By Bonnie Marshall, Cherry Spoon Collective

Cherry Spoon Collective announces its inaugural ‘mini-season’ in St. Paul with two performances. On Friday, April 26 at 7pm and 9pm Cherry Spoon Collective will perform at Studio Z (275 East Fourth Street, Suite 200) during the St. Paul Art Crawl and will include street performances in lowertown prior to the show.  On Wednesday, May 1, Noon to 1:00 a.m., Cherry Spoon Collective will hit the sidewalk for an outdoor performance during Food Truck Wednesdays (Kellogg Boulevard across from City Hall).

Cherry Spoon Collective is a new, multi-generational, multi-instrumental group of 15+ improvising local musician/composers. Musician members are active in several prominent local smaller ensembles (Zeitgeist, Jelloslave, Orange Mighty Trio, Coloring Time, etc.) that represent the most interesting music scenes the Twin Cities has to offer. “Just about everyone in the group is a hybrid performer/composer/improviser, and it’s a great mix of players and creators from a variety of different scenes and styles, so there is a huge variety of musical knowledge and experience represented” said Pat O’Keefe who has composed a piece for the group and will be playing clarinet. This experimental music collective will feature freshly commissioned and improvisational new music. Members of the Cherry Spoon Collective are top-notch composers/musicians who are engaged in their work, performing at the top of their game and seek to create a vibrant environment for new music.

Michelle Kinney, cellist and composer, says that the sound of Cherry Spoon Collective “is of a large multi-genre ensemble improvising and grooving like a rock band, but not playing rock music! There are singular voices present in this group, not section players. It’s an entirely different sound than a classical orchestra or even a big jazz band. The point is to bring all these voices into focus, yet to be able to identify each one of them for their uniqueness.”

The band’s uniqueness is in the instrumentation that spans from violins to spoken word. Nick Gaudette, bass player and composer, says, “this “mini orchestra” comprised of winds, strings, brass, rhythm section and spoken makes this ensemble unique.”

Joe Horton, spoken word artist, is excited to be working as a member of this small orchestra. He says, “the compositions are complex without being esoteric and the musicians are amazingly tuned to dynamics. As a spoken word artist, most of my contribution to the group is improvisational. I am pulling some from words and concepts the composers used to describe the inspiration for their pieces.”

Project leaders for Cherry Spoon Collective include members Michelle Kinney (cello), Nick Guadette (bass) and Patrick O’Keefe (sax), and includes the following musicians: Laura Harada (violin), Melissa Mathews (violin), Zack Kline (violin), Jacqueline Ultan (cello), Graham O’Brien (drums), Chris Thomson (sax), George Cartwright (sax), Trent Jacobs (bassoon), Lee Tran (sax), Chris Cunningham (guitar), Joe Horton (spoken word), Geoff Senn (trumpet) and Mike Ethen (trombone).

This project is made possible in part by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the American Composers Forum. The American Composers Forum (ACF), a St. Paul-based national organization. ACF makes possible the artistic development of composers, the creative development of music, and fosters a thriving community for music.