EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC & SOUND ART AT ROULETTE: DAN SENN

*Monday, December 5th*
DAN SENN
Dan Senn is a composer of experimental classical music (electronic and acoustic,) a sculptor of new instruments for exhibition and performance, a video artist for installation and proscenium play, a ceramist and a documentary film artist. He performs and exhibits world-wide and creates ephermeral public art projects, which bring experimental work to alternative audiences. Senn came to contemporary music by way of the visual arts. Trained since childhood as a French horn player and vocalist, in 1972 he began studying ceramics and raku pottery, an ancient ceramic method that fundamentally shifted his aesthetic. In 1977 he began building sculptural instruments and soon after began developing computer software to emulate the raku process in musical compositions, which, like his instruments, exhibit the peculiar paradox of raku – highly considerate, non-linear systems that exist, in part, to confound the will of the artist. He has toured Europe, New Zealand, the U.S. and Canada exhibiting and performing at festivals and experimental venues. In 1995 he was awarded the McKnight Composer-in-Residence Award for the State of Minnesota. In 1997 he was awarded the Artist Trust 10th Anniversary President's Award (Seattle) for his influence on the arts throughout the Pacific Northwest, and in 1998 he was awarded the first Artist-in-Residence for 1998 at the University of Washington at Tacoma and first prize at the Papier Bienale at the Leopold Hoesch Museum in Duren, Germany. In 2002 his documentary film, The Exquisite Risk of Civil War Brass, won at the da Vinci Film Festival. His scored music is published by Smith Publications, Sonic Arts Editions, and AM Percussion Publications. His recorded music is available from the NI Archive, Experimental Musical Instruments and Periplum Records. Most recently, Dan has been involved with his International Space Band Initiative and related public art projects in Portland, Prague and Kladno (Czech Republic.) 
Dan’s work can be viewed in detail at: www.newsense-intermedium.!
com.