Rhys Chatham

Rhys Chatham (born September 19, 1952) is an American composer, guitarist, trumpet player, and multi-instrumentalist (flutes in C, alto and bass, keyboard), primarily active in avant-garde and minimalist music. He is best known for his "guitar orchestra" compositions. He has lived in France since 1987. Early years Chatham began his musical career as a piano tuner for avant-garde Minimalist composer La Monte Young as well as harpsichord tuner for Gustav Leonhardt, Rosalyn Tureck and Glenn Gould. He studied flute under Sue Ann Kahn, with whom he first encountered contemporary classical music, and studied soon afterwards under electronic music pioneer Morton Subotnick and minimalist icon La Monte Young. He was a member of Young's avant-garde group, Theatre of Eternal Music during the early seventies. Chatham also played with Tony Conrad in an early version of Conrad's group, The Dream Syndicate. In 1971, while still in his teens, Chatham became the first music director at the experimental art space The Kitchen in lower Manhattan. His early musical work, such as Two Gongs (1971) owes a significant debt to La Monte Young and other minimalists such as Terry Riley and Philip Glass. Compositions from the late 1970s and early 1980s By 1977, Chatham's music was heavily influenced by punk rock, having seen an early Ramones concert. He formed the No Wave groups Tone Death (that performed early versions of his Guitar Trio) and The Gynecologists after being intrigued and influenced by the group of artists that music critics would label No Wave in 1978. That year, he began performing Guitar Trio around downtown Manhattan with an ensemble that included Glenn Branca, as well as Nina Canal of Ut. During this period, he wrote several works for large guitar ensembles, including Drastic Classicism, a collaboration with dancer Karole Armitage.