Marking the closing day of the Speaking in Tongues exhibition, musician Andrew Tholl activates Compass, Raven Chacon’s score for solo electric guitar, included in the exhibition as an outdoor painted mural on ICA LA’s 7th Street facade. Intended to be performed outdoors, the drawing-as-composition references the four cardinal directions, which are fundamental to Diné cosmology. Ensuring no performance will ever duplicate a previous one, the guitarist is invited to respond to the surrounding environment, illuminating the cyclical and cumulative nature of experience.
Marking the closing day of the Speaking in Tongues exhibition, musician Andrew Tholl activates Compass, Raven Chacon’s score for solo electric guitar, included in the exhibition as an outdoor painted mural on ICA LA’s 7th Street facade. Intended to be performed outdoors, the drawing-as-composition references the four cardinal directions, which are fundamental to Diné cosmology. Ensuring no performance will ever duplicate a previous one, the guitarist is invited to respond to the surrounding environment, illuminating the cyclical and cumulative nature of experience.
Andrew Tholl is a performer/composer whose genre-blurring work blends the visceral and the experimental, spanning contemporary classical music, experimental rock and pop, improvisation, film, dance, and theater. Hailed by Los Angeles Times as “vigorously virtuosic,” his compositions and performances have been heard across the United States and Europe. As a composer, Tholl’s work explores the passage of time, the physicality of performance, noise, nostalgia, and memory. His style is heavily informed by a synthesis of musical influences, the integration of improvisation, and a practice-led methodology. As a soloist and chamber musician, he is dedicated to the performance of new music and the collaborative process between composers and performers. He is a co-founder of the “superb” (Los Angeles Times) Formalist Quartet, an ensemble dedicated to adventurous new repertoire by both established and emerging composers, and has been a member of the contemporary music ensemble Wild Up since its f ...
Andrew Tholl is a performer/composer whose genre-blurring work blends the visceral and the experimental, spanning contemporary classical music, experimental rock and pop, improvisation, film, dance, and theater. Hailed by Los Angeles Times as “vigorously virtuosic,” his compositions and performances have been heard across the United States and Europe. As a composer, Tholl’s work explores the passage of time, the physicality of performance, noise, nostalgia, and memory. His style is heavily informed by a synthesis of musical influences, the integration of improvisation, and a practice-led methodology. As a soloist and chamber musician, he is dedicated to the performance of new music and the collaborative process between composers and performers. He is a co-founder of the “superb” (Los Angeles Times) Formalist Quartet, an ensemble dedicated to adventurous new repertoire by both established and emerging composers, and has been a member of the contemporary music ensemble Wild Up since its formation. In addition to his work as a “classical musician,” Tholl maintains a second musical life writing and performing pop, punk, noise, ambient, and improvisational music. Working across disciplines, he challenges traditional formats, creating intersections between music, art, and performance. His most recent project, The River Above, The River Below, is an album of electronic ambient work released on Populist Records, which he co-owns and operates. He currently teaches at UCSB and Ventura College. He lives in Los Angeles, where he continues to be involved with music for concert halls, art galleries, films, puppet shows, bars, garages, bedrooms, and coat closets.
Embodied Meanings: An Artist Conversation with Karen Lofgren in the PRS Library