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MOTZER JANUSONIS & FRIENDS featuring VERNON REID, JOSH WERNER, LEON GRUENBAUM - Live Streaming, November 21     

MoonJune presents
Sonic Shapeshifters Live Webcast Series
Chapter 3

tickets:
www.shapeshifterlab.com/livestream/moonjune-3

TIM MOTZER & GINTAS JANUSONIS
with FRIENDS
featuring
VERNON REID
LEON GRUENBAUM
JOSH WERNER

TIM MOTZER is widely known for his distinct textural acoustic-electro guitar voice utilizing looping, bowing, electronics, and prepared techniques. From 2016-19, Tim toured the world playing prestigious venues and jazz festivals with Bandit65, an improvising trio he co-leads with guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel and drummer Gintas Janusonis. He has also collaborated with numerous musical luminaries including David Sylvian, Burnt Friedman, Jaki Liebezeit, poet Ursula Rucker, King Britt, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, Vernon Reid, David Torn, Markus Reuter, ALex SKolnick, Percy Jones, Kenny Grohowski, and Pat Mastelotto, among others. Tim‘s work has appeared in the hit HBO series True Blood as well a major motion picture directed by Michael Mann. As an in-demand, solo live composer/improviser in the world of modern dance, Tim most recently playing to sold-out houses in Tokyo, Japan; Seoul, South Korea; Oujda, Morocco; Philadelphia, PA; and Toronto, Canada. For over a decade, he has served as a live accompanist/composer for master choreographers at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Tim brings his dynamic, eclectic array of musical projects together under his own 1k Recordings imprint, which has over 40 releases and counting.

GINTAS JANUSONIS has performed and toured all around the globe, recorded and collaborated with an incredibly diverse range of artists including Angélique Kidjo, Branford Marsalis, Eminem, Carlos Santana, Bill Laswell, The revelations., RZA, Wu-Tang Clan, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Otis Clay, Charles Hodges, Teenie Hodges, Leroy Hodges, Lester Snel, Boo Mitchell, Yuna, M.O.P., Lee Scratch Perry, Erykah Badu, Los Lobos, Xander Duell, Foxy Brown, Frankie Negron, Bilal, Defunkt, James Spaulding, Oliver Lake, Utada Hikaru, Ursula Rucker, Tre Williams, Jonah Smith, The Next Legacy Big Band, Kahil El Zabar, Sandra St. Victor, Josh Roseman, Reggie Washington, Fareed Haque, Rueben Wilson, Curtis Fowlkes, Jeffrey Mironov, Michael Harvey, Angela Johnson, and many others. As an auspicious start to his recording career, in 1997 Gintas received a UK gold record for his performance on the Ultra Naté hit single “Free”, from the album “Situation Critical”.

VERNON REID is a guitar legend. Webster’s Dictionary defines an artist as “one who professes and practices an imaginative art; a person skilled in one of the fine arts; a skilled performer.” By any of these definitions, guitarist and composer Vernon Reid is a true artist, one whose art is a work forever in progress, from his formative years on the downtown New York jazz/funk/punk scene with Ronald Shannon Jackson’s Decoding Society, to his leadership of the pioneering multi-platinum rock band Living Colour, to his collaborations with creative spirits ranging from guitarist Carlos Santanaand African singer Salif Keita to choreographers Bill T. Jones and Donald Byrd. He cites Miles Davis, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Robert Fripp, Jeff Beck, Carlos Santana, Eddie Hazel, John McLaughlin, Jimmy Page, Eddie Van Halen, and Dr. Know among his influences. Among many of his most notorious collaborations are those with Jack Bruce, David Torn, Ronald Shannon Jackson and the Decoding Society, Mick Jagger, Ambitious Lovers, Rollins Band, Spearhead, Public Enemy, Janet Jackson, Mariah Carey, Tracy Chapman, Ronald Shannon Jackson, Don Byron, Defunkt, Santana, Bernie Worrell, MC 900 Ft. Jesus, B.B. King, Madeleine Peyroux, Meridiem, Jack Bruce, Terry Bozzio, Black Sugar Transmission, DJ Spooky, and many others.

LEON GRUENBAUM has been a vital force in the New York music scene for over 25 years. After early classical training on piano and woodwinds, Mr. Gruenbaum developed an interest in jazz, funk and avant-garde music. He conceived of the world's first relativistic music keyboard, a patented MIDI controller called the Samchillian Tip Tip Tip Cheeepeeeee. This instrument won a prize at the 2011 Guthman Musical Instrument Competition and is now listed in the 2nd edition of the Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments. He has recorded and performed on his instrument internationally with guitarist Vernon Reid (Living Colour), James "Blood" Ulmer and the Burnt Sugar Arkestra. He also plays this keyboard while singing in his projects - "Creative Apocalypse" and "Genes and Machines". Other artists with whom he has performed include Stew, Nana Vasconcelos, Chaka Khan, Beans, M.C.P.S., Micah Gaugh and Aaron Comess's "Air Conditioned Gypsies”

JOSH WERNER is a bass player, composer, performer and abstract painter, Werner has made quite a name for himself working in a variety of styles, most notably in dub, experimental rock, hip hop and jazz. His work with Ghostface Killer, CocoRosie, Lee “Scratch” Perry, Cibo Matto, PopCaan, James Brandon Lewis, Matisyahu, Sly and Robbie, Wu Tang Clan and TV On The Radio’s Tunde Adebimpe has cemented his status as a low-end heavyweight.

 
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