SOUND CITIZENS BIOGRAPHIES

SHIFTING GROUND Matthias Schack-Arnott Matthias Schack-Arnott is a based percussive artist working in contemporary classical and experimental music as a performer, composer and improvisor.

Described by The Guardian as ‘sonically and visually exquisite’, Matthias’ solo work explores unique approaches to percussive performance, often involving the development of new instrumental set-ups built in collaboration with architects, engineers and technicians. His work has been presented by Melbourne Festival, La Comete (France), The Unconformity (Tasmania), Arts House, Supersense – Festival of the Ecstatic (), MPavilion, Spot Festival (Denmark) & Next Wave (2012 & 2014).

At the age of 21 Matthias was invited to be the Artistic Associate of Speak Percussion, Australia’s leading percussive arts organisation. Matthias is a key artist in the creative team and a performer in almost all of Speak’s projects nationally & internationally.

He has won numerous awards, including the 2016 Melbourne Prize for Music ‘Development’ Award, the 2014 Green Room Awards ‘Outstanding Work by an Emerging Artist’ and multiple Australian Art Music Awards for his work with Speak Percussion.

As a guest artist Matthias appears with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Malaysia Philharmonic Orchestra, Exo- Tech, ELISION, Australian Art Orchestra, Synergy, Chamber Made Opera and Nick Tsiavos Ensemble.

Performance highlights include Berliner Festspiele (Germany), GAIDA Festival (Lithuania), ARENA Festival (Latvia), Roullette (New York), CONNECT Festival (Sweden), Batteries IV Festival (Geneva), Taiwan National Concert Hall, Salihara Festival (Indonesia), Adelaide Festival, Perth International Arts Festival, Melbourne Festival, MONA FOMA and Dark Mofo.

Keith Tucker Keith was Resident Lighting Designer with the Australian Dance Theatre for seven years and was then Production Manager at TANDANYA, The National Aboriginal Cultural Institute. He went on to Production Manage at the Adelaide Fringe Festival and worked freelance in theatrical lighting design. Keith has lit shows for choreographers such as Graeme Watson, Leigh Warren, David Atkins, Jonathon Taylor, Ariette Taylor and Nanette Hassall. He also lit theatrical productions for the State Theatre Company of SA and Sydney Theatre Company, working with directors such as Robyn Nevin and Simon Phillips. Since creating production company Megafun he has designed the lighting for companies The Moscow Circus, The English National Ballet, Edgley International, Melbourne City Council (Federation Square), The Melbourne Museum, Crown Casino and Lucy Guerin Inc. His most recent project was as Creative Producer of the Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony River Event (The Fish!).

Michaela Coventry is a creative producer whose career spans 20 years and all artforms. She is currently the creative director of Sage Arts and acting executive producer of Lucy Guerin Inc. In demand as an executive producer for organisations and as a creative producer of interdisciplinary work, Michaela has worked with many of Australia’s most exciting arts organisations and independent artists including Speak Percussion (2015-2017), Megafun (2013-2014), Lucy Guerin Inc (2006-2012), Marrugeku & Stalker (2004-2006) and Performance Space (2001-2004).

EIGHT HOUR DAY Julian Day Julian Day is an artist and composer based between New York and Australia. Recent projects include: Moving Collected Ambience in which fifty vocalists flooded the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, reading the collection as a score; The Weight Of Air for MONA FOMA in which Day performed for 24 hours using fifty weights upon the keys of the Hobart Town Hall pipe organ, sculpting the air with rich vibrations; and White Noise for the Australian Centre of Contemporary Art in which a gallery was subsumed by the sound of 50m of paper agitated by subsonic bass tones.

Day has presented work at Tate Modern, Whitechapel Gallery, Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, California Pacific Triennial (Orange County Museum of Art), Prague Quadrennial, Asia Pacific Triennial (Queensland Art Gallery of Modern Art), Artspace, Carriageworks, Firstdraft and Institute of Modern Art. His work has been acquired by various museums including the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Orange County Museum of Art and Wollongong Art Gallery. His music has featured at festivals worldwide including Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Royal Academy of Music Piano Festival, Spitalfields Music Festival, Bang On A Can Marathon, MATA, Metropolis, Totally Huge New Music Festival, Liquid Architecture, St Jerome’s Laneways Festival, Dark MOFO and MONA FOMA. He is represented by Dominik Mersch Gallery.

TOWN CHOIR Maiko Yamamoto – Artistic Director, Theatre Replacement Maiko Yamamoto is an Artistic Director of the Vancouver-based performance company Theatre Replacement, a company she formed in 2003 with fellow artist James Long. Works include MINE (2018), Town Choir (2017) and Town Criers (2016), Kate Bowie (2014), Dress me up in your love (2011), WeeTube (2009), Train (2008), Yu-Fo (2007), BIOBOXES (2007), Sexual Practices of the Japanese (2006), and The Empty Orchestra: a love story powered by karaoke (2005). Theatre Replacement continues to present work both nationally and internationally. For the company, Yamamoto’s work has focused on building intercultural and experimental performances that react to contemporary existence through a highly evolved and extended process of collaboration. Maiko also directs, writes, teaches and creates performance for a diverse range of companies and venues. She holds a BFA in Theatre from Simon Fraser University’s School for the Contemporary Arts and an MAA in Visual Art from Emily Carr University of Art + Design.

Michele Lee Michele Lee is an Asian-Australian playwright and theatre-maker working across stage, live art and screen. Her work is largely narrative-focused, in comedy and drama and explores stories of women, otherness and found families. She has been commissioned by Griffin Theatre Company, Sydney Theatre Company (STC), , Arts House, Next Wave Festival, Darwin Festival and Monash University. Current works-in-development include Single Ladies (Red Stitch), How Do I Let You Die? (Arts House), Pussy Monologues (Darlinghurst Theatre), Squishy Taylor (The Inhabitors), Security (Darebin Speakeasy) and Going Down: Web Series

Previous works include An Assistant’s Notes For A Pandemic (2018, Arts House), Going Down (2018, Malthouse, STC), Rice (2017, Queensland Theatre, Griffin Theatre), Off Centre (2016, STC), Naked Self (2016, 2018, Arts House, FOLA) and Talon Salon (2012, 2013 Next Wave Festival, You Are Here, Darwin Festival). Rice won the 2016- 17 Queensland Premier’s Drama Award, the 2018 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award, the 2018 Australian Writers’ Guild stage drama award and was a finalist for the 2018 NSW Premier’s Literary Award, Prize. Going Down was a finalist for the 2019 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award, Drama; 2019 NSW Premier’s Literary Award, Nick Enright Prize and five 2019 Green Room Awards.

Joel Bray A Melbourne-based artist, Joel Bray is of Wiradjuri, Scottish and English heritage.

Joel’s most recent works are Daddy for Yirramboi 2019 and Dharawungara for Chunky Move’s Next Move commission (2018). His body-of-work includes Biladurang (2017), commissioned for the 2017 Melbourne Fringe and awarded Best Performance in the Fringe Awards. The work has toured nationally to the 2018 Darwin and Brisbane Festivals, the 2018 Bendigo Queer Film Festival and the 2019 Sydney Festival. His work Machines of More (2016), which interrogates the brutal abbreviated dialect used by gay men on online dating apps, was commissioned by the 2016 IntimaDance Festival in Tel Aviv. Other works include Zero to A Hundred (2016) for the Albania Dance Theatre and Match (2016) for Kolben Dance in Jerusalem. Joel was the Artist-in-Residence at NAISDA Dance College and created Augury (2015) for the student body.

Scott Price Scott began working with Back to Back’s community performance – making group THEATRE OF SPEED in 2005 and joined the Back to Back ensemble in 2007. Scott’s forte is in devised performance, improvising text and characters such as the young man in FOOD COURT (2008) and God in LADY EATS APPLE (2016). Since joining the touring Ensemble, Scott has co-devised and performed in TOUR GUIDE, which premiered in Linz, Austria in 2009, GANESH VERSUS THE THIRD REICH (2011) which has toured to 31 cities internationally, SUPER DISCOUNT (2013) and LADY EATS APPLE (2016). In 2015 Scott created PRICE with filmmaker Rhian Hinkley and director, Tamara Searle. A video blog where Scott interviews Australian and international artists, performers, political leaders and activists, PRICE was a finalist in the 2016 Australian Multicultural Marketing Awards and was Scott’s attempt to answer those who might misunderstand Back to Back’s provocation as merely shock tactics.

Zoë Coombs-Marr Zoë Coombs-Marr is an Australian comedian and actor. Her show Trigger Warning received the Barry Award at the 2016 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. In 2018, Zoe was nominated for Best Comedy Performer at the Helpmann Awards.

Robbie Blake – Composer and Conductor Robbie Blake is an Irish artist working as a composer and performance-maker in the contexts of music, theatre, dance and live art. Robbie collaborates with a diverse range of artists to create new work that expands how music is made and experienced. His work is fuelled by curiosity and carried out with sensitivity. Robbie is the artistic director of TONNTA, a music performance company and Ireland’s only dedicated new music vocal ensemble. Tonnta is committed to performing and promoting new works of interdisciplinary music with a particular aim in supporting new Irish vocal composition.