Damian Barbeler is a composer, media artist and director. While primarily music based, his work incorporates a variety of visual, sculptural and theatrical elements. He regularly directs and curates festivals and concert events and is passionate about connecting adventurous artists with audiences in approachable, playful and exploratory contexts. Barbeler lectures in digital music, composition and performance practice and Sydney Conservatorium and University of NSW. In 2020 Damian set up an online festival HiberNATION which aimed to carve out space for experimental music online. Its first season, which spanned 2020’s lockdown, was nominated for an APRA Award for Excellence in Experimental Music it also made the long-list for the German-based global
WeiZen Ho has been devising and presenting open-disciplinary performances since 1999. Her practice has expanded through music-visual concerts, into solo and participatory works to occupy spaces of uncertainty between performance, ritual and installation. These works employ significant accoutrements and deep imagery to shift and coalesce relationships between body, voice, sound and site. Oscillating between multiple perspectives in her practice and devising processes, she investigates possibilities for accessing the memory-body through vocal-bodywork, improvisational techniques and re-imagined psycho-physical states of spirit possession. These are informed by Southeast Asian rituals and animistic practices she has witnessed in her ongoing research.
James Crabb: Internationally praised for his breathtaking virtuosity and versatile musicianship, Scottish born James Crabb is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading classical accordionists. He studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Music, Copenhagen with accordion pioneer Mogens Ellegaard. James has collaborated with some of the most important composers of the last 50 years including Sofia Gubaidulina, Thomas Adès, Harrison Birtwistle, Sally Beamish, Luciano Berio and has premiered countless concertos, chamber music and solo works dedicated to him. He is also recognised internationally as an authority on the music of Astor Piazzolla and was invited to curate the inaugural Piazzolla Festival in Buenos Aires in 2016. In 2019 James gave the world premiere of Brett Dean’s accordion concerto The Players in Sweden, (recorded on the BIS label). He has also featured in the on-stage role in Dean’s opera Hamlet with Cologne Opera and the Bavarian State Opera, Munich, a role he will reprise for Opera Australia in 2024. Further projects next year will see James also return to the ACO, numerous music festivals in Australia and the UK and once again collaborate with the Australia Ensemble.
Niki Johnson is a contemporary percussionist and composer-performer whose musical practice incorporates interdisciplinary collaboration and artistic research. She has been commissioned to compose and perform solo percussion works for the Sydney Powerhouse Museum and Art Gallery of New South Wales, and is a current PhD student at Monash University. As an interdisciplinary collaborator she works with sculptors, sound designers, musicians, fine artists, and theatre-makers to create instrumental sculptures and performances across the disciplines of music, installation and experimental theatre. As a freelancing percussionist she has recorded percussion for the ABC, Sydney Opera House, Phoenix Central Park, and Trackdown Fox studios.
Liam Mulligan: An emerging multi-sensory creative, Liam Mulligan (b.1997) is a music and media composer who wants audiences to ‘feel’ his music - literally. Liam has recently completed a Masters in Music (Composition) research degree at the University of Sydney under Benjamin Carey, exploring multi-sensory counterpoint, a compositional approach that has heavily influenced his creative practice. Liam’s work has an electroacoustic focus, and holds themes of connection, fragility, and interaction. Liam explores, creates and collaborates in diverse artistic fields ranging from film, to carpentry, and bread making. His work “sounds equally appropriate in a museum space or a concert hall.”
Leta Keens is a freelance writer and editor, who has worked in England, Italy, the US and Australia. Over the years, she has written for many newspapers and magazines, has edited a number of non-fiction books, and is also the author of a couple of books. The odd ghostwriting job comes her way as well.
Dahyo Lloyd is a composer, sound designer and performance artist working on Eora country in Sydney, Australia. With a keen interest in generative and computer-based art, Dahyo's works explore themes of transhumanism, cyborg theory and the complex nature of human-computer interaction. Dahyo's installation work "Body in a Box" was performed at the Rouse Hill Psychedelia festival, and again as part of Back Stage Music's "Clarity Engine" festival in 2022. Dahyo has performed with artists such as WeiZen Ho and Hirofumi Uchino at events in Sydney and Canberra, as well as opening for Ryosuke Kiyasu as one half of the harsh-ambient duo _chuckr, along with fellow composer Maddison Briggs.
Chris Cooper is a boxer and clarinettist.
Amy Fenton is a registered Nurse at Prince Wales Hospital.