The Golem Rescored: Guests

Steven Drozd is best known as a multi-instrumentalist, composer and vocalist for The Flaming Lips. The Flaming Lips received Grammys (in 2003 and 2007) for “Best Rock Instrumental Performance.” He has contributed to other artists’ albums and has had multiple side bands such as Electric Würms (with Lips band mate Wayne Coyne) and “STEVENSTEVEN”, a children’s psychedelic rock album he created with former “Blues Clues” host Steve Burns. They won 2019’s best selling children’s Audible Book with “Foreverywhere”. Drozd has also scored films such as Adam Goldberg’s 2003 film, “I Love Your Work”, the Flaming Lips movie, “Christmas on Mars” and documentaries such as “The Heart is a Drum Machine,” and “SHOT! The Psycho-Spiritual of Rock.” Drozd lives in Oklahoma City with his family.

∈Y∋ is a Japanese musician, performer, vocalist and visual artist, best known as the member of the legendary BOREDOMS. He developed experimental music performance and influenced the underground music scene. He has worked with many artists all over the world. He also actively works as DJ and visual artist.

Ina Archer is a filmmaker, visual artist, programmer and writer whose multimedia works and films have been shown nationally; most recently as the solo artist with Microscope Gallery (NYC) for the 2021 Frieze International Art Fair. Archer was a studio artist in the Whitney Independent Study program, a NYFA multidisciplinary Fellow, and a 2005 Creative Capital grantee in film. She is a Media Conservation and Digitization Specialist at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture.

A longtime mainstay of the Los Angeles music scene, saxophonist Steve Berlin enjoyed perhaps his greatest prominence as a member of Los Lobos, although he was also a sought-after producer and session player. Born September 14, 1955 in Philadelphia, he first surfaced with the Blasters, and officially joined Los Lobos in 1984 after co-producing their 1983 EP And a Time to Dance with T-Bone Burnett. Berlin also continued playing on sessions for a variety of Southern California bands, including the Beat Farmers, Translator, and the Flesh Eaters. In 1986, he appeared on Paul Simon’s landmark Graceland, and a year later, Los Lobos enjoyed their commercial breakthrough with the soundtrack to the film La Bamba. Concurrently, Berlin’s reputation as a producer continued to grow, and he helmed sessions for acts ranging from Faith No More to Dave Alvin to the Tail Gators. In the years to follow, he remained an alternative rock fixture, forging ahead with Los Lobos and working as a freelance with the likes of the Replacements, John Lee Hooker, Leo Kottke, and Sheryl Crow.

For Scott Amendola, the drum kit isn’t so much an instrument as a musical portal. An ambitious composer, savvy bandleader and capaciously creative foil for some of the world’s most inventive musicians, Amendola applies his rhythmic virtuosity to a vast array of settings. His closest musical associates include guitarists, Nels Cline, Jeff Parker, Charlie Hunter, Hammond B- 3 organist Wil Blades, violinists Regina Carter and Jenny Scheinman, clarinetist Ben Goldberg, players who have each forged a singular path within and beyond the realm of jazz. No project better displays Amendola’s big ears and musical ambitions than “Fade To Orange”, an orchestral piece commissioned as part of the Oakland East Bay Symphony’s Irvine Foundation-funded New Visions/New Vistas initiative. The roiling work premiered to critical acclaim at Oakland’s Paramount Theater on April 15, 2011.

Marika Hughes is a native New Yorker, a cellist, a singer, a songwriter and has been a storyteller on The Moth Radio Hour. Born to a bi-racial, musical family Marika’s grandfather was the great cellist Emanuel Feuermann and her parents owned a jazz club, Burgundy in their neighborhood. As children, she and her younger brother were both regulars on Sesame Street, and attended the beloved Manhattan Country School. Marika continued her education in the double degree program at Barnard College and the Juilliard School, graduating with BAs in political science and cello performance, respectively.

Marika has worked with Whitney Houston, Lou Reed, Anthony Braxton, David Byrne, Adele, Henry Threadgill, D’Angelo, Idina Menzel, Nels Cline, Somi and Taylor Mac, among many others. She was a founding member of the Bay Area-based bands 2 Foot Yard (Two Foot Yard, Tzadik 2003 & Borrowed Arms, Yard Work, 2008) and Red Pocket (Thick, Tzadik 2004). She is a master teacher and director for Young Arts and a teaching-artist at Carnegie Hall’s Lullaby Project. She currently holds the cello chair at the Broadway show, Hadestown. Marika has self-released three albums: The Simplest Thing (2011), Afterlife Music Radio (2011) and New York Nostalgia (2016). She happily leads her bands Bottom Heavy and The New String Quartet and is the co-founder and director of Looking Glass Arts, an artist-led, recording residency and program in upstate New York. With a commitment to a sliding scale fee structure, LGA is democratizing access to the space, time and natural beauty critical to artistic growth.

Sharon Gal is an interdisciplinary artist, performer, vocalist and composer, specializing in free-improvisation and participatory, collaborative compositions.  She works with voice, electronics, various instruments, field recordings, found audio & video; exploring presence, listening, embodiment, and the relationship between people, sound and space.  Sharon performs solo and in many collaborations including, David Toop, Steve Beresford, Phil Minton, Charles Hayward, Andie Brown and Lina Lapelyte.  Since 2007 she has been directing large group, experimental, site-specific compositions with musicians & non-musicians.  Past performances include The V&A, ICA, The Whitechapel Gallery, Tate Modern,Tate Britain, MACBA, and Colour out of Space, Borealis, Supernormal, Supersonic& Tusk festivals.  Sharon’s music was released by many labels, including five solo albums and various collaborations.

Michael Morley was born in Ahuriri, Te Ika a Maui, 1963. He has a BA University of Otago, MFA University of Canterbury.  He began playing music, drawing and painting at an early age. Forms Wreck Small Speakers on Expensive Stereos with Richard Ram 1979. Forms The Dead C with Bruce Russell and Robbie Yeats in 1986.  Also records and performs as Gate and under his own name, and other names. Lives in Koputai, Te Wai Pounamu.

Meg Baird & Charlie Saufley are songwriters, composers, and performers with deep roots in folk and underground music. In addition to their respective work with Espers, Meg Baird & Mary Lattimore duo, and Assemble Head in Sunburst Sound, the two musicians also collaborated in the critically acclaimed rock ensemble Heron Oblivion (SubPop) and on Meg’s recent LP’s under her own name (Drag City).

Dr. Justin Sledge works as a part-time professor of Religion and Philosophy in the Detroit area and is the host of the popular YouTube channel Esoterica with nearly half a million subscribers. His academic expertise is in Western Esotericism, especially the metaphysical and philosophical background of early modern occultism.  His educational work focuses on a range of topics including alchemy, magic, kabbalah, gnosticism, hermetic philosophy and the occult. In addition to his academic work Dr Sledge is also a collector and dealer in arcane antiquarian books.  He is also a distiller and recently teamed with Detroit City Distillery to recreate a historically accurate Absinthe following 19th century protocols. Dr. Sledge lives in Detroit with his wife, Rabbi Alana Alpert, his two children and their dog Mississippi.

Nathan Young & John Olson aka Wolf Eyes is an American experimental music group from Michigan, formed in 1996 by Nate Young. Currently the group consists of John Olson and Nate Young. Wolf Eyes are a prominent act within contemporary noise music. They have collaborated with a variety of artists from different countries and art forms. The group has released 297 recordings during their 21 years of ceaseless prolific activity. Official releases have appeared on labels including but not limited to the Lower Floors, Hanson Records, Bulb Records, American Tapes, Fusetron, De Stijl Records, Sub Pop, Troubleman Unlimited, AA Records, Gods of Tundra, Freedom From. They have collaborated with Anthony Braxton, Merzbow, Sonic Youth, Black Dice, Double Leopards, John Wiese, Mammal, FLUCT, MV Carbon, Twig Harper, Jaimie Branch, Richard Pinhas, and Smegma and many more.

I am lost. Working on improving. I belong to the shyness mafia.

Riva Lehrer is an artist, writer, and curator who focuses on the socially challenged body. Best known for representations of people whose physical embodiment, sexuality, or gender identity have long been stigmatized. Lehrer’s memoir, Golem Girl, (One World/ Penguin Random House) won the 2020 Barbellion Prize for Literature and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. She is represented by Regal Hoffman & Associates, and by Zolla/Lieberman Gallery.

A widely known voice of esoteric ideas, Mitch Horowitz is a writer-in-residence at the New York Public Library, lecturer-in-residence at the Philosophical Research Society in Los Angeles, and the PEN Award-winning author of books including Occult America, The Miracle Club, and Uncertain Places. The Washington Post says Mitch “treats esoteric ideas and movements with an even-handed intellectual studiousness that is too often lost in today’s raised-voice discussions.” Mitch’s books have appeared in Arabic, Korean, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish, and Chinese. He received the Walden Award for Interfaith Understanding. China’s government has censored his work.

Ken Goldberg is the William S. Floyd Distinguished Chair in Engineering at UC Berkeley and an award-winning roboticist, filmmaker, artist and popular public speaker on AI and robotics. Ken trains the next generation of researchers and entrepreneurs in his research lab at UC Berkeley; he has published over 300 papers, 3 books, and holds 9 US Patents. Ken’s artwork has been featured in 70 art exhibits including the 2000 Whitney Biennial. He is a pioneer in technology and artistic visual expression, bridging the “two cultures” of art and science. With unique skills in communication and creative problem solving, invention, and thinking on the edge, Ken has presented over 600 invited lectures at events around the world.

Maya Barzilai is associate professor of Hebrew literature and Jewish cultures at the University of Michigan. Her research interests include Weimar cinema, German Jewish culture and thought, Hebrew modernism, and translation studies. She is author of Golem: Modern Wars and Their Monsters (NYU Press, 2016) and Golem, How He Came into the World (Camden House, 2020).

Kate is a novelist, playwright, and songwriter. Her debut novel “Fans of the Impossible Life” was an Indie Next pick and has been published in ten languages. Her new novel “Improbable Magic for Cynical Witches” will be out from HarperCollins/Balzer+Bray in May 2022. Kate’s play “Everyone’s Fine With Virginia Woolf” has been produced by Elevator Repair Service Theater in NYC and Dublin, and is published by Dramatists Play Service. Kate also writes songs and performs with her band The Witch Ones and reads tarot from her home in upstate New York.

Gretchen Gonzales Davidson grew up in Flint, MI. She graduated from Michigan State University with a dual-degree in Anthropology and Environmental Policy. She moved to Detroit in 1998 as a musician, where she played in numerous bands. Gretchen has an event production company and serves on numerous boards including Detroit Children’s Fund, Michigan Council of Arts and Cultural Affairs, Cranbrook Academy of Art, and CultureLab Detroit. She has three boys with her husband Ethan.

Jeremiah Lockwood is a scholar and a storyteller; a singer, guitarist and composer with an expansive knowledge of musical traditions and techniques that stretch from The Piedmont blues to the cantorial traditions of his family. He is currently a Fellow at the Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Lockwood’s music career began with over a decade of apprenticeship to the legendary Piedmont Blues musician Carolina Slim, playing in the subways of New York City. He also trained under his grandfather Cantor Jacob Konigsberg and performed in his choir. Jeremiah’s band The Sway Machinery seeks inspiration from diverse realms of experience related to the cultural geography of New York City. The Sway Machinery has played around the world, including stints at legendary music festivals like Montreal Jazz, Roskilde, and perhaps most notably, Festival au Desert in Timbuktu, Mali. His first book, Golden Ages: Hasidic Singers and Cantorial Revival in the Digital Era, is coming out in February 2024 with University of California Press.

Rebecca Odes is a multimedia artist and writer. She is an author and illustrator of four books about life stages and personal identity and the cofounder of gurl.com, wifey.tv, and most recently, thecherrypicks.com.

A musician and writer, Alan Licht’s has appeared on over 100 recordings that range from indie rock to minimalist composition to free improvisation. Recent releases include Currents, a solo acoustic album, and Tomorrow Outside Tomorrow, a collaboration with Tetuzi Akiyama, Rob Mazurek, and Oren Ambarchi. A contributing music editor at BOMB magazine who has written frequently for Artforum, Art Review, Modern Painters, Parkett, and many other publications, he is also the author of Sound Art Revisited (Bloomsbury, 2019) and the editor of Will Oldham on Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy (Faber & Faber/W.W. Norton, 2012).