MICHAEL KOTT

"I used to be a cellist... now i'm a chill-ist..."

Transgalactic electro-cellist Michael Kott has been playing the cello since he was nine.

Of his musical influences he says, "there are many... not all from music per se... the motion of a fish or a bird of prey...call forth emotions and stories...the visual and the aural become one..."

Michael's most recent credits include the PBS special MUSIC FROM A PAINTED CAVE (with ROBERT MIRABAL and the RareTribalMob) currently airing on 47 PBS stations. the companion audio CD 'MUSIC FROM A PAINTED CAVE...' will be in stores April 3...

He appears on TAOS TALES (Robert Mirabal, SilverWave) the CD which was named Amazon.com NEW AGE ARTIST OF THE YEAR 1999... The album also received NATIVE AMERICAN SONGWRITER OF THE YEAR recognition at the NAMMYs (Native American music awards...).

One of his favorite projects was with the tribal-trance ensemble SONS OF GANESH (with Phil Hollenbeck and Riksharaj and others).

Of his work on the cello michael says, "I used to be a cellist... now i'm a chillist..." His new CD series 'CELLOGY' is the culmination of an extended exploration of the sonic terrain opened up through the use of transducer pickups and sound processors on bowed instruments. Michael uses THE REALIST cello pickup, designed by Ned Steinberger (NSDesigns...) and manufactured by David Gage (New York...) (Listen to Trance Galactic from Cellogy Volume One.

Michael sees the cello as a very powerful gateway/channel into the emotions and the heart: "Music has the power to transform... uniting perception with intuition and emotion... forging passion... and dissolving conceptual structures, such as time..."

Michael has a song CD--POCAHOLINIT (INIT records). He's one of the founding members of the PrimalTribal Arts Council. Two of his songs ('Go Girl, Go' and 'Hormones in the Headphones' were featured in performances by VICTOR WOOTEN on the grammy-nominated CD 'Yin-Yang' (Compass Records.) Besides the RareTribalMob and PTAC, Michael appears with artists such as trance-opera diva SASHA LAZARD and chanteuse/torch singer LISA ZANE. He recently interfaced with DJ collective MOONTRIBE, and has recorded with tribal/ambient artists INLAKESH.

During fall 2001 Michael will be performing MUSIC FROM A PAINTED CAVE with Robert Mirabal. He plans to do more solo performances in 2002, including a planetarium scene which will use lighting and digital images.

"The language of the cello is found within the very shape of the instrument...with the interaction of the bow and the string...forming many worlds and different dimensions...it's a cellistic universe..."

Michael and some of his other cellist friends have formed the CELLISTIC SOCIETY to encourage the imaginative use of cello in different musical forms. It is also a celebration of what is held within the traditional realms of the cello. Michael describes the tradition: "Although the tones of the cello are often described in more feminine terms, the intensity, force and sustain of altered tones also have a tradition... it reaches into the baroque and beyond... to a time when troubadours wandered from one feast to the next, from one dance... to the next..."

"As far as i might stray from the more familiar realms of the cello...the classical/romantic qualities remain... indeed, they are often magnified..."

Michael lives in Santa Fe, where he is inspired by the visual arts and the powerful beauty of the high desert mountain wilderness. Professor of Cello at the College of Santa Fe, he is also an avid snowboarder and green chile enthusiast. He can usually be found soaking in the hot springs at ojo caliente or sipping/swilling a chai in a local cafe.