Kaleidescape: A Conversation with Troy Music Hall’s Jessica Bowen

TROY – The music community of the Capital Region is often recognized for its collaborations, and this is certainly the case with the latest event conceived by Jessica Bowen. The classically trained violinist, who, apart from her own projects, also works at Troy Music Hall, has conceptualized a truly unique musical experience, Kaleidescape. The event centers around six music acts in the area: Buggy Jive, Sam Torres, Ohzhe, Sara Ayers, Zan & The Winter Folk, and The E-Block – whose original pieces will all be woven together with incidental music composed by Patrick Burke. The immersive experience that even boasts audience participation at the finale takes place this Saturday, October 14^th!

To get your tickets for the event, please visit here.

I had a chance to sit down with Jess before the event. What follows is our conversation.

Lucas Garrett: Jess, I want to thank you for finding time to meet up and talk for a minute. How’re you doing?

Jessica Bowen: I’m doing great; I’m hanging in there. We’re really busy, so I appreciate all the flexibility of finding a time to get together.

LG: Not only are you a musician in your own right, but you also work at Troy Music Hall. Tell us about that.

JB: I’ve been with the music hall for… I guess this is my fifth season this year, which is crazy to think about. I came on the staff when I was teaching music full-time, and I was working shows at night—I was house managing. That was my first season, coming in and working the shows at night in 2018–2019. The following year, the wonderful folks gave me the opportunity to come on there full-time. I took that and ran with it.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve fallen into the community engagement role there and continued to build educational programs for students and adults. Also, continuing to widen the spectrum of the ways we engage with the community.

LG: That’s awesome. But that’s not all you’re doing! You have a show, Kaleidescape, coming up there this Saturday! I want to hear all about that.

JB: The concept for Kaleidescape came up over my experience with a lot of things: I play violin; studied and continue to study classical music; play a lot of classical music. It’s commonplace in the classical world around here to play over at the music hall, and when I started playing a lot more non-classically with the various projects and meeting all the wonderful folks that are a part of that community—this amazingly vibrant musical community we have here—I found many people never had the experience of playing at the hall. Not even for a performance, but getting to bring their instrument on stage and play it a little bit or sing. I found that to be sad, because I have such a special connection with my experiences playing there. Especially over the pandemic, it was a really special place to be; I bonded with the space in a new way.

I really value having that time, as a musician, to create in that space, whether it’s on my own with nobody in the audience, or in front of people. I was thrilled and motivated to have people have their own experience like I had. To feel welcome in that space, and to create in a world-class amazing, amazing gift in this area. We wanted to welcome more local artists into the space and to allow them the time and the freedom to come in and create.

LG: Who’s going to be a part of the event?

JB: The event is a culmination of spending time in the hall and on their own, creating a work that’s inspired by this space and how they reacted to it over the last few months. We worked with Organ Colossal, Sam Torres and Sophia Subbayya-Vastek, to commission the artists. We have a multi-genre lineup, and that was intentional. It’ll be a little bit like musical whiplash, but it’ll be really fun and unique in that way. The artists are: Ohzhe, Sam Torres, Sara Ayers, Zan & The Winter Folk, The E-Block, and Buggy Jive. Essentially, we gave them a jumping point in exploring the space in any way they felt and a prompt. Sam, Sophia and I built and curated from a list to give them an idea. They’ll be performing those works for the first time on Saturday.

LG: How does one get tickets?

JB: Tickets are $20.00, and you can buy them here. We also wanted to keep this as accessible as possible from an audience standpoint, so we also have a free ticket bank that anyone can take advantage of, online or at the box office. It’s for people who need it. Everybody can feel welcome to the event.

LG: It sounds like an exhaustive project! If it does well, would you want to do another one?

JB: The short answer is yes. I do want to continue to welcome local artists into the music hall because there is a lot of value in that. The artists performing this Saturday have expressed similar things. Whether it will look exactly like Kaleidescape, I’m not so sure. I’m already starting to brainstorm what we could do moving forward. We definitely won’t stop the path that we’re on of getting more local people in. We really want to create a community, and I personally value that in my work. I know my colleagues feel the same.  

LG: As you said, you’re classically trained but play non-classical, as well. What are some of the things outside of the hall that people can see you involved in?

JB: On the non-classical side, I play with a couple of different groups at the moment. I play in my main musical outlet, House of Saturn, and we’re a little trio. We play my songs and one of our other player’s songs. That’s an indie-rock project; I play guitar and fiddle in that. We’re just about to release a new single coming up soon. So, we’ll finally have one other piece of the puzzle for people to listen to.

LG: You certainly sound like you know how to keep yourself busy, Jess!

JB: Sometimes painfully so! Hahaha. They’re all things I’m passionate about, so it’s hard to balance picking which one should take priority.

LG: Is there anything else you’d like to elaborate on as we wrap the interview up?

JB: In addition to those six acts that I mentioned before, we wanted it to not only to be a way for the artists to experience the space in a way they hadn’t before, but we wanted it to be different from an audience perspective. We have so many genres performing that night, which isn’t something you see all the time. We also wanted the holistic experience of concertgoing to be a unique one. We worked with local composer Patrick Burke; he’s really fantastic. He wrote the musical thread that’ll be performed between the main artists – incidental music that’ll serve as interludes to hold it all together. That’ll be performed from other areas. The musicians will be set up in other areas of the hall: boxes; over to the side; things like that. It creates this 360-sound experience; it’s really cool. I’m playing violin on that, Nick Tariello is playing percussion, and Sophia is playing piano. Sam will join us for one at the very end. Playing those from different areas sounds really cool. Rehearsals have been really fun.

The finale of the piece was an additional thought to incorporate everyone in the music-making. After we hear all the artists that are woven in with the interludes, the whole night will conclude with a final act of all the artists who performed already, plus the folks performing the interludes, plus special guests are all going to go on stage to perform this final act. The special guests are: Julia Alsarraf, Connor Armbruster, Girl Blue, Angelina Valente, and Jimi W. The act also has points for audience participation. The goal is for everybody in the space, at the end of the night, making music together.

LG: Thank you for taking the time, Jess, and good luck with your show!

JB: Thank you!