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Gerry Hemingway
Gerry Hemingway, Composer/Percussionist/Visual Artist, has been at the forefront of creative music for four decades.
About Me
Gerry Hemingway, Composer/Percussionist/Visual Artist/Educator, has been at the
forefront of creative music for four decades. He was born in 1955 in New Haven, Conn., to
a family with musical interests (his grandmother had been a concert pianist and his father
studied composition with Paul Hindemith). He became interested in drums around the age
of ten and by the age of seventeen was working as a professional musician primarily in the
jazz and bebop traditions. In the 1970's, New Haven was home for a number of interesting
musicians. This was where Gerry met and first played with Anthony Davis, Leo Smith,
George Lewis and Anthony Braxton. In the late 1970's, Hemingway, trombonist Ray
Anderson, and bassist Mark Helias formed a collective trio which they eventually named
BassDrumBone. The trio was awarded a grant from Chamber Music America on the
occasion of their 30th anniversary in 2007 to compose a new set of works reflecting their
then 30 year collaboration. These compositions appear on a release on the Clean Feed
label entitled the “The Other Parade”.
He joined and remained a member of the Anthony Braxton quartet for eleven years from
1983 - 1994. In 2007 he and Anthony Braxton had a historic reunion as a duo resulting in
a 4 CD release on Mode/Avant entitled “Old Dogs (2007)”. In the late eighties he began
performing with the Reggie Workman Ensemble who at different times included Oliver
Lake, Jeanne Lee, Marilyn Crispell, John Purcell and Don Byron among others. He was a core
member of Anthony Davis' Episteme Ensemble, and has performed and recorded as a
featured soloist on Mr. Davis' violin concerto “Maps” as well as the operas “Under the
Double Moon” and “Tania” (released recently on Koch Classics). Hemingway also performed
in duet with pianist Cecil Taylor in May of 1999 on the invitation of De Singel in Antwerp,
Belgium.
A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, Hemingway has become increasingly prominent as
a composer and improvisor and a leader of several long standing quintets and quartets of
international acclaim (see below). In addition to receiving fellowships from both the
National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation on the Arts, he has also
received four commissions through the Parabola Arts Foundation with funding from the
New York State Council on the Arts, including a 1998 grant supporting the creation of the
”The Visiting Tank”, which concludes his Tzadik release of “Chamber Works”. In 1993, he
premiered a commission from the Kansas City Symphony with funding from Meet the
Composer for a concerto for percussionist and orchestra entitled “Terrains”. In June of
1998 a co-composition with the Amsterdam based composer Guus Jannsen was
commissioned by the NPS radio of the Netherlands and performed at the Holland Festival.
Entitled “Cycles”, the work used a unique computer controlled conducting system that
allowed the ensemble to play in multiple tempos.
Between 1997 and 2007 his primary working band was a quartet with either Ray Anderson-
trombone or Herb Robertson-trumpet, Ellery Eskelin-tenor sax and Mark Dresser or Mark
Helias on bass. The band performed 40 concerts in the US in 1998 and it's first recording,
”Johnny's Corner Song” was released on the Auricle Record label in March of 1998. The
quartet completed a studio recording entitled “Devil's Paradise” which was released in May
2003 on Clean Feed records, who since also released “The Whimbler” with Herb Robertson,
Ellery Eskelin and Mark Helias (5/05).
This follows nine years of performances and recordings with his European based quintet
whose final cd was released on GM Recordings in the fall of 1999 entitled “Waltzes, Two-
Steps and Other Matters of the Heart”. Previous recordings include, “Special Detail” (91),
”Down to the Wire” (93), “Demon Chaser” (94) and “The Marmalade King” (95) all on the
Swiss Hat Art label (all except “Demon Chaser” currently out of print) and “Slamadam” (95)
and “Perfect World” (96) (both out of print - but still available from this site) on Random
Acoustics. The quintet formation began a reactivation with new personnel and
instrumentation and a performance and recording in Lisbon, Portugal in the fall of 2002. A
release of that material “Double Blues Crossing” was released in April 2005 on Between the
Lines (whom has merged with SunnyMoon Records).
In 2008 A hybrid quintet formation was conceived with Ellery Eskelin (ala quartet), Oscar
Noriega (multi-reed, ala quintet), Terry McManus (guitar, ala previous cello chair), Kermit
Driscoll - ac & el bass. This has become the current working band with a recording entitled
”Riptide” released on Clean Feed, and with occasional performances in New York and a tour
in 2012 this group performs new repertoire as well as material from both previous quintet
and quartet book. In 2012 Mr. Hemingway formed a mixed quintet combining the WHO trio
- pianist Michel Wintsch, bassist Baenz Oester, as well as guitarist Terrence McManus, and
original quintet member Michael Moore with multi reeds.
A significant part of Mr. Hemingway's body of work is represented in his work as a solo
percussionist which began in 1974. His interest in extending the vocabulary of the
instrument for the purpose of creating richly textured, vibrant and engaging compositions
for the drum set have been previously documented in four recordings including “Electro-
Acoustic Solo Works (84-95)” and “Acoustic Solo Works (83-94)” on the Random Acoustics
label as well as the previous vinyl editions “Solo Works” on Auricle Records and “Tubworks”
(now re-released on cdr) on the Sound Aspects label. Mr. Hemingway has been developing
a new solo CD + DVD project for the past fifteen years which will weave together some of
his more recent solo works and his work as a film artist as it relates to his solo percussion
work. Release is scheduled for September 2011. He currently is performing a solo program
entitled “Behaviors” in collaboration with video artist Beth Warshafsky with whom he has
been collaborating since the late 80's. The program puts a collection of his new electro-
acoustic solo works in a theatrical framework that includes video projection and real time
interactive visual and sound work. A major new release of his solo work both as a drummer
and electronic musician, combined with his visual art work as fimmaker was released on
Auricle Records as a CD+ DVD in January of 2014 called “kernelings”.
His work as a composer and percussionist includes recordings, collaborations and
performances with Derek Bailey, Leo Smith, Oliver Lake, Kenny Wheeler, Frank Gratkowski,
George Lewis, John Cale and Hank Roberts among many others. Collaborative trios include
the GRH trio with German pianist Georg Graewe and the Dutch cellist Ernst Reijseger, the
WHO trio with Swiss pianist Michel Wintsch and bassist Baenz Oester, and Brew with Reggie
Workman and Miya Masaoka.
As well there are a number of ongoing duos including one with John Butcher which began
performing duos in 2000, Tom & Gerry is another duo with Thomas Lehn who performs
live analog electronics which began in 1997. In the fall of 2010 Mr. Hemingway released
recordings of three more recordings of ongoing duo projects, a duo with guitarist Terrence
McManus, a duo with saxophonist Ellery Eskelin and a duo with komungo player Jin Hi Kim.
In addition the duo with pianist Marilyn Crispell continues after a long hiatus, and
documented with a new release on Intact records entitled “Affinities”. Another duo project
is with vocalist Andrea Goodman known for her work with Meredith Monk. They released a
recording on Ruby Throated Records entitled “Divine Doorways”. His work for multimedia
includes “Waterways”, for multiple slide projectors, tape and percussion, as well as
numerous ongoing collaborations with video artist/animator Beth Warshafsky.
The many facets of Hemingway's work as composer/soloist/collaborator/ensemble
member can be heard on over 100 recordings from many different record labels, among
them: Tzadik Records, Enja, Palmetto, Mode/Avant, Random Acoustics, Intact, Auricle
Records, and Hat Art.
Between 2005 and 2009 Mr. Hemingway was part of the faculty of New School's “Jazz and
Contemporary Music” program where he ran the Sound in Time ensemble and taught two
different history classes, one in World Music History and the other in Contemporary Jazz
and its Exponents, the latter of which focused on the music of the 1960s until the present.
Both history courses were taught as multimedia lectures, incorporating audio and visual
data including numerous fims Mr. Hemingway had collected to help intensify the
experience of assimilating these important history topics. Since the fall of 2009 Mr.
Hemingway has joined the faculty of the Hochshule Luzern in Switzerland where he is now
lives and is based for the forseeable future. In this context Mr. Hemingway teaches
drumming, improvisation and composition as part of the music theory program as well
running a variety of workshops each semester.
