Tune in on Thursday, May 21st at 11am when Sparkle Motion hosts Bay Area composer, multi-instrumentalist, and improviser, Matthew Evan Taylor, for a live in-studio interview.
AfroPneumatic composer and improviser Dr. Matthew Evan Taylor (1980) creates music
that is inspired by community, time, and the human. His current practice is built upon
AfroPneumaism, a liberatory framework for music composition, performance, and
community building which connects musical action, musical timeframes, and audience
witnessing to the breath. Emerging in part from the Black Lives Matter Movement, Dr.
Taylor’s AfroPneumaism answers the urgent and poignant refrain “I can’t breathe!” with
a defiant “I will breathe! I must breathe!”
Dr. Taylor’s music has been performed internationally including engagements at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art; the 17 th World Saxophone Congress in Strasbourg, France;
Michelle Grabner’s Poor Farm in Wisconsin; and Chineke! Orchestra’s African Music
Festival in the United Kingdom. His pandemic era cycle, Postcards to the MET, has
garnered over 500,000 views on Instagram while his Unheard Mixtapes (2020, New
Amsterdam Records) were lauded for “…wrestl[ing] with the societal boundaries of
Black artistry only to blast them apart…” (Dr. Kori Hill, I Care if You Listen). He has
enjoyed fruitful collaborations with such ensembles as Del Sol Quartet and Metropolis
Ensemble; visual artists Molly Zuckerman-Hartung and Danielle Tegeder;
dancers/choreographers Laurel Jenkins, Priscilla Marrero, Lida Winfield, and Julian
Barnett; and musicians Marilyn Crispell and Elliott Sharp.
Dr. Taylor is a BMI composer based in Oakland, California and is Assistant Professor of
Composition at UC Berkeley.
