Nate Wooley on Solo Improvisation
In recent years, Nate Wooley has become a giant in the new music world, whether guesting with the New York Philharmonic to perform the work of Ashley Fure or through starting a new band with the likes of Mary Halvorson and Susan Alcorn. (That is Columbia Icefield, by the way, and they will be at Big Ears 2019.) In this great interview for NewMusicBox, though, Nate digs into the motivations behind his solo practice and performances. We love his analogy of a solo show with the tradition of storytelling.
“Every choice I make now has to do with a kind of storytelling now that’s not strictly narrative or meant to paint a picture, but tries to get at the core of what a great storyteller does, which is slowly pry open their chest and show you everything that’s inside them, if only for a brief second,” he says. “The hope being that, at the end, I’ve given a small, actually living, piece of myself and the audience feels like they know me a little better.”
