Soundwaves New Music Concert

After eight years and almost one hundred shows, the Soundwaves new music series at the Santa Monica Public Library concludes with a concert by the Present Quartet, on Saturday July 6, 3:30pm, at the Main Library Martin Luther King Jr. Auditorium, 601 Santa Monica Blvd.

Series founder and bassist Jeff Schwartz organized the Present Quartet in 2018, combining his most frequent collaborators: flutist Ellen Burr and woodwind player Charles Sharp, with harpist Anne LeBaron, a new partner for all three. Schwartz, Sharp, and Burr are core members of LA’s improvised music community. LeBaron is better known as a composer, with recent major performances at UCLA and REDCAT, but she also has a notable history as an improviser. Originally intended as a one-time meeting, the Present Quartet’s debut show led to offers of more, and they have since performed at Coaxial, Kulak’s Woodshed, the Track 16 Gallery, ArtShare-LA, the International Society for Improvised Music conference, and the Edgetone New Music Summit, and recorded for the Pfmentum and Edgetone labels.

The Present Quartet is closely connected to Soundwaves; LeBaron and Schwartz first met in May 2016, when her music was featured on the fourth Soundwaves concert and, like the Soundwaves series, the music of the Present Quartet draws on experimental elements of multiple genres and communities: classical, jazz, rock, noise, etc.

Soundwaves was created by librarian/musician Jeff Schwartz and composer Daniel Rothman in 2016 to present cutting-edge music at the Santa Monica Public Library. It has received grants from the Friends of the Santa Monica Public Library and the Amphion Foundation. Programs have included collaborations with the Angel City Jazz Festival, Piano Spheres, Jacaranda Music, Microfest, Cold Blue Music, and the Dog Star Orchestra. A complete list of shows, with many videos, is at soundwavesnewmusic.com.

All Library programs are free and open to the public. Parking is available underneath the Main Library, several bus lines and the Metro E line stop nearby, and there are bike racks. The MLK Auditorium is wheelchair accessible. Please call (310) 458-8600 to request additional accommodations.