Mark Trayle

Mark Trayle worked in a variety of media including live electronic music, installations, improvisation and compositions for wireless chamber ensembles. He used re-engineered consumer products and cultural artifacts as interfaces for electronic music performances and networked media installations. In recent pieces for chamber ensembles he placed performers in an interactive network where composers, performers and technology cooperate to form the music.

Trayle performed and exhibited at experimental music and new media venues and festivals in the U.S., Canada, and Europe including New Langton Arts (San Francisco, 1985 and 1989), LACE ( Los Angeles, 1989), Experimental Intermedia Foundation and The Kitchen (New York City, 1988 and 1989), Het Apollohuis (Eindhoven, Netherlands, 1993), the Centro d’Arte (Padova, Italy, 1995), Metrònom (Barcelona, 2000) and Mex (Dortmund, 2001). He was a featured performer at New Music America ’89, New Music Across America ’92, Ars Electronica ’94, WRO Media Festival ’95 (Wroclaw, Poland), SoundArt ’95 (Hannover, Germany), ISEA ’95 (Sixth International Symposium on Electronic Art), DEAF ’95 (Dutch Electronic Arts Festival, Rotterdam), the Sonambiente Festival (Berlin, 1996), Le Festival de la Vallée des Terres Blanches at the CICV Pierre Schaeffer (Hérimoncourt, France, 1997), Resistance Fluctuations (Los Angeles, 1998 and 2000), the net_condition festival (ZKM Karlsruhe, 1999), Pro Musica Nova (Bremen, 2000), and Format5 (Berlin 2001).

Trayle received grants from Arts International American Composers Forum, the National Endowment for the Arts, and a commission from Radio Bremen (Germany). He was an artist-in-residence at Mills College, STEIM (Amsterdam), and The Lab (San Francisco). Trayle collaborated with Wadada Leo Smith, Vinny Golia, Nels Cline, Jeff Gauthier, KammerEnsemble Neue Musik Berlin, David Behrman, and as a member of The Hub, with Alvin Curran and the Rova Saxophone Quartet.

Trayle’s music has been the subject of articles in Strumenti Musicali and Virtual (Italy), Keyboard (USA), and “Escape Velocity: Cyberculture at the End of the Century” (Grove/Atlantic), and he wrote articles for Leonardo Music Journal (US/UK) and MusikTexte (Germany). Trayle recorded for the Artifact, Atavistic, CRI, Inial, Los Angeles River, Elektra/Nonesuch, and Tzadik labels.

He died in 2015.