FMP Benefit with Keir Neuringer (solo & trio with David Middleton & Julius Masri)

A fundraiser for Fire Museum Presents.

Keir Neuringer:

Keir Neuringer is a saxophonist, composer, and writer committed to emancipatory and interdisciplinary practices in his work, activism, and parenting. He co-founded the critically-acclaimed band Irreversible Entanglements and co-leads the improvisation trio Dromedaries. Traveling widely to present his work, he has appeared internationally on festival stages, in underground spaces, and occasionally within academia. His solo saxophone playing is documented most notably on his 2014 double album Ceremonies Out of the Air; he also performs on electric and electronic keyboard instruments, writes and narrates text (most notably with Dutch group Ensemble Klang, which released the album of his work Elegies & Litanies in 2020), and composes largely outside of conventional new music scenes. After completing an undergraduate composition degree at Ithaca College, he spent two years on a Fulbright research grant in Krakow, absorbing and participating with the Polish avant-garde and forming deep collaborative relationships with duo partner Rafal Mazur and both Marek and Tomek Choloniewski. He then lived in The Hague for eight years, curating audiovisual art and performance and earning a masters degree from the experimental ArtScience Institute. In the 2010s he moved to Philadelphia, participating in its radical art and anti-carceral activist scenes, and is currently based in Ithaca, New York.

Keir will perform a solo set and a trio set with David Middleton (guitar) & Julius Masri (drums).

Among many other projects and collaborations, David Middleton is a long-standing member of Sun Ra's Arkestra under the direction of Marshall Allen. He has developed many through-composed and free-improvised performances, compositions, and orchestrations for an international list of ensembles and artists. He is half of the duo Jupiter Blue with vocalist Tara Middleton, and continues to explore sonic textures live and recorded.

Julius Masri is a Philadelphia based multi instrumentalist, and performer/composer for the city's dance community at large. His music focuses on improvisatory methods and syncretic / linguistic exchanges within various musical languages including Jazz, Metal, AfroCuban, Experimental Noise, and Arabic music. Born in Tripoli, Lebanon, he moved to the States in 1990 and picked up drumming a year later. He studied with Philadelphia instructors Carl Mottola, Elaine Hoffman-Watts, and as an undergraduate at Bard College, with AACM's Thurman Barker, Richard Teitelbaum, and Joan Tower. Julius plays drums, circuit modified Casio keyboards, Oud, Kamancheh (aka Rabab, Spike Fiddle), and various other instruments. He currently performs in groups such as grind/crust metal band Night Raids, free jazz groups Sirius Juju and Dromedaries, trombone and synth duo Superlith, and more. He has performed with Henry Grimes, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, Thurman Barker and members of the Sun Ra Arkestra. Julius is a recipient of a 2022 Yaddo Fellowship for composition, the 2022 university of the arts creative research and innovation grant, and project funding via pew center for arts & heritage, as well as Swarthmore college and the Andrew W. Mellon foundation.

accessibility: two steps from street to venue.

Please note, entrance is via the side door on Arizona Street.