Pagani , Andrea Morricone , Andrea Parodi , Paolo Vivaldi. Teaches Oud, Tar and Setar and Eastern music theory. More info: https://www.facebook.com/pejman.tadayon |
 RUSTY STRINGFIELD – bluegrass/americana. The result of the 10 year collaboration of some fine Northern California Bluegrass, Jazz and Americana musicians, Rusty String Fields has put together a great mix of pickin, grinning,’ and singin’. Take a listen and hear for yourself, in the studio, live or in your living room, Rusty String Fields can bring it. The band was conceived by long time friends Russell Ives and Matt Lauer while in… Costa Rica in 1999. The idea…..”let’s bring together a collection of incredible musicians from the bay area and showcase the rich musical diversity of the Bluegrass, Country Americana scene on the west coast.” More info: www.rustystringfield.com |
 SARAH CAHILL – pianist. Recently called “fiercely gifted” by the New York Times and “as tenacious and committed an advocate as any composer could dream of” by the San Francisco Chronicle, has commissioned, premiered, and recorded numerous compositions for solo piano. Composers who have dedicated works to her include John Adams, Terry Riley, Frederic Rzewski, Pauline Oliveros, Annea Lockwood, and Evan Ziporyn, and she has also premiered pieces by Lou Harrison, Julia Wolfe, Ingram Marshall, Toshi Ichiyanagi, George Lewis, Leo Ornstein, and many others. Cahill has researched and recorded the music by the important early 20th-century American modernists Henry Cowell and Ruth Crawford, and has commissioned a number of new pieces in tribute to their enduring influence. She enjoys working closely with composers, musicologists, and scholars to prepare scores for performance. Recent appearances include Spoleto Festival USA, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts, the Pacific Crossings Festival in Tokyo, the Portland Piano Festival, and the Mendocino Music Festival. In December she was soloist with the Berkeley Symphony for Lou Harrison’s Piano Concerto. She has performed chamber music with the New Century Chamber Orchestra, the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, and many other chamber groups. Sarah’s most recent project,A Sweeter Music, premiered in the Cal Performances series in Berkeley in January 2009 and continued to New Sounds Live at Merkin Hall, Rothko Chapel, the North Dakota Museum of Art, Le Poisson Rouge, and venues around the country, with newly commissioned works on the theme of peace by Terry Riley, Meredith Monk, Yoko Ono, Frederic Rzewski, Phil Kline, and many others. The San Francisco Chronicle wrote that “the music, helped along by the impassioned force of Cahill’s playing, amounted to a persuasive and varied investigation of the subject,” and London’s Financial Times called it “a unique commissioning programme that unites artistic aspirations with moral philosophy.” Most of Sarah’s albums are on the New Albion label. She has also recorded for the CRI, New World, Other Minds, Tzadik, Albany, Cold Blue, and Artifact labels. She is currently preparing a CD of Mamoru Fujieda’s Patterns of Plants. Her radio show, Then & Now, can be heard every Sunday evening from 8 to 10 pm on KALW, 91.7 FM in San Francisco. She is on the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory and curates a monthly series of new music concerts at the Berkeley Art Museum. For more info, please visit www.sarahcahill.com |
 SCARLET CROW (Marya Stark and Carmen Crow) set a group intention and guide audience members to go on a journey within. They include meditation, inner exploration, open Q&A, and delicately placed moments of musical therapy. Scarlet Crow focuses on topics like gender alchemy, divine masculine and feminine (what does that even mean to people?), healing ancient times of the witch burnings, assist in calling pieces of our souls back to us in hopes that each participant leaves our workshops and prayerformances feeling loved, seen, whole, complete and inspired. For more info, please visit www.facebook.com/ScarletCrowRemembrance |
 THE SILK ROAD RAMBLERS are a half-century-old, west-coast tribe of musicians and dancers practicing traditional arts from the Middle-East, North Africa, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and California. Their performance will include collective improvisation while each musician and dancer responds and listens to one another. For more info, please visit www.youtube.com/watch |
SWEET MEDICINE has musical roots in the folk, world, and sacred chant traditions. Inspired by the elements, spirit, truth, earth, and heart, they sing as a pure offering to the community, earth, and healing of all beings. They offer a participatory musical experience, bathing you in sacred sound, harmonic singing and playful improvisation. Sweet Medicine bridges ancient world sounds with contemporary artistic expression as well as blurs the line between performer and audience member. For more info, please visit http://singsweetmedicine.reverbnation.com |
 TAJ(ology) is a newly formed music manifestation that takes you on a cosmic journey through harmonic frequencies that promotes deep listening and positive interactions. TAJ(ology) does this with (1) the sound of the didgeridoo and (2) other instrumentation such as Native American flutes, hand drums, blossom chimes, tong drums, rain sticks, trumpet, keyboard, and saxophone. These instruments overlay the base sound of the didgeridoo and hand drums to highlight its sweet, harmonic sounds. The didgeridoo’s drone sound is said to align consciousness with the energy and patterns of nature, such as the sounds of animals, wind, trees cracking, running water, and thunder. For more info, please visit www.facebook.com/TAJology |
 THE BAY AREA HANDPAN PLAYERS. The handpan is a beautiful, resonant instrument that is a mix of old-school steel crafting and 21st century metallurgy and harmonics. In the last 6 years there has been a renaissance of builders of this amazing instrument and the Bay Area is blessed by a large community of amateur and professional handpan players.They will open with a demonstration of the instrument and a couple of solos, followed by 3 longer group performances. For more info please visit www.facebook.com/groups |
 THE DULCIMATES presents “Mountain Dulcimers in the Redwoods,” a performance presenting dulcimers playing minimalistic, spare instruments. As people gather to listen, they are encouraged to pick up a spare instrument and experiment, receiving pointers and some simple instruction in playing these lovely instruments. For more info, please visit www.djhamouris.com |
 THE ELEMENTS are cutting-edge explorers of vocal improvisation, with an emphasis on healing, social change, ritual and community, vulnerability, truth, collaborative leadership and excellence. They touch, break, and mend hearts; provoke tears and laughter, transform atmospheres, and turn performances into rituals. The group strives to serve the wellbeing of audiences by utilizing sound healing and music therapy. For more info, please visit www.TheElementsMusic.org |
| THE SILK ROAD RAMBLERS are a half-century-old, west-coast tribe of musicians and dancers practicing traditional arts from the Middle-East, North Africa, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and California. Their performance will include collective improvisation while each musician and dancer responds and listens to one another. For more info, please visit www.youtube.com/watch |
 VIBE THERAPY: RENÉ JENKINS & JANAY CIPRIANI. The Ceremonial Sound Healing is akin to shamanic journeying based on Peruvian cosmology, ancestral wisdom, and modern healing principles. Sounds of ancient indigenous world instruments (i.e. didjeridu, condor quill antara, Mayan, Peruvian, Zapotec & Hawaiian ritual flutes, Chimu whistling water vessels, traditional Shamanic instruments & more!) will be played, invoking an ecstatic-state of awareness to improve well-being. Spirit-inspired songs by professional musician René Jenkins and Angel Therapy Practitioner Janay Cipriani bring together the Power of Sound-Vibration and Love & Healing Touch to create a sense of peace & vitality while strengthening spirituality. For more info, please visit www.vibetherapy.org |
 VAL SERRANT is a wizard of the steel pan, (steel drum of Trinidad and Tobago), as well as the kalimba, shekere, and many other assorted percussion instruments infuses vitality into this cultural musical mix. He teaches an Annual Six-week Course, as part of UC Berkeley Music Department’s, Caribbean Musics Program. Val, as a member of Vox Mundi Project’s “Annual Summer Retreat” at Pema Osel Ling, always visits the Sacred ”STUPAS”, Namdrol Pemay Gatsal, there….to be replenished.He is a founding-member of Oakland’s Afrika Heartbeat and Co-Producer with Grammy-Award Winner *Sikiru Adepoju, of their CD: IJINLE ILU {“Original Drumming”} …recorded in Ghana, West Afrika, and Alameda, California.Val has been teaching his craft to children and adults at home and abroad. In tune with his Afrikan heritage, Val has performed his art in many countries of the world, including Australia, Finland, Holland, Senegal, Malaysia, Singapore, and the USA. See more about Val Serrant at: Atunbi, Avotcja, and the Vox Mundi Project. |
 WOMEN WITH OPTIONS and CHINESE MELODRAMA present “The Whole Body Listening Experience,” an exploration of the earth and all of life as one body, and our individual and collective consciousness as one with all of life, through the vehicles of listening and sound. The lines between “performer” and “audience” or “sound maker” and “listener” will be blurred. A brief “warm-up” exercise will be offered for the audience to engage the body, the breath, and the apparatus of listening and vocalization. Starting from silence, the artists will lead and invite each participant to enter into the space of Whole Body Listening in their own way. Trusting what we feel in the depth of this experience, we will allow the sounds that spontaneously emerge to form the canvas we work from. Giving and receiving sounds, listening, playing, touching with sound, we will ride the wave of the process and follow its lead. For more info, please visit themusicwithinus.com, jojoworks.com, or chinesemelodrama.com |
MIRIAM RAZIEL