No matter your musical preference, tonight’s performance will have something to pique your interest.
Tonight, Fowler Museum’s free outdoor concert series, Fowler Out Loud, will feature composer and pianist Ethan Braun, bassist Aaron Folb, guitarist Sam Jones and programmer Wyatt Keusch. The group will perform an experimental blend of classical, jazz, rock and electronic music.
Fowler Out Loud is a series of concerts that features a collection of talented artists, and this show will be no exception. Braun, a fifth-year ethnomusicology student at UCLA, is a jazz and classical musician, whose influences range from experimental jazz musician Ben Monder and experimental band Meshuggah to composers such as Gyorgy Ligeti. While working on his debut album, Braun partakes in experimental music collaborations and performs in his funk-fusion band, umbrellaMAN, along with Jones and drummer Daniel Blum.
Jones is a guitarist as well as a composer, focusing on jazz, classic rock, funk and electronic music. A student of USC’s Thornton School of Music, he is currently pursuing a degree in studio and jazz guitar. Jones’ diverse influences include minimalist composer Steve Reich, Norwegian guitarist Terje Rypdal and electronic musicians such as Autechre and Aphex Twin. He also draws upon the sounds of Asian ritual percussion music, bands from the European jazz and improvised-music record label, ECM, and musique concrete, a form of electroacoustic music. High school friends, Braun and Jones have been musical partners for almost eight years. To commemorate their long-lasting musical friendship, the two plan on performing an opening set together at the group’s appearance at Fowler Out Loud.
“This first set will be of a very different nature, as we will be playing in a more conventional and intimate jazz-oriented format,” Jones said. “The two of us have been improvising together and honing our skills in musical communication for many years, and we wanted to play a duo set in addition to the quartet as a way of rounding off the last few years of development and launching into the next.”
Originally, the concert was organized as the debut of the musical trio of Braun, Jones and Keusch. The group originated when Braun and Keusch met through mutual friends almost two years ago. After jamming and improvising, the two felt that they “melded well together,” Braun said. After releasing his first album, “Object-Relations,” with Catalog Records, Keusch collaborated with Braun and Jones.
“We initially formed the group as a trio with the intention of creating a unique, collaborative approach to composition and improvisation,” Jones said. The main objective of this collaboration was to create a series of pieces that could ultimately be recorded for Keusch’s next album. Recently, bassist Aaron Folb has been added to the lineup, completing the quartet.
“The addition of Aaron on bass was a relatively recent development,” Jones said. “(It was) intended to give the music a firm foundation in the low frequencies and free the rest of us to explore other sonic areas.”
The group’s large variety of musical interests will be very apparent in its upcoming performance.
“(The performance is) one piece in four movements,” Braun said.
Each member of the quartet is responsible for one of the movements, the first one being Braun’s. While each member has a diverse background in a variety of classical, rock, jazz and electronic genres, the pieces for Fowler Out Loud will be reminiscent of each individual performer’s varied influences. However, don’t expect traditional genres.
“The goal was to do something fairly new,” Braun said.
“My hope,” Jones said, “is that we will present to the patient listener a new combination of sounds that will challenge preconceived perceptions and ultimately reward him or her with an enjoyable but thought-provoking experience.”