Multi-faceted percussionist Michael Brenneis joins infamous Madison saxophonist JoAnne Pow!ers and bassist Jennifer Pendur to celebrate the first day of spring with a program of ecstatic, spirited free-jazz. -After years of collaboration, Pendur's inscrutable bass and the dulcet yet harrowing tones of Pow!ers form an intricate sonic language of whispers, growls and screams. -Tireless innovator Brenneis punctuates the conversation with a startling array of textures and rhythms from around the globe. As the celestial clockwork of the heavens prepares to free the earth (well, this part of it, anyway) from three long months of ice and darkness, this heavy dose of cosmic fire music is the perfect way to welcome the thaw.

Musician Bios:
JoAnne Pow!ers:
Free jazz outlaw JoAnne Pow!ers plays frequently in the Madison Area both as a solo act and with her trio (The aptly-named JoAnne Pow!ers Trio). Pow!ers also makes occasional appearances in the [sometimes literally] underground music scenes of New York, Chicago, and San Francisco. Her frenetic saxophone abuse is often compared to that of Albert Ayler and Peter Br-tzmann, with further influences from late-period John Coltrane and legendary Japanese free-improviser Kaoru Abe. With a tone that has been known to alternately peel the paint off of walls and lull angry babies to sleep, Pow!ers is known for her lightning-fast keywork, and heavy use of multiphonics and other extended techniques. While largely operating within the -Energy music- school of improvisation, Pow!ers- music also incorporates elements of the music of the Middle East and India. In addition to her trios, Pow!ers- collaborators have included New York percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani; Dave Rempis (saxophones), Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello), Tim Daisy (percussion), Jaimie Branch (trumpet) and Marc Riordan (percussion) of Chicago-s thriving improvised music scene; Philadelphia percussionist Bob Cozzolino, extreme vocalist D.B. Pedersen, and the late multi-instrumentalist Lyx Ish.

Jennifer Pendur:
Jennifer Pendur evolved her eclectic multidimensional musical aesthetic from many sources, including early exposure to Cleveland radio during its experimental non-commercial heyday. As a child she cheerfully absorbed musical influences from anywhere and everywhere, discovering in her teens the works of John Cage, Morton Feldman, Arnold Schoenberg, Ornette Coleman, and Charles Mingus. The interplay of natural environmental sounds and -noise- has always fascinated her, and she began composing with magnetic tape in eight grade, when she became fascinated with collage and its application to sound and begged her parents for a tape recorder. While she has also studied French horn, piano, flute, guitar and dulcimer, her bass and her voice are her primary instruments at this time. She took up the upright bass after moving to Chicago in 1974, and has studied at length with the legendary Russell Thorne, and also recorded with him in the Giordanisti Trio and Emergency Theatre Ensemble. During her tenure in the Midwest improvised music scene, she has also performed with the likes of Donald Raphael Garrett, Chicago free-jazz legend Hal Russel (who began his avant-garde career with Russell Thorne in the Joe Daley Trio), and Milwaukee instrument-inventor Hal Rammel. She has appeared numerous times with the astonishing jazz-rock guitarist Elijah Israel (now tragically deceased) in the psychedelic jam-band Earthen Vessels.

Michael Brenneis:
In addition to his work with such innovative ensembles as The Active Percussion Duo and Tomato Box, Michael Brenneis, percussion, studied music with jazz master Alan Dawson, and at the Berklee College of Music. He collaborates with such musicians as: Dave Stoler, Tim Whalen, Louka Patenaude, Paul Hastil, the New Breed Quintet, Sean Michael Dargan, Albert, Alison Margaret, and many others. This Fall three of his compositions for large ensemble were featured at a performance of the Modern American Music Repertory Ensemble at the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts, under the direction of Charlie Kohlhase.