Cosmic Gothic is a 5 piece, jazz-configured ensemble
dedicated to creating fabulous musical experiences for diverse, crossover audiences
by pushing the boundaries between the acoustic, the electronic, and the historical.
"Cosmic Gothic played an energetic, engaging and unique set for the Mandorla Music Series. That they're all top-shelf players is almost secondary (almost). The compositions were beautiful and varied, and the arrangements and instrumentation unusual; the clarinet and trombone front line and the incorporation of audio samples made for a sound that was never predictable, even when the melodies were familiar. I look forward to hearing more from this group."
--Mark Redmond, Presenter
The Ensemble
DAN FOX
// trombone
Boston-based trombonist and educator Dan Fox has performed at concerts and functions, in radio and TV studios, and for musicals throughout the US, Europe and Japan. He recently performed at the Kennedy Center in D.C. as part of the Washington Ballet's rendition of The Great Gatsby, and has appeared at major jazz festivals in the U.S. and Europe, including Newport, Monterey, Beantown, and Mallorca Jazz Festivals.
As an educator, Dan has served on the faculty of the Berklee School of Music, the Traveling Jazz School in Mallorca, Spain, and is active in the Boston area community, promoting jazz as a creative outlet for people with “day jobs.” He is the founder of Morningside Music Studios, a community jazz ensemble program that provides students and working professionals with the opportunity to experience the excitement and joy of playing jazz in groups, with regular public performances, workshops, and jazz jam sessions. Dan also spearheads the annual A-Town Jazz Festival, now 5 years running, and is a major influence in keeping jazz alive in the local communities of Arlington, Lexington, and Cambridge.
Steve Langone
// drums
Drummer, composer, and educator Steve Langone is one of Boston’s most seasoned and accomplished purveyors of percussive sounds. The influence of his collaborators and mentors can be heard in his incredible diversity of styles and timbres, weaving together standard jazz beats with the intricate complexities of rhythms from Uruguay, Brazil, and the Caribbean. Steve’s creative partnerships with pianists such as Fernando Huergo, Nando Michelin, Eduardo Tancredi, Gilson Schachnik and Kevin Harris, and guitarist Sergio Brandao, created a long-tail journey of dozens of recordings and hundreds of performances across the globe.
Steve maintains an active teaching career as a member of the percussion faculty at The University of Rhode Island, Wellesley College and the Berklee College of Music, and is the author of the book, Advanced Rhythmic Concepts for the Modern Drummer: Subdivisions and Groupings -Volume 1. The fact that a great drummer can then codify their knowledge of rhythm into a pedagogical format is yet another testament to Steve’s many gifts; we think you’ll also like listening to him play.
Todd Brunel
// reeds
Todd Brunel is a clarinetist and saxophonist whose career has constantly bridged classical, jazz, and new music. He performs regularly with a variety of original-music groups including the Eric Hofbauer Quintet, the Sonic Explorers and the avante-funk band, The Circadian Rhythm Kings. Brunel is also the director of the Vortex Series for New and Improvised Music and has been awarded grants by the Somerville, Cambridge, Arlington and Massachusetts Cultural Councils.
Equally at home with standard classical and jazz repertoire as well as world premieres by highly regarded composers, he has performed at many well-known venues in the U.S. and Europe such as Carnegie Hall, Brandeis University, Dartmouth College, Spazio Teatro NO'HMA in Milan, the Out of the Box Festival, and the Academy of Music Dance and Art in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
Like the other members of Cosmic Gothic, Mr. Brunel strives to pass his knowledge of music and instrument on to the world’s unsuspecting students. He is on the faculty of Wheaton College and is a NEST artist with the New England Foundation for the Arts, among several other public and private institutions, and is a Conn-Selmer Endorsing artist and clinician. If you dare, you can find out more about Todd at his website, www.clarinetconspiracy.com.
Peter Tillotson
// bass
Peter Tillotson, a master bass player, has fooled many a human on this planet by carefully concealing his origins as a brother from another planet. Hailing from a galaxy far, far, away, Peter regularly travels across time and space and has probably hovered over your unborn children as they approach old age. If you are wondering why that buzzing sound in your ear never goes away, chances are that it's because Peter put it there to annoy you.
While it may seem impossible, Peter has actually performed at many of the finest venues in the U.S. - all at the same time. We are grateful for his presence in Cosmic Gothic, as he is the only one in the group who can truly tell us what is going on, from a cosmic perspective, out there in the universe.
KATHERINE SHAO
// keyboards & envisioner
Katherine has led a deep and diverse career in music performance, management, and creative production and composition. Her keyboard playing today is specialized in jazz, and informed by a background in classical and baroque music. An accomplished baroque keyboard player through her post graduate years, with a Masters of Music from Indiana University Bloomington, she has performed and recorded with many of the nation's finest classical ensembles, including the New Century Chamber Orchestra, The Orchestra of St. Luke's, the San Francisco Symphony, and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. Venues have included Carnegie Hall, Davies Symphony Hall, and a variety of prestigious music series around the US and Europe.
In recent times, Katherine has started developing ideas that merge creative thinking and business. Katherine’s endeavors as a performer of specialized musical styles has equipped her with a seasoned foundation of knowledge about the sound, affect and style of different genres. She has played many different roles in production - from concerts and theatrical staging to recordings, video and digital media. While not every mixture and juxtaposition makes it to the performance stage, you can be sure that none are off limits to consideration..