Eli Keszler

Eli Keszler, a composer and visual artist based in New York, has earned recognition for his innovative drumming methods along with expansive sound art installations. Drawing from free jazz improvisation together with hardcore punk and experimental noise, his percussive methods feature swift, hummingbird-like patterns as well as harsh, feedback-laden deconstructions. Recording since the mid-2000s, his catalog encompasses joint projects with Ashley Paul under the Aster duo name, Joe McPhee, and Oren Ambarchi, plus solo releases such as Cold Pin from 2011 and Stadium from 2018. Commissions have come from the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, ICE Ensemble, and So Percussion. Additional performance and recording work has involved David Grubbs, Laurel Halo, and Oneohtrix Point Never. His debut original film score, for the horror movie The Scary of Sixty-First, came out in 2021.

Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, Keszler took up drumming and composition prior to his teenage years. During high school he performed in hardcore bands, then completed studies at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. After relocating to New York City, he created performance installations frequently incorporating piano wire, motors, and pickups. Limited CDs began appearing on his own R.E.L Records imprint starting in 2006. The first vinyl outing, Livingston, arrived via Rare Youth in 2008. He launched the duos Aster with Ashley Paul and Red Horse with Steve Pyne, both delivering self-titled debuts in 2009. That same year also brought the solo CD Tilt.

Oxtirn, Keszler’s solo album, surfaced on ESP-Disk in 2010, followed by the live counterpart Oxtirn Live on R.E.L in 2011. That period also marked the unveiling of his large-scale installation Cold Pin along with a same-titled album on Pan. The label next put out Catching Net, a 2012 double CD compiling Cold Pin material plus a complete ensemble rendering of the work. Further 2012 releases included the live Joe McPhee collaboration Ithaca on 8mm Records and a split LP with Keith Fullerton Whitman on NNA Tapes. In 2013 Keszler joined the Iceland Symphony Orchestra for a performance at the Transmedial Festival.

Alps, his project with Oren Ambarchi, appeared on Dancing Wayang in 2014. During that year he toured the United States alongside engineer and sound artist Rashad Becker; the pair later performed together in Japan in 2016. Empty Editions issued the solo double-LP Last Signs of Speed in 2016. Keszler featured on Laurel Halo’s widely praised 2017 album Dust and toured with her as a duo the next year. He also joined Oneohtrix Point Never’s MYRIAD ensemble and contributed to the 2018 release Age Of. Shelter Press put out Stadium, Keszler’s most accessible solo album to date, that same year, then followed with the 2019 EP Empire.

Two 2018 live documents—a set with John Butcher at London’s Café Oto and a solo Stadium performance at New York’s Kitchen—both surfaced in 2021. Icons, his studio album, then arrived on LuckyMe, while the score for the horror-thriller The Scary of Sixty-First appeared digitally late that year. The single “The Vaulting Sky,” paired with a Kode9 remix of the Icons track “Static Doesn’t Exist,” emerged in 2022.