Laminal Animal, a Madison-based trio consisting of Luke Leavitt (piano and electronics), Tim Russell (percussion and electronics), and Ari Smith (bass, percussion and electronics), utilizes improvisation to investigate emergent, complex social interactions in order to create and navigate new sonic landscapes.
Adult Swim at Madison Children’s Museum honors the public pool tradition of kicking the kids out so adults can have the space to themselves (without the water or need for a swimsuit). This 21-and-up event series offers adults the opportunity to play like a grown-up for the evening—crawling, sliding, crafting, and dancing their way through the museum.
Adult Swim is presented by the Great Dane Pub & Brewing Co.
6:30pm on 2nd floor NOSFERATU (1922) 100th anniversary screening! with Live Score and Sound FX by DB Pedersen, Brennan Connors & BC Grimm
Monsters and robots and clowns, oh my! Adult Swim returns after three long years! Adult Swim at Madison Children’s Museum honors the public pool tradition of kicking the kids out so adults can have the space to themselves (without the water or need for a swimsuit). This 21-and-up event series offers adults the opportunity to play like a grown-up for the evening—crawling, sliding, crafting, and dancing their way through the museum. Don’t miss the Wonderground, our newest 10,000 square foot outdoor playground and exhibit space.
Join us to celebrate Halloween in style – wear your favorite costume or make costume accessories after you arrive. Additional activities:
Get sketchy or model your costume for a fast-draw competition
Compete in a horror film scavenger hunt
Experiment with dry ice bubbles
Make spooky or silly ghost print
Relive a childhood nightmare as you share your worst trick-or-treat “treat”
Enjoy a vintage horror flick with live sci fi accompaniment
Enter our costume fashion show and contest to win fabulous prizes
Please note, this event is not affiliated with ADULT SWIM, the television and entertainment network—also, we don’t have a swimming pool.
Behold the Monstrosity of DB Squidersen!!
I’m very excited to perform once again with DB Pedersen! He’s been one of the most frequent collaborators to pop up on the GrimmusiK website, and of course, one of my favorite human beings that I’ve met in Madison! It’s been a little while since we’ve performed together; partly due to DB having a few year stint as a chef out in Spring Green at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin and partly due to the obvious lack of performances during this Covid era… I can’t think of a better way to reconnect than scoring a spooky silent film during its centennial this Halloween! DB and I have performed a lot of free improvisation in Madison over the years, most notably in our trio with my brother AJ, called “Sister’s Three”. A big highlight was when Sisters Three composed & performed a live theater score for A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Bartell Theatre (Madison, WI) with Strollers Theatre Company. DB is well known for his throat singing expertise, impromptu theatrics and a knack for making any sound effect you could ever imagine with his mouth! If you haven’t seen him perform before, you are in for a major treat; it’s always unpredictable, surprising, funny, and even spiritual when DB gets on stage.
db pedersen in a Spring Green silo!Brennan Connors performing with Stray Passage @ Cafe CODA | (c) 2018 Paul S Howell Photography
Most of you will know Brennan Connors from our decade long collaboration in his jazz trio Brennan Connors & Stray Passage. Saxophonist and improvisor extraordinaire, Brennan has recently developed a new style which dips into the sonic territory of 20th century composition. Brennan has been working on heady, layered dissonances and new concepts to break him away from expected norms in today’s Jazz or even New Music scenes. It’s been a long time since I’ve improvised with Brennan in such a different mode, outside of the Jazz Trio idiom. I can’t wait to see what he brings to the table!
Not only have DB and I performed a lot of free-improv together, but Brennan and DB have also shared the stage countless times in their free-improv group Amoebageddon. With soundscapes built from flutes and implements through loop stations, saxophones, and electric cello accompanied by live visual art on a projector – this was one of my favorite Madison area acts to see in the free-improv and experimental scene! We’ll be drawing on years of various collaborative configurations in order to bring you a Live Improvised Score to the silent horror film classic Nosferatu!
“did somebody say my name…?”
Film Screening: starting at 6:30pm on the 2nd floor, we’ll be celebrating the 100th anniversary of Nosferatu (1922), an unauthorized film adaptation of the novel Dracula (1887) by Bram Stoker. As the fates would have it… this is actually the second time that I’ll be performing a live improvised score to this film, also at a museum! Back around 2008-2010 I was in a guerilla new music ensemble of graduate composers at Butler University called Ensemble 48. One of our most memorable performances was a live, outdoor, improvised score to Nosferatu, with the film MASSIVELY projected onto the entire side wall of a museum in Indianapolis! It was so much fun! Miss these goofballs >>
vintage Ensemble 48, in costume after our Nosferatu screening in 2008! pictured Left to Right (standing): Joshua Morris, Nick Liebman, Adam Cohen-Leadholm, Zane Merritt, Megan Pokorney, Brian Grimm; (kneeling) Scott Comanzo, Matt Smart.
“Their sets embrace plenty of sinuous melody and conversational interplay, but can just as easily dive into minimalism and dissonance.” ~ Tone Madison
Experimental Jazz trio Brennan Connors & Stray Passage has been performing in Madison for the past 5 years, exciting listeners with a range of sonic capabilities. Their improvised music is directly linked to the atmosphere in the room and energy of the audience. The listener is such a crucial element in shaping the band’s sound that they recorded this album in front of a live studio audience – expertly captured by master engineer Steve Gotcher at Audio for the Arts. Listeners will experience a jazz trio that embraces both free and structured improvisation, original compositions, groove based experiments, and sound exploration. The breadth of a performance ranges from focused minimalism to fiery high energy music, all while maintaining a sense of narrative organization and compelling ensemble interplay.
The group is led by Brennan Connors on tenor and soprano saxophones. Geoff Brady orchestrates drum and percussion textures, while Brian Grimm rounds out the trio bowing cello, contra-cello, and electric bass.
We are ecstatic and grateful to setola di maiale records in Italy for officially releasing our first album!
We’ll be joined by a fantastic drummer & friend of mine, Hamir Atwal (San Francisco), with his trio Invisible Guy. The group features Michael Coleman on keyboard & Ben Goldberg on clarinet. We are very glad to share our CD release show bill with another trio that explores the dynamics of free-improv in full range!
“Mr. Goldberg is a clarinetist of range and curiosity.” – The New York Times
Ben Goldberg’s Bay Area-based trio looks forward and backward at the same time, creating both nostalgic reveries and modern statements. Goldberg is known for drawing on his Jewish roots and radical versions of Klezmer music and his clarinet work is always focused with an endearing lyrical quality. Pianist Michael Coleman leaps between stride riffs and electronic splatter. Drummer Hamir Atwall provides everything from a swinging undercurrent to a clattery rush.
As a trio, Ben, Michael, and Hamir are in strict pursuit of beautiful melody. Michael Coleman says: “Melody is the knife that cuts through to truth. Then there is the importance of breath, and personal expression.” Reviewing a 2014 concert, Howard Reich of the Chicago Tribune said the group is “an unusually focused ensemble inventing a musical syntax for itself.”
From 1992, when his group New Klezmer Trio released Masks and Faces and “kicked open the door for radical experiments with Ashkenazi roots music” (SF Chronicle) to 2013’s simultaneous release of Subatomic Particle Homesick Blues (featuring Joshua Redman) and Unfold Ordinary Mind (featuring Nels Cline), which the New York Times noted for “a feeling of joyous research into the basics of polyphony and collective improvising,” clarinetist and composer Ben Goldberg has shaped a career through relentless pursuit of musical truth across many genres and styles, resulting in the Downbeat Critics’ Poll naming him the #1 Rising Star Clarinetist in both 2011 and 2013. In 2015 Ben released a recording of his songcycle Orphic Machine , sung by Carla Kihlstedt and performed by an allstar nine piece band including Nels Cline, Greg Cohen, and Ches Smith. The LA Times called Orphic Machine “knotted and occasionally spooky composition marked by dazzling interplay.” All Music Guide says “Orphic Machine is wildly ambitious and sophisticated, but also graceful, emotionally honest, and accessible. It makes the profound embraceable and, as a result, is a masterpiece.” Ben currently composes for and leads the following groups:
Unfold Ordinary Mind ; Go Home ; Ben Goldberg School ; and Ben Goldberg Trio with Greg Cohen and Kenny Wollesen.
Drummer/Percussionist Hamir Atwal is a Berklee College of Music graduate who
has taught at Music Academy International, and the Stanford Jazz Workshop. Hamir is an active endorser of DREAM Cymbals. Hamir has played with saxophonists Joe Lovano, Greg Osby, and Grant Stewart; Bassist/Producer Bill Laswell; and clarinetist Ben Goldberg.
Michael Coleman is a pianist, improviser and composer currently residing in Brooklyn, NY. He has had the pleasure of playing with many great musicians and recording with some of his favorite bands and people. Apart from leading his own groups (Beep!, CavityFang, Young Nudist), Michael has toured the world with Chris Cohen, tUnEyArDs,
Sean Hayes, Miles Kurosky and Jug Free America.
