Be The Sky

Tenzin Choegyal is one of the world’s finest musicians in the Tibetan tradition. As a son of Tibetan nomads, he feels a particular connection to the music of the high Himalayan plateau.

In a career spanning 20+ years Tenzin has performed at festivals across Australia and curated numerous events and concerts including Brisbane’s annual Festival of Tibet. Internationally he has performed in New Zealand, Japan, India, Germany, Bangladesh, Russia and USA, including performances at New York’s Carnegie Hall. He has also opened many of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Public Talks in Australia, New Zealand and Japan with his musical offerings.

While proudly continuing the unbroken nomadic lineage which is central to his repertoire, Tenzin also embraces opportunities to take his music into more contemporary, uncharted territory, both in the studio and on stage.

Tenzin has nine independent albums, three of them with his fusion band Tibet2Timbuk2, and regularly performs with Camerata Brisbane’s acclaimed Chamber Orchestra. His collaborative albums include The Last Dalai Lama?with Philip Glass, Peradam album by Soundwalk Collective with Patti Smith featuring Anoushka Shankar & Charlotte Gainsbourh and the 2021 Grammy-nominated Songs from the Bardo released through Smithsonian Folkways with his longtime friend and collaborator Jesse Paris Smith and Laurie Anderson – a moving interpretation of the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

An outstanding composer/ performer with a great depth of musical knowledge, intuition and inventiveness, Tenzin continues to bring new sounds of Tibet while strongly holding the essence of ancient Tibetan wisdom. He attributes his art form to the early karmic imprints of hearing his mother and father as a toddler.

Tenzin Choegyal is currently working on a few new music projects and a new album “Dear Ama la” with one of Australia’s finest Camerata Chamber Orchestra.

Alex Ring Gray is a composer, performer, and producer working in concert, film, and electronic musics. His work is both process-oriented and improvisational, blending roots in the traditions of free jazz, minimalism, ambient, and Appalachian folk. As a multi-instrumentalist, he has performed and recorded with artists such as Philip Glass, Attacca Quartet, Scorchio Quartet, and Tenzin Choegyal, and has appeared at Carnegie Hall and Big Ears Festival.

In addition to his own creative output, Alex is an active producer and engineer. He is a co-founder of cmntx records and Technical Director of InfraSound Ensemble. Since 2018, a main engagement has been working for Philip Glass, currently serving as his music assistant and production manager. He has also worked in varying music production & preparation capacities for composers Nico Muhly, Angélica Negrón, and Alex Weston, among others, and as concert & playback engineer for several artists.

Vanessa Tomlinson is an internationally significant musician and academic leader. She works at the intersection of music interpretation, improvisation and composition seeking new artistic platforms to share ideas around listening, ecological change, place and curiosity. As a percussionist she has been touring the world for 35 years, premiering works, collaborating with musicians and working across artforms.

As a composer she focuses on conceptual, speculative text-based compositions, large-scale sonic gatherings and exploring the sounds of everyday objects. As a curator she makes events in improbable locations from rockfaces, to bushland, gathering people in place and activating audiences toward deep listening. Vanessa has won 7 Art Music Awards, 2 Green Room Awards, an Australian Council Project Fellowship, been artist in residence at the Smithsonian Institute, received an Asialink residency, worked extensively in Sichuan province of China, released multiple albums, received a Doctorate from University of California, San Diego, and is currently Director of Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University in Australia.