7:30pm doors / 8pm show
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Now that the audience is assembled is a book-length prose poem that describes a fictional musical performance during which an unnamed musician improvises the construction of a series of invented instruments before an audience that is alternately contemplative, participatory, disputatious, and asleep. Over the course of this phantasmagorical all-night concert, repeated interruptions take the form of in-depth discussions and musical demonstrations. Both a work of literature and a study of music, Now that the audience is assembled explores the categories of improvised music, solo performance, text scores, instrument building, aesthetic deskilling and reskilling, and the odd fate of the composer in experimental music.

David Grubbs is Professor of Music at Brooklyn College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and author of Records Ruin the Landscape: John Cage, the Sixties, and Sound Recording, also published by Duke University Press. As a musician, he has released fourteen solo albums and appeared on more than 180 commercially released recordings. Grubbs is known for his cross-disciplinary collaborations with poet Susan Howe and visual artists Angela Bulloch and Anthony McCall, and his work has been presented at the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Tate Modern, and the Centre Pompidou. Grubbs was a founding member of the groups Gastr del Sol, Bastro and Squirrel Bait, and has appeared on recordings by Tony Conrad, Pauline Oliveros, Will Oldham, and Matmos, among other artists. Grubbs has written for The Wire, BOMB, Bookforum, and the Süddeutsche Zeitung.

Drummer/percussionist; recording engineer/producer/mixer John McEntire is founding and current member of Tortoise and The Sea & Cake; former contributing/touring member of Red Krayola and Gastr Del Sol. Extensive international touring with these groups and many others. Recording/re/mixing projects include work with: Modest Mouse, Yo La Tengo, Broken Social Scene, Stereolab, Teenage Fanclub, Jaga Jazzist, The High Llamas, The Fiery Furnaces, Spoon, Blur, and hundreds more. As a member of Tortoise, numerous collaborations with artists such as Tom Zé, Daniel Lanois, Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Cluster, The Ex, Fred Anderson, Colin Newman, and Mouse On Mars. McEntire is the owner/operator of Soma Electronic Music Studios in Chicago, IL (1995-2017) and Nevada City, CA (2017-present).