Formed in NYC in 1993, the improvising collective No-Neck Blues Band (NNCK) favors anonymity, autonomy, and obfuscation. Alongside founding member Keith Connolly (2016 AIR), they return to open ISSUE’s Fall season at First Unitarian Congregational Society in Brooklyn.
ISSUE presents the first commission from Eden Girma (2026 AIR). Part dreamscape and part summoning circle, an intimate diasporic familial archive is pieced together through the eyes of a five-year-old child.
In partnership with Franklin Furnace as part of their 50th anniversary commemoration and November release of "Back to the Present: 50 Years of Free Expression with Franklin Furnace" ISSUE presents an evening of performance and conversation.
Incorporating elements of noise, trance and minimalism, Sergei Tcherepnin (2012 AIR) presents new work for Serge Modular synthesizer.
Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellowship 2019
2019 Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellow Benedict Nguyen presents very peak summer solstice (vpss), featuring Fana Fraser, Jasmine Gibson, Annie Heath, and Sokunthary Svay. This is their second program in soft bodies in hard places, a platform of trans-disciplinary events circling planetary events over 2019.
ISSUE presents the debut NYC collaborative performance from Jennifer Walshe and San Francisco-based musician & composer Wobbly (Jon Leidecker). The artists perform solo & collaborative works ranging across their shared interest in the idiosyncrasies of digital sound and the outer reaches of online culture.
DeForrest Brown Jr. curates “Okonkwo Weeps In Exile,” a new rhythmic opera featuring producer Nicholas Dawson (Bookworms), drummer Donald Sturge Anthony Mckenzie II, poet and "enlightened educator" Rafael Sanchez, with text from Guerilla essayist His Triumphant Blackness: The Negro Subversive.
Philosopher and musician Henry Flynt performs Everlovin’ Game On, an evocation of his best-known work: You Are My Everlovin’. Featuring solo electric violin & pre-recorded tambura, the piece brings together disparate vernaculars: Southern blues, modal jazz, Appalachian fiddle & North Indian raga.
Red Bull Arts NY and ISSUE co-present two live audio-visual performances organized in response to Gretchen Bender’s unfinished work of media theater, which was to be entitled So Much Deathless, by post-industrial band Black Rain (with Philip Vanderhyden) & Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith (with Sean Hellfritsch).
Japanese quartet SAICOBAB gives their NYC debut, consisting of vocalist YoshimiO of Boredoms/OOIOO and instrumentalists Yoshida Daikiti and Motoyuki "Hama" Hamamoto. The evening also features Lizzi Bougatsos & Sadie Laksa’s I.U.D. project, embedding an eccentric dub modality into industrial music.
American musicians Jeff Witscher & Jack Callahan premiere new collaborative and solo work. Known for their discrete compositions and far-ranging work under various monikers, recently both have been using primary descriptors such as “Music Art” and “Sound Music” to re-assert the simplicity of their practices.
