Eli Keszler is an American

percussionist A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...

, composer, and

visual artist The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts al ...

based in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. Known for his complex and intricate style of drumming, as well creating

sound installations Sound art is an artistic activity in which sound is utilized as a primary medium or material. Like many genres of contemporary art, sound art may be interdisciplinary in nature, or be used in hybrid forms. According to Brandon LaBelle, sound a ...

involving

piano wire Piano wire, or "music wire", is a specialized type of wire made for use in piano strings but also in other applications as springs. It is made from tempered high-carbon steel, also known as spring steel, which replaced iron as the material ...

and other mechanisms to accompany his live performances, his shows have involved visual elements such as Keszler's drawings, diagrams, screen prints, and writings. In 2012, ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...

'' wrote that "Keszler deserves recent attention for his large-scale sound art installations, which not only force musical ideas to interact with an acoustic environment but, in turn, for flesh-and-bone musicians to interact with both of them." Keszler has also toured or collaborated with artists such as

Tony Conrad Anthony Schmalz Conrad (March 7, 1940 – April 9, 2016) was an American video artist, experimental filmmaker, musician, composer, sound artist, teacher, and writer. Active in a variety of media since the early 1960s, he was a pioneer of both ...

Jandek Jandek is the musical alias of Houston, Texas based lo-fi folk singer Sterling Smith. Since 1978, Jandek has independently released over 45 albums without granting interviews or providing any biographical information, releasing on a self-made lab ...

Loren Connors Loren Mazzacane Connors (born October 22, 1949) is an American guitarist who has recorded and performed under several different names: Guitar Roberts, Loren Mazzacane, Loren Mattei, and currently Loren Connors. His music has touched on many genres ...

, the

Iceland Symphony Orchestra Sinfóníuhljómsveit Íslands (Iceland Symphony Orchestra) (ISO) is an Icelandic orchestra based in Reykjavík, Iceland. Its primary concert venue is the Harpa Concert Hall. The Iceland Symphony is an autonomous public institution under the aus ...

and

Oneohtrix Point Never Daniel Lopatin (born July 25, 1982), best known as Oneohtrix Point Never or OPN, is an American experimental electronic music producer, composer, singer and songwriter. His music has experimented with tropes from various music genres and eras, s ...

, and has released several solo albums since 2008. The most recent, ''Alps'' in 2014, was a collaboration with guitarist

Oren Ambarchi Oren Ambarchi (born 1969) is an Australian musician. He is a multi-instrumentalist who plays mainly electric guitar and percussion. Biography Oren Ambarchi was born in Sydney to an Iraqi Jewish family. Ambarchi has been performing live since ...

. In 2012 Keszler debuted a sound installation project where he mounted wires up to 800 feet long off the Manhattan Bridge. He has had exhibitions of his visual work, installations and performances at museums and galleries such as the

Victoria & Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

The Kitchen The Kitchen is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary avant-garde performance and experimental art institution located at 512 West 19th Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was foun ...

South London Gallery The South London Gallery, founded 1891, is a public-funded gallery of contemporary art in Camberwell, London. Until 1992, it was known as the South London Art Gallery, and nowadays the acronym SLG is often used. Margot Heller became its direc ...

LUMA Foundation LUMA Foundation is a nonprofit organization established in 2004 that is based out of Zurich, Switzerland. It supports the activities of independent contemporary artists and other pioneers working in the fields of art, photography, publishing, docu ...

, Tectonics Festival in Reykjavik,

Centraal Museum The Centraal Museum is the main museum in Utrecht, Netherlands, founded in 1838. The museum has a wide-ranging collection, mainly of works produced locally. The collection of the paintings by the Northern Mannerist Joachim Wtewael is by a lon ...

Utrecht Utrecht ( , , ) is the fourth-largest city and a municipality of the Netherlands, capital and most populous city of the province of Utrecht. It is located in the eastern corner of the Randstad conurbation, in the very centre of mainland Net ...

, and

Boston Center for the Arts Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

. He and

David Grubbs David Grubbs (born September 21, 1967) is an American composer, guitarist, pianist, and vocalist. He was a founding member of Squirrel Bait, Bastro, and Gastr del Sol. He has also played in Codeine, The Red Krayola, Bitch Magnet and The Wingd ...

recently debuted a piece at the

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

List Center. He composed the soundtrack for the 2021 horror-thriller ''

The Scary of Sixty-First ''The Scary of Sixty-First'' is a 2021 American horror thriller exploitation film directed by Dasha Nekrasova, who co-wrote the screenplay with Madeline Quinn. It stars Betsey Brown, Quinn, Nekrasova and Mark Rapaport. The film had its worldwi ...

''.

Early life and education

Eli Keszler was born in Brookline, Massachusetts. By the age of eight he was learning drums, and he began composing his own music at age twelve. He began playing in various rock and

hardcore Hardcore, hard core or hard-core may refer to: Arts and media Film * ''Hardcore'' (1977 film), a British comedy film * ''Hardcore'' (1979 film), an American crime drama film starring George C Scott * ''Hardcore'' (2001 film), a British documen ...

bands in his teenage years, and later graduated from the

New England Conservatory of Music The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the oldest independent music conservatory in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world. The conservatory is located on H ...

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

. Upon graduation he moved to

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts ...

and then to

. He is

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

Career

2000s: Early installations and albums

Working as a drummer, guitarist, and composer in New York, Keszler soon became known for accompanying his music performances with live installations and visual elements, sometimes utilizing drawings, diagrams, screen prints, and writings. His

sound installation Sound art is an artistic activity in which sound is utilized as a primary medium or material. Like many genres of contemporary art, sound art may be interdisciplinary in nature, or be used in hybrid forms. According to Brandon LaBelle, sound art ...

s and visual pieces "often use microprocessor-controlled motors to strike, scrape and vibrate various lengths of

as well as other materials." He released his first album, ''Livingston,'' in 2008 on Rare Youth Records, which was followed by ''Oxtim'' in 2010 on

ESP-Disk ESP-Disk is a New York-based record company and label founded in 1963 by lawyer Bernard Stollman. History Though it originally existed to release Esperanto-based music, beginning with its second release (Albert Ayler's ''Spiritual Unity''), ESP ...

2011-14: ''Cold Pin'' and collaborations

Keszler released his album ''Cold Pin'' in 2011, on Pan Records. In the summer of 2011, ''

Wire Magazine ''The Wire'' (or simply ''Wire'') is a British music magazine publishing out of London, which has been issued monthly in print since 1982. Its website launched in 1997, and an online archive of its entire back catalog became available to subs ...

'' hosted streams of Keszler's live music on their website. ''Wire'' described one track as "a recording of a quintet performing with Keszler's 14 string, 40 x 15 foot mechanical sound installation, ''Cold Pin''. The installation consists of 'three to five 25 foot long strings with motors, wire, a curved wall, micro-controllers, pick-ups and phono cables'." His ensemble included Ashley Paul on

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of Single-reed instrument, single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed (mouthpi ...

, Geoff Mullen on guitar, and others. In 2012 another of his sound installations was featured in ''

'', who wrote that "Keszler deserves recent attention for his large-scale sound art installations, which not only force musical ideas to interact with an acoustic environment but, in turn, for flesh-and-bone musicians to interact with both of them." He has released a number of solo albums since then, and has toured or collaborated with other such as Ashley Paul, C. Spencer Yeh,

, and the

. He has performed at number of national and international festivals, including Transmediale Festival in 2013, where he performed with the

. In 2013 some of his drawings were replicated in the art book ''Neum'', in tandem with a 2013 exhibit of his work at the

. He recently debuted a project where he mounted wires up to 800 feet long off the Manhattan Bridge which was commissioned by National Public Radio.

2014: ''Alps'', ''Stadium'', and tour with Oneohtrix Point Never

In November 2014, Keszler released the collaborative album ''Alps,'' which he recorded with

, an experimental guitarist and composer. ''Alps'' was written as a two-part suite divided into two tracks. Music critic Fred Thomas of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

gave ''Alps'' 4/5 stars, writing that "these duets merge Ambarchi's symphonic and sometimes storytelling feedback with nonstop blasts of scattershot drumming from Keszler for an attack of noisy improvisation. Keszler's fluid and anxiety-ridden percussion style is a perfect companion for Ambarchi's grizzly guitar stabs and horror movie drones." 2016 saw the release of ''Last Signs of Speed'', Keszler's eighth studio album, through the German label Empty Editions. In 2018, Keszler released his ninth studio album, '' Stadium'', through Shelter Press to positive reviews. That same year, Keszler was a collaborator on American electronic musician

's ''

Age Of ''Age Of'' is the eighth studio album by American electronic producer Oneohtrix Point Never, released on June 1, 2018 on Warp Records. Recorded over two years, it is the first Oneohtrix Point Never album to prominently feature Daniel Lopatin's ...

''. He also toured with him among other artists for the album's accompanying performance installation, ''MYRIAD''. In 2019 Keszler released the Empire EP, his final release with Shelter Press.

2021

In July 2021, Keszler released his tenth studio album, ''Icons'', on LuckyMe.

Visual art and installation

In conjunction with his performances he has had exhibitions of his visual work installations at the

, Harpa Hall at the Tectonics Festival in Reykjavik,

, Barbican - St. Lukes amongst other places. He recently debuted a piece along with

at the

List Center. An article on his work was featured in ''Modern Painters Magazine'', focusing on his drawing, score writing and installation.

Style and influences

Keszler is known for incorporating the sounds of diverse genres, including punk rock,

free jazz Free jazz is an experimental approach to jazz improvisation that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s when musicians attempted to change or break down jazz conventions, such as regular tempos, tones, and chord changes. Musicians duri ...

, and

free improvisation Free improvisation or free music is improvised music without any rules beyond the logic or inclination of the musician(s) involved. The term can refer to both a technique (employed by any musician in any genre) and as a recognizable genre in its ...

. About his tendencies as a composer, Keszler has stated "Oftentimes, musically I find myself attracted to things that are so slow they seem fast and so fast they seem slow—when you have so many hits that they eventually turn into a long tone." He explained to

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

's ''

All Things Considered ''All Things Considered'' (''ATC'') is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio (NPR). It was the first news program on NPR, premiering on May 3, 1971. It is broadcast live on NPR affiliated stations in the United ...

'', "I like to work with raw material, simple sounds, primitive or very old sounds." His live performances often are fused with

and visual art, and various guest artists have contributed. ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' described Keszler's work as "using rigorously conceived scores to harness the inchoate energy of improvisation and its capacity for surprise."

Discography

Albums

References

External links

EliKeszler.comEli Keszler
on

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Eli Keszler
on

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Pan-Act.com
;Audio and video
Eli Keszler
on

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