We are pleased to announce Fred Moten & Brandon López in concert > Thursday 21.05.2026
Fred Moten and Brandon López make incendiary music for a burning world. Their infamous live shows explore a propulsive, relentless, and massively energetic large-scale developing form.Inimitable poet and cultural theorist Fred Moten creates new conceptual spaces that accommodate emergent forms of Black cultural production, aesthetics, and social life. New York-
based composer and bassist Brandon López engages with work, improvisation, and finding new modalities and sonic possibilities on the double bass. Together as a duo, they concern themselves with the necessity for improvisation of navigating the ascending reign of long-
institutionalized madness while simultaneously keeping humanity and sanity intact. In 2025, their synergistic mesh in duo was presented on record for the first time on ‘Revision’ (TAO Forms), following two acclaimed works on the Reading Group label in trio with Gerald Cleaver.
Fred Moten is a poet, cultural theorist, author, and 2020 MacArthur Fellow. Moten is a professor of
performance studies and comparative literature at New York University.
Brandon López is a bassist, composer, and improviser living in New York City. In 2025, ‘Downbeat’ Critics Poll named him Rising Star Bassist of the Year. In 2019, he was a featured soloist at the New York Philharmonic.
The performance at West Den Haag will mark the duo’s premiere in The Netherlands.
Live Concert
Fred Moten: texts, voice
Brandon López: bass
We are delighted to share this first announcement — the full program will follow soon.
Thursday 21.05.2026, 20:00
Location: West Den Haag, former US ambassy
Lange Voorhout 102 Den Haag
Ticket: 15 euro
Reserve your ticket now: link in bio
Photo by @juliadratel@bantlopez@fredmoten@westdenhaag
#improvisation
#freejazz
#doublebassplayer
#art
#poetry
Searching for comprehensive lessons on the composition of improvisation? Bass technique feeling stale or painful? Inquire here, and we’ll work.
Photo by the @juliadratel
#doublebassists #lessons #arco #outside #improvisation
P.I.T. is psyched and honored to host the birthday show for the compa Brandon Lopez. It’ll be a deep hang with deep sounds. Sunday 5/24 6pm doors. Hope to see you 🏴❤️🏴❤️
@bantlopez
Muchas gracias a todos los que asistieron al primer encuentro de Movimientos Aberrantes. Gracias a los artistas que intervinieron, a su apertura. Esperamos haya sido un potente y bonito diálogo entre el escucha y la improvisación lúdica.
Nos vemos en el siguiente movimiento.
Acá una recopilación de imágenes de lo que sucedió.
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#movimientosaberrantes #fredmoten #brandonlopez #spokenword #improvisation
As part of Craft 1o1 2026 by Arts Letters & Numbers, Brandon López will lead “Probabilities, Uncertainties, Intuit / The Praxis of Improvisation,” taking place July 5–21 on the Averill Park campus.
This class explores the shifting modalities of improvisation through collective experimentation, listening, and intuitive response. Grounded in López’s approach to rhythm, collaboration, and ensemble practice, the workshop opens a space for participants to investigate improvisation as both a musical method and a broader artistic praxis.
Craft 1o1 is Arts Letters & Numbers’ interdisciplinary model of education, bringing together over twenty workshops, intensives, and gatherings between July 1 and August 30 through an ethos of listening, mentorship, collaboration, and cross-disciplinary exchange.
Explore all programs through the link in our bio. Applications: June 15th!
THE AGONIES OF LÓPEZ — spray paint/rust paint on butcher paper..
my love and admiration for the work of @bantlopez can never be understated, and this merging with poet and scholar Fred Moten and legendary drummer Gerald Cleaver is an astonishing effort in a career full of them.. López and Cleaver slide in and out of primitivist beats and warped pulses, and lock in with Moten into a perfect cadence, a private syntax.. these words are such a deftly vexed and awe-inspiring interrogation of art’s complicity in upholding racial structures.. but even without the context of Moten documenting and skewering the wreck of our shared history, the album would feel like a perfect aesthetic moment - angry, nimble and tense, three people in a symbiotic convergence.. amazing.. released in ‘22 by @relativepitchrecords
dm for album art comms.. follow @s_o_r_g_e
#brandonlopez #fredmoten #geraldcleaver #poetry #primitivism
Brandon López (NYC), compositor y contrabajista. Su obra se centra en la improvisación y en la exploración de nuevas posibilidades sonoras con el contrabajo. Ha colaborado con artistas como Gerald Cleaver, John Zorn, The Mat Maneri Quartet, “knknighgh” de Nate Wooley, Satoko Fuji, Zeena Parkins, Ingrid Laubrock y Tom Rainey, Standing On The Corner, Cecilia Lopez, Ash Fure, Joe Morris, Tyshawn Sorey y muchos otros.
Próximo 8 de mayo junto con Fred Moten.
Preventa, link en bio.
Gracias por la imágenes grabadas en @noideafestival 2025 por @rhizomesfilms
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#improvisation #brandonlopez #freejazz #doublebassplayer #art
