Image: Fay Victor by Eva Kapanzade

Presenting a talk, musical performance, and a question and answer session, New York-based sound artist and composer, Fay Victor utilizes music as a vehicle to express thoughts and sounds in a multigenre universe that reflects identity, new music, jazz, blues, house, funk, and free improvisation—recalling references from jazz legend Albert Ayler to the innovative Frank Zappa. In partnership with Chicago-based musician Mike Reed, the two explore message together through jazz.

Fay  Victor,  called  “artistically complete”  by the New  York Times, hones a unique vision for the vocalist's role in jazz and improvised music. Victor’s recorded work has been featured in media outlets such as The Wall Street Journal, The San Francisco Chronicle, Time Out New York, and The Huffington  Post.  Victor has performed with luminaries such as Randy Weston,  Roswell  Rudd,  Nicole  Mitchell,  Archie  Shepp,  Marc  Ribot, and Tyshawn  Sorey. Performance highlights include those at The  Museum of  Modern  Art  (New York),  Hammer  Museum  (Los Angeles),  Kölner Philharmonie (Germany), De Young Museum  (San Francisco),  Symphony  Space  (New York),  and  Bimhuis  (Netherlands). Victor was the  2017  Herb  Albert/Yaddo  Fellow in  Music  Composition.  Current releases  include  her  album  Wet  Robots (ESP  Disk, July  2018)  with  her  SoundNoiseFUNK  project,   Nicole  Mitchell’s  Maroon  Cloud (FPE Records, August  2018),  and  Marc  Ribot’s upcoming Songs of Resistance (September 2018) featuring Victor as well as guests vocalists Tom Waits, Steve Earle, and Meshell Ndegeocello.

Mike Reed is a musician, composer, bandleader and arts presenter based in Chicago. In addition to leading or co-leading several working bands, all rooted deeply in jazz and improvised music, he’s the current programming chair of the Chicago Jazz Festival, and the owner and director of the acclaimed performing arts venue Constellation.

Image: Fay Victor. Photo: Richard Koek

For more information on the exhibition, Incense Sweaters & Ice, click here.