A special music-only performance featuring the musicians of The Thank-you Bar, BLACKFISH features multi-instrumentalist composer James Everest (Minneapolis, MN) and improviser/composer Joel Pickard (Portland, OR) who perform live improvised duets in a series of surround-sound installation concerts that accompany live performances of The Thank-you Bar. Using the vastness of the Northrop stage and auditorium, Joel Pickard plays pedal steel guitar and upright bass, and James Everest plays nylon and steel string acoustic guitars through a myriad of effects and looping pedals to create spontaneous sounds and songs that span from the intricate and spare to dense, layered, sonic constructions.

James Everest is based in Minneapolis and has worked on a variety of musical projects, including Lateduster, Neotropic (UK), Sans Le Systeme, Roma Di Luna, Vicious Vicious, with collaborators Walter Kitundu and Eduard Nesterenko (RUS), and as a solo artist. Since 2002 Everest has been a close collaborator with choreographer Emily Johnson | Catalyst, writing and performing original scores for several performances with Lateduster, as a solo artist, and most recently with Joel Pickard. Since 2005, he has hosted and curated the Making Music conversations series at the University of Minnesota's Whole Music Club and the Walker Art Center.

Joel Pickard is based in Portland, Oregon and works as an artist creating music for dance, theatre, video, commercial advertising, and performance. In 2003 he created Hatfarm (a music production company) as a name under which all of these various projects come together. Joel has an MA in composition from Mills College in Oakland, CA where he studied with Fred Frith, Alvin Curran, and Pauline Oliveros. Active as a performer, Joel plays guitar in Jigsaw with cellist Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan and pedal steel guitar in Mire with electronic artist Elise Baldwin, guitarist William Collins, and drummer Seth Warren. 

Artists and programs subject to change.