BIOGRAPHY

Dan Joseph is a free-lance composer based in New York City. He began his career as a drummer in the vibrant punk scene of his native Washington, DC. During the late 1980s, he was active in the experimental tape music underground, producing ambient-industrial works for independent labels in the U.S. and abroad. He spent the ‘90s in California where he studied at CalArts and Mills College. His principal teachers include Pauline Oliveros, Alvin Curran and Mel Powell. Equally influential where his studies with Terry Riley during several workshops in California and Colorado.

As an artist who embraces the musical multiplicity of our time, Dan works simultaneously in a variety of media and contexts, including instrumental chamber music, free improvisation, and various forms of electronica and sound art. Since the late 1990s, the hammer dulcimer has been the primary vehicle for his music. As a performer he is active with his own chamber ensemble, The Dan Joseph Ensemble, as well as in various improvisational collaborations and as an occasional soloist. He has collaborated with a variety of creative artists including Miya Masaoka, Pamela Z, Loren Dempster, JD Parran, Pauline Oliveros, India Cooke, William Winant and John Ingle.

Dan Joseph’s work has been presented at Merkin Concert Hall (NYC), Diapason Gallery for Sound (NYC), Roulette (NYC), Deep Listening Space (Kingston, NY), The Kitchen (NYC) Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (SF), New Langton Arts (SF) and other venues. He has received commissions from several ensembles and performers, including Gamelan Son of Lion, the SF Sound Group, baritone Thomas Buckner, flutist Jacqueline Martelle and clarinetist Matt Ingalls. His most recent CD Archaea (2006) is available from the Mutable Music label and includes three recent chamber works.