Christopher Adler
Christopher Adler is a composer, performer and improviser living in San Diego, California. His music draws upon thirty years of research into the traditional musics of Thailand and Laos and a background in mathematics. He is a foremost performer of new music for the khaen, a free-reed mouth organ from Laos and Northeast Thailand, and his CD Landscape Traces: New music for khaen, volume two was selected by Ted Gioia as one of the top 100 releases of 2023. He attended the International Gugak Workshop in Seoul, South Korea in 2022, and was a U.S. Fulbright Scholar to South Korea in 2024.
His cross-cultural compositions for traditional Korean instruments have been presented at the National Gugak Center by the Society for East-West Music and by Ensemble The Geomungo. Other recent projects include Science Fictions for two pianos, based on mathematical sequences explored in a co-authored paper with mathematician Jean-Paul Allouche, and Aeneas in the Underworld, a concert-length oratorio for guitar and ensemble recounting the sixth book of Vergil’s Aeneid released on MicroFest Records.
He is a pianist with NOISE, and co-founder of the soundON Festival in La Jolla, California, and a founding member of the world folk fusion duo Sädesärla with Batya MacAdam-Somer.
He is currently Professor of Music and Director of the Asian Studies Program at the University of San Diego. His compositions have also been released on many labels including Tzadik, MicroFest, Innova, Centaur, New Amsterdam, and Cities and Memory, and his performances are on labels including Tzadik, Innova, and Centaur.
Cowries is a trio for khaen, the free-reed mouth organ from Laos and Northeast Thailand that I have played since 1995. This groove piece mostly in the meter of 19/8 was inspired by the ancient sea-faring routes that linked Southeast Asia to Eastern Africa.
These routes also linked to islands of the Maldives that were the source of cowrie shells used as currency and to decorate objects, including musical instruments.