The Electronic Lover — Artist Bios
CREATORS
Berkeley, CA-based composer, improviser, bassist and producer Lisa Mezzacappa has been an active part of California’s vibrant music community for more than 20 years. Her activities as a composer and ensemble leader include ethereal chamber music, electroacoustic works, avant-garde jazz, music for groups from duo to large ensemble, and collaborations with film, dance, and visual art. Recent projects include Cosmicomics, a suite for electro-acoustic jazz sextet based on Italo’s Calvino’s stories about the origins of the cosmos; Organelle, a chamber work for improvisers grounded in scientific processes on micro and cosmic scales; Glorious Ravage, an evening-length song cycle for large ensemble and films drawn from the writings of Victorian lady adventurers; and Touch Bass, a collaboration with choreographer Risa Jaroslow for three dancers and three bassists. She is a recipient of the Pauline Oliveros New Genres Prize from the International Alliance for Women in Music (IAWM), and has been commissioned by the San Francisco Girls Chorus and Del Sol Quartet. lisamezzacappa.com
Beth Lisick is a writer, actor and storytelling producer from the San Francisco Bay Area, currently living in New York. As an author, she has published six books including the novel Edie on the Green Screen (2020); the memoir collection Yokohama Threeway and Other Small Shames (2014); the New York Times best-selling comic memoir Everybody Into the Pool (2005); and the gonzo self-help manifesto and national bestseller Helping Me Help Myself (2008). With a grant from the Creative Work Fund, she collaborated on a chapbook series called Tell You What (2012) with the artists at Creativity Explored, a studio and gallery for artists with developmental disabilities. Beth’s acting credits include a role on the Emmy-winning Amazon series Transparent and lead roles in numerous independent films screened at Cannes, Sundance, Tribeca and the San Francisco International Film Festival. She does voiceover work for museums, including the Smithsonian, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and SFMOMA. bethlisick.com
CAST & CHOIR
Karina Denike (Joan, aka Talkin’Lady) is a San Francisco-based vocalist, songwriter and bandleader who moves fluidly from intimate torch song chanteuse, to soul singer, to modern musical stylist to punk powerhouse. KQED’s California Report says, “Denike possesses a voice so rich and luxuriant she sounds like she was born to sing any song that comes her way.” She has appeared on more than 30 albums on major and indie labels, sung on countless soundtracks and compilations, and tours extensively worldwide. A current member of bands NOFX, her own self–titled group, the Cottontails,
the Red Room Orchestra and the Bluebelles, Denike is also known for her work with the Dance Hall Crashers, Ralph Carney’s Serious Jass Project, Tony Sly, Aaron Novik, Hepcat, Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions, and Fat Mike’s Home Street Home musical. She has been presented by SFJazz, Montreaux Jazz festival (Switzerland), Redding Festival (UK), and Outside Lands (SF).
Michelle Amador’s (Margot, aka GoGo) musical career is the result of a lifetime of familial influence, an exemplary education, and a desire to make the invisible visible through her music, vocal performance and words. Michelle has been hailed as “silkenvoiced” by the San Francisco Chronicle, and her compositions are prized by accomplished jazz musicians—most recently with saxophonist and composer Dayna Stephens recording his arrangement of her work, “Amber is Falling (Red and Yellow)” on a release featuring pianist Brad Mehldau, bassist Larry Grenadier, and drummer Eric Harland in 2017. In 2020, Amador released You Are Where You Belong, an EP she recorded with producer and sound engineer Eli Crews (tUnE-yArDs, Questlove, Kathleen Hanna, Yoko Ono) at Figure8 recording in Brooklyn, NY.
Katy Stephan‘s (Frankie, aka Friday) voice has been featured in major motion picture soundtracks (XMen: Dark Phoenix, Catwoman, The Time Machine), TV movies and theme songs, and even in children’s toys. She has been a soloist with the Oakland East Bay Symphony for concert versions of Candide, Follies and Leonard Bernstein’s Mass, and was a soloist on the Grammy-nominated recording of the Bernstein Mass with the Pacific Mozart Ensemble and Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. She has performed in Germany, France, Italy, Brazil, Japan, Cyprus, the U.K. and the U.S. with various groups and projects. Katy composes and performs original music for theater, dance, burlesque and circus.
Oakland-based vocalist Melody Jeune Ferris (Theresa, aka T-Rex) grew up singing in choirs, and studied music performance at Mills College. She has performed and recorded the gnarly and uncategorizable music of composer Aaron Novik, most notably in his groups Thorny Brocky and Frowny Frown. She has also appeared with Karina Denike, Dominique Leone and Lily Taylor, and in the tropicália-influenced Bay Area band, Killbossa.
Nikola Printz (Susan, aka MizStacks) is an artist and performer known for their dark velvety voice, charismatic stage presence and artistic fearlessness. They most recently were seen playing the title roles of “elle” in La Voix Humaine with Magic Circle Opera, as well as premiering a song cycle by Jake Heggie at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, with members of the SF Opera Orchestra. Other recent titular role debuts include Orfeo ed Euridice (West Edge Opera), Carmen (Opera Modesto) as well as Rosina, Cherubino, and Isabella in L’italiana in Algeri with Opera Memphis, where they
spent two years as a company resident artist. Nikola is a graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music vocal program in 2013, where they studied under the tutelage of Patricia Craig. They attended University of Memphis (as a dual resident program with Opera Memphis) to obtain their Artist Diploma in Opera performance.
Lola Miller’s (Marianne, aka Charlene) passion for the freedom and collaboration of jazz and new music are apparent in her artistry as a singer and composer, built on a strong foundation of classical training. Miller’s music weaves together activism and the human experience. Playing alongside and studying with jazz greats such as Edward Simon, Carmen Bradford and Warren Wolf has helped her develop a profound appreciation for the expressivity and individuality of jazz. Other mentors include Theo Bleckmann, Clairdee French, Laurie Antonioli, and Jason Hainsworth. She was featured in the Jazz Education Network’s annual Young Composer Showcase, and recently earned her BM from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
Critically acclaimed soprano Shawnette Sulker (Angelwings, Ep. 6) has recently sung the roles of Sister Rose (Dead Man Walking); Floralba (Messalina); Die Königin der Nacht (Die Zauberflöte); Mary Jane Bowser (Intelligence). International highlights include singing a concert of operatic favorites in the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, touring Die Fledermaus as Adele in Holland and Belgium, and orchestra concerts in Leipzig’s Gewandhaus and Prague’s Smetana Hall. She has been a soloist with companies such as San Francisco Opera, American Bach Soloists, Mark Morris Dance Group, Hawaii Opera Theatre, Opera Memphis, Opera Fairbanks, Opera Idaho, Opera Naples and Union Avenue Opera.
David James (Garrison, aka Buck) is a San Francisco-born guitarist, singer and composer who leads the sextet GPS, and co-leads the group Russian Telegraph. He has been a performing and recording member of bands ranging from noise (Thessalonians) to hip-hop (The Coup, Spearhead), music for theater and film (Beth Custer Ensemble), to Afrobeat (Afrofunk Experience). Additionally, he has recorded with Zap Mama, Stephen Marley and Ledisi, among others, and recently completed an ambitious song cycle about his father’s life as an activist in the Mission District of San Francisco.
Bass-baritone Sidney Chen (Alex, aka. SaltySherlock), whose voice has been described by the San Francisco Chronicle as “expressive and richly mellifluous,” is passionate about creating new work through collaboration with artists of all disciplines. Recent projects include touring with ODC/Dance as a guest performer in KT Nelson’s Path of Miracles, creating the role of Apollo in Anne Hege’s laptop opera The Furies with SLOrk (Stanford Laptop Orchestra), and premiering Ryan Brown’s “medical oratorio” Mortal Lessons. As a member of composer/choreographer Meredith Monk’s
Vocal Ensemble, he has performed internationally and recorded for ECM Records. He performs regularly with the new-music chamber chorus Volti and the nine-voice ensemble Clerestory. His solo performances often include his DIY music boxes and intricately hand-punched scrolls.
Immersed in both contemporary music and Baroque performance practice, Will Adams (Stan, aka. SirStacks) is a freelance flutist, tenor and educator in the Los Angeles area. Adams is a recent graduate of UCLA where he received his Master of Music in Flute Performance under the tutelage of Denis and Erin Bouriakov. As an educator, Adams works for the Piedmont East Bay Children’s Choir summer program where he leads rehearsals, teaches musicianship, and is the assistant camp director. Adams has also served as an assistant conductor and woodwind coach for the Northern Ohio Youth Orchestras. He coached chamber music and taught secondary lessons while in Oberlin, and currently maintains a private flute studio in Los Angeles.
Jesse Olsen Bay (choir, Ep. 1) is a musician, composer and teacher based in Western Massachusets. He is well-known in the Bay Area and beyond as one-half of the avantfolk duo Ramon & Jessica, and also performs with the experimental percussion group Open Graves, and collaborates frequently with dance and theater. Jesse’s work has received awards and support from the American Composer’s Forum, the Ucross Foundation, San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music, and the Isadora Duncan Awards, among others. He is currently working towards a credential in music therapy.
Aurora Josephson (choir) is a musician and visual artist who currently resides in Portland, Oregon. Building on a foundation of operatic training and both a BA and MFA degrees in music performance from Mills College, she has forged a bold and unique vocal style. To unleash the limitless range of sonic possibilities in the voice, Josephson employs a variety of extended and unconventional techniques drawn from the worlds of contemporary composition, improvisation and rock. She has performed and recorded with Alvin Curran, Gianni Gebbia, Henry Kaiser, Joelle Leandre and William Winant, and musical groups Big City Orchestra, the Flying Luttenbachers, the Molecules, ROVA Saxophone Quartet and the Merce Cunningham Dance Company.
Danishta Rivero (choir) is an improviser, performer and sound artist based in Oakland, California. She explores the artifacts resulting from heavy processing of the voice and their relationship to its acoustic resonating presence. As a soloist, Rivero often performs as Caribay, conjuring the eponymous mountain spirit, whose laments cause avalanches. She is a member of electro-acoustic duo Voicehandler with percussionist Jacob Felix Heule. She is also half of Las Sucias, a feminist tropical noise duo with Alexandra Buschman-Román.
David Israel Katz (choir, Ep. 2-9) is a singer, improviser, mover and composer. He studied composition and improvisation at Mills College, and art and social change at the California Institute of Integral Studies, and has specialized in voice and movement improvisation. With his Jewish art project, foreignfire, he organizes ensemble improvisations, writes performance scores, and directs creative workshopping processes. The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz described Katz as “an uber-performer,” and his art-ritual, THRESH, was praised by Jewish Currents as “an intense game you can lose yourself in.” Recent appearances include the Musrara Mix Festival, (Jerusalem); Xavier Veilhan’s Studio Venezia (Venice Biennale); and Naomi Rincon Gallardo’s Formaldehyde Trip (SFMOMA, The Broad, MCA).
ENSEMBLE
Steve Blum (synthesizers & keyboards) is a multifaceted pianist, keyboardist and composer who performs with Bay Area ensembles the Electric Squeezebox Orchestra, SLUGish Ensemble, Bells Atlas, the Dirty Snacks Ensemble, Jr. Reggae, Steve Horowitz’ Code Ensemble, the Crushing Spiral Ensemble, and many others. He has also performed and recorded in Los Angeles with Vinny Golia and the BABAOrchestra, Blockrad, among others. He is an in-demand synthesizer player, and has released several albums of original music that bridge classical minimalism and electronic music. He graduated from CSU Long Beach and California Institute of the Arts, where he studied and played with Dave Roitstein, Charlie Haden, Joe LaBarbera, Larry Koonse, Vinny Golia and Wadada Leo Smith. It was also at CalArts he developed a deep passion for West African drumming and Indian classical music.
Jordan Glenn (percussion) spent his formative years in Oregon and in 2006 relocated to the Bay Area where he received an MFA from Mills College. Since then he has been most closely associated with Fred Frith (FF Trio, Gravity Band), William Winant, Zeena Parkins (The Adorables), Roscoe Mitchell, Ben Goldberg, Todd Sickafoose, John Schott, Lisa Mezzacappa (avantNOIR, Glorious Ravage, Lisa Mezzacappa Six), Motoko Honda, Dominique Leone, Michael Coleman and the bands Jack O’ The Clock, Kyle Bruckmann’s Degradient, tUnE-yArDs, and the Oakland Active Orchestra. He has also worked with Rhys Chatham, Secret Chiefs 3 and ROVA Sax Quartet, and has been commissioned to create scores for evening-length dance pieces by Sharp & Fine and Liss Fain Dance. As a leader he has composed and conducted the trio Wiener Kids, Mindless Thing (a collaboration with poet Jim Ryan) and the percussion-heavy large ensemble BEAK.
SPECIAL GUESTS
Stunning range, flexibility, drama, and power are among the hallmarks of the 40-yearold San Francisco Girls Chorus’ Premier Ensemble, recognized as one of the world’s leading youth vocal ensembles. Led by Artistic Director Valérie Sainte-Agathe, the Premier Ensemble has achieved an incomparable sound that underscores the unique clarity and force of impeccably trained treble voices.
Fascinated by the feedback loop between social change, technology, and artistic innovation, the San Francisco-based Del Sol Quartet is a leading force in 21st-century chamber music. They believe that live music can, and should, happen anywhere –whether introducing Ben Johnston’s microtonal Americana at the Library of Congress or in a canyon cave, taking Aeryn Santillan’s gun-violence memorial to the streets of the Mission District, or collaborating with Huang Ruo and the anonymous Chinese poets who carved their words into the walls of the Angel Island Immigration Station. Since 1992, Del Sol has commissioned and premiered thousands of new works. Del Sol’s eleventh album A Dust in Time debuted at #3 on Billboard in October 2021. Called “excavations of beauty from the elemental” (The New York Times), this hour-long meditation was released in the form of a coloring book.
Benjamin Kreith & Samuel Weiser, violins
Charlton Lee, viola
Kathryn Bates, cello