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Chris Chalfant

Chris Chalfant, born September 10, 1960, Akron, OH; Composer, director, pianist, vocalist, artist, author, and poet; Noted for her unique style as a creative artist, Chris Chalfant is a lyrical, rhythmically compelling, and powerful, innovative driving force in the world of jazz, new and improvised music. Her prolific output of composition and improvisation (over 400 works) draws largely from traditional music of Africa, Hungary and India, as well as from American folk music, jazz and classical music. Critics have compared her music and playing to a wide range of artists: Andrew Hill, Charles Ives, McCoy Tyner, Mal Waldron, Cecil Taylor, Bud Powell, Stravinsky, Don Pullen, Keith Jarrett, Webern, Meredith Monk, Thelonious Monk and a Buddhist monk. She draws from nature, poetry and dance with a strong sense of counterpoint and polyrhythm, resulting in non-ordinary phrasings, tonal structures and rhythmic layerings. Her work is both simple and complex at the same time, where she will take a simple children’s tune and create an expressionistic multi-tonal, multi-rhythmic contrapuntal composition or improvisation. Chalfant has a strong melodic sense as well as a feeling of tranquility in much of her work. Her keen sense of moment-to-moment movement in her composition and improvisation is supported by her training in Buddhism and Aikido, where “living under the blade” results in an unshakable fearlessness, confidence and a path of truth.