Event

Rhys Chatham

Composer and multi-instrumentalist Rhys Chatham returns to ISSUEs 22 Boerum theater for a rare solo performance on Thursday, November 3rd. He was the founder of the music program at The Kitchen in downtown Manhattan in 1971 and was its music director between 1971-73 and 1977-80.

Rhys Chatham altered the DNA of rock and created a new type of urban music by fusing overtone-drenched minimalism with the relentless, elemental fury of the Ramonesthe textural intricacies of the avant-garde colliding with the visceral punch of electric guitar-slinging punk rock. The amalgamation was inspired. It energized the downtown New York scene throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s, and made Chatham a founding father of the notorious No Wave movement.

Chatham has a long history with ISSUE, performing Guitar Trio as part of ISSUEs Ten Years Alive on the Infinite Plain, the Spy Music Festival in 2012, and Table of the Elements Copernicum Festival in 2011. ISSUE is proud to welcome him back for an intimate solo performance.

Rhys Chatham is a composer and multi-instrumentalist from Manhattan, currently living in Paris, who fused avant-garde minimalism with the electric crunch of punk rock. Chatham's instrumentation ranges from the seminal composition Guitar Trio, composed in 1977 for 3 electric guitars, electric bass and drums, to the epoch evening-length work for 100 electric guitars, An Angel Moves Too Fast to See, composed in 1989... all the way to Chatham's recent composition for 200 electric guitars, Crimson Grail, last performed in New York at the Lincoln Center Outdoor Summer Festival in 2009. Chatham is currently touring as a solo performer, playing versions of his recently released LP, A Pythagorean Dream, from Foom Records.