HARRISON GOLDBERG - Tenor, Alto, and Soprano saxophones
STEVEN MILLER - Shendai Ceremonial Drums, gongs, bells, cymbals, and miscellaneous percussion. The Shendai drums are a one-of-a-kind melodic set, a cross between Taiko drums and Timpani, and are played with specially designed percussion mallets.
Influences
World Jazz, African, Middle Eastern and Oriental music, Gagaku, Noh (No) Theatre, Free Jazz, Creative Music, New Music, Mysticism, Taiko.
Significant individuals include Karlheinz Stockhausen, Paul Desmond, Dave Brubeck, Pharoah Sanders, Sun Ra, Steve Roach, Robert Rich, Paul Winter, Paul McCandless, Al Gromer Khan, Hamza el Din, and numerous other great players worldwide.
Sounds Like
Hmm... tough to say. Kind of like Paul McCandless, Oregon, Paul Winter, Ian Bederman, Codona, Pharoah Sanders, Jan Garbarek, and/or Wayne Shorter. But the Shendai drums are a unique instrument, and the fully improvised "intuitive" pieces we play have the flavor of jazz, but are quite non-traditional, yet also not what is usually termed "free jazz". So in the end, we really only sound like ourselves.
Despite this, people frequently compare our music to the artists on our influences list, and also, surprisingly, to Miles Davis. We think it's something about the jazz "feel".
Some of the most valuable musical training we ever undertook was a regimen of intuitive silence and listening exercises with our San Francisco Bay Area improv art collaborative Tabula Rasa. This work was intended to help us begin to escape the traditional jazz framework that we had drilled into ourselves since childhood, and foster more free musical expression. The group was inspired mainly by the experimental 'Intuitive Music' concepts of KarlHeinz Stockhausen, plus the work of several other 20th century musical pioneers including John Cage, Steve Reich, Edgard Varese, and Anthony Braxton.
Tabula Rasa's four musicians (there were also dancers and visual artists)
strove to begin to hear music in new ways, outside the usual constraints of key and time signature, familiar chord progressions, melodic forms, etc. The ultimate goal was to free ourselves to create new music spontaneously in the present moment, both while recording and in live performance, without the benefit of any advance planning, or even a conceptual framework. At first extraordinarily difficult, this gradually became not just easier but also enormously liberating, so that we eventually found making intuitive music far more satisfying and stimulating than the best traditional forms, which seemed overly restrictive and two-dimensional to us by comparison. Inspiration had become the order of the day.
Neon Egypt carries this work forward while revisiting our roots in the forms and sensibilities of jazz. Please enjoy the journey with us!
Neon Egypt
was active as a musical group from 1999 through late 2007. An outgrowth of the popular San Francisco improvisational jazz quartet Tabula Rasa, Neon Egypt is widely
considered to have pioneered a new jazz-based hybrid of Karlheinz
Stockhausen’s Intuitive Music. Their
sole album, Tales Of Kings, released in May of 2000, is recognized
as a classic of the genre. Various songs from the album regularly
populated top slots in the Improvisational Jazz and World Fusion charts on
numerous Internet music stations for several years following the album’s
release. The album’s most popular song, Passage ToDjibouti,
has appeared in several feature settings, most notably in the 2004 art
film Journey of the Dream Warrior.
Although the group’s
members have now moved on to other works, its legacy of leading edge intuitive music remains. The CD Tales Of Kings is
available online, and as digital song downloads through most major
Internet music providers.
Meditative Jazz / World Fusion
Whether called Meditative Jazz, World Jazz, or World Fusion, Neon Egypt's offering is decidedly unique. Expressive, free-flowing saxophone melodies float gracefully over Taiko-like melodic drum lines, featuring the one-of-a-kind Shendai Ceremonial Drums.
Intuitive Music
All of Neon Egypt's selections are "first takes" of spontaneously improvised Intuitive Music, recorded live. None of their pieces have a predetermined form or concept, a title, or even a key or time signature before play is begun - each is truly a unique product of the moment. Yet each has clear musicality, satisfying coherence and unmistakable structure. The broad foundation of melodic drum and percussion music created by Steven Miller's Shendai Ceremonial Drums allows master jazz saxophone soloist Harrison Goldberg freedom to weave an artful musical offering in real time. The result... well, you are invited to listen for yourself!
Come join us for an exotic artistic excursion!
Band History
Steven Miller and Harrison Goldberg are veteran jazz musicians who stepped outside mainstream jazz in 1992 with formation of the California-based performance art collaborative Tabula Rasa. This group of four players, which included well known San Francisco Bay Area creative musicians Troy Silveira on piano and eight-string guitarist Ron Thompson, founder of the progressive improv group SpiritPark, strove to learn to improvise music and performance art live using only the compasses of intuition and heart, and without the benefit of any predetermined structure, form or guidelines. (See Intuitive Music) Their critically acclaimed 'collage' performances incorporated a melding of improvised acoustic/electronic music, dance, and visual art. This work led to formation of the improvisational trio Legend with bassist/synthesist Roger Foote, and release of their debut music CD early in 1997. Now performing as the duo Neon Egypt, Miller and Goldberg feature guest performances by contributing artists including musicians, dancers, and visual artists.
Vote for Neon Egypt,
and find other top bands
at BAMBOO MUSIC
Downloads:
and: Audiophile grade downloads including full 44.1khz WAV files at Neon Egypt Audio Shop
Greetings Steven, Wishing you only good things on your upward journey. We are still recording prolifically and have found a guitarist who's renderings compliment our sonorous sketches. My gratitude for all your kindnesses. Your disc is one of my favorites. Blessings be yours, Michael
Hello there, thanx for the add. We are a Post Rock/Electronica band from Cairo, Egypt. Our debut album "Marching Stickmen" is now available FOR FREE on our page. Please check us out and feel free to download our album ;)
Hello Steven, It's been awhile. I'm glad you like our work. I do hope your Shendais will feel the pulse of your soul again soon. I for one am inspired by their/your sound. Please stay in touch my brother. Warm regards, Michael
Thanks for befriending my music page! Enjoy the tunes and check back for updated blogs, tour info, etc. And feel free to comment or msg me whenever. I love getting feedback from new friends and fans! Also, my debut album is coming out at the beginning of Oct! xoxo alyssa suede =)
Always great to see you guys (virtually so far) and always a mystical pleasure to hear you. Nothing else like your sound - I'm amazed and deeply satisfied every time I listen
Musikzirkus-Magazin – the Internetmagazine about Prog-, Art-, Psychedelic-, Melodic-, Krautrock and Electronic with a lot of Concert-, CD-, DVD-Reviews, Interviews and many Infos. So have a look.
