Ches Smith with Mary Halvorson, Liberty Ellman, Nick Dunston

Auricle New Music Series welcomes percussionist and composer Ches Smith in support of his new album Clone Row on Tuesday, October 7, 2025 at 7:00pm. Smith leads an adventurous new quartet featuring guitarists Mary Halvorson and Liberty Ellman and bassist Nick Dunston. Tickets are $25.00 general admission or $20.00 for students (with ID) in advance, or $30.00 at the door. ALL Members receive a 10% ticket discount on advance tickets with promo code. Advance tickets (highly recommended!) can be purchased at Brown Paper Tickets.

Smith finds endless possibilities in this seemingly limited instrumentation, weaving together varied threads from his divergent earlier projects in ways that sound not quite like any of them. “This definitely ain’t your father’s guitar band,” writes no less an expert on six-string subversion than Marc Ribot, who penned the album’s liner notes. “It’s as if I’m hearing a Jim Hall concert in which one of us did a lot of mushrooms, or… some post-punk post-Dave Brubeck post-trip-hop experiment with classical form.”

Four renowned composer-improvisers tangle with Ches Smith’s newest compositions. Two highly individualistic guitarists swirl, echo and double-take, squaring off with a bass and drums team that anchors and unhinges through doubling sounds -- drum machines and acoustic drums, low-end analog synth and acoustic bass, digital samples and repeated fragments performed in real time. In a dance of coherence and chaos, the four musicians plunge headlong into the feedback loop of composition and improvisation armed with chemistry created by their mutual appreciation and enduring friendships.

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• This Friday, 22nd August, 07:00 pm, Sound Worlds with Sven Fredrik in Madison
• Next Wednesday, 27th August, 03:00 pm, Charmaine Lee | NIKA | Emili Earhart in Madison
• Next month, 3rd September, 07:00 pm, Marc Ribot album release, Map of a Blue City in Madison

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