BAZANTAR :: a low end orchestra of trancendental sound

- BAZANTAR -
:: a low end orchestra of trancendental sound ::
Philzone.com interviews MARK DEUTSCH
Conducted 8/1/02 by R.Lucente. Forward compiled from www.bazantar.com.
Interview composed by R.Lucente. © 2002. All rights reserved. Philzone.com/2012 Productions.
*All photos copyright 2002. Jessica Millberg.

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Meet Mark Deutsch: a classically trained bassist with extensive experience in orchestral ensembles, sitar performance, jazz groups, and global folk traditions. Mark has invented a revolutionary new bass instrument called the Bazantar.
The Bazantar is a five-string acoustic bass, fitted with an additional twenty-nine sympathetic strings and four drone strings. The instrument possesses a melodic range of over five octaves, while its sympathetic range spans four octaves. His concentration on both the Bazantar and sitar culminated in 1999 with Mark being awarded a U.S. Patent for the Bazantar design in March and with the release of the composition 'Fool...' in May. In this solo project, he draws inspiration from the many diverse influences of his musical career, the concepts formed from his study of nonlinear math, and the philosophies learned through his experiences in life.

Join Philzone.com as we discuss with Mark Deutsch his masterful bass creation and his musical odyssey.
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Welcome to Philzone.com! We are a Web site that revolves around the universe of Mr. Phil Lesh. Not only is Phil an incredible bass player, but he's an adventurer, a seeker of cosmic truths and mysteries, so to speak. At Philzone.com, we are a portal to that space, so once we heard about your musical creation: BASS meets SITAR, we knew it was something for the ZONE. So, on that note, lets get started. Why don't you give us a little history on how you became a bass player and your path in music. What drew you to the bass?

I started out as a guitarist at the age of 9. All my friends played guitar and we wanted to start a band. I was like "I think maybe I'd like to play the bass", because nobody else played the bass. I, also, really liked the lowness of it; the visceralness and the rthymicness of the bass. Later on, I thought of other reasons why I liked the bass, but initially it was the sonic visceral quality of the bass. The bass sets up all of the harmonic changes that are going to happen musically, and also propels the rhythm along so I think it's a really interesting instrument to play. Now, I developed from being a bass player to being a Bazantar player and a sitar player and all kinds of other instruments, but I started with the electric bass.

So you started with the electric bass in your early youth? What about your path into highschool or college?

Well, I think when I was 10, I started playing in a little rock band with a bunch of kids. I had moved from one school to another and I didn't know anybody so I was really keen on doing something so that I could meet people and make some friends. Plus I just loved music; music just blew my mind when I was a kid. I had no comprehension of what was going on, but it just seemed like ultimate magic - to play these instruments and make these incredibly emotional sounds, I just loved it. But when I was 12, my dad was a musician, he was an artist and a musician, and he started a band with my uncle. It was a wedding band, but they played all kinds of music. I was like the little trained seal I guess, this little kid, like "Lets watch the kid play all these different instruments", banjo, saxophone, trombone, and bass and guitar. It was an amazing education.

At what point did you transition from electric bass to classical style bass?

When I was 18 or 19. I was really set up to be a jazz musician, an avante garde, funk jazz player. I was a really proficient electric bass player. I was listening to Jaco Pastorius, Stanley Clark, and Chris Squire, all these guys back then.

Well, for electric bass, I was listening to Jaco Pastorius, Alphonso Johnson with Weather Report, and Jack Bruce from Cream. I really loved Phil Lesh's playing on the song Sugar Magnolia. For acoustic bass, I was listening to Miroslav Vitous, Fernando Saunders, Ralph Armstrong, Scott LeFaro, Charlie Haden, and Mingus. Some other non-bass players, but big influences were Charlie Parker, Yo Yo Ma, and Pablo Casals (cellist).

I was playing a fretless 4-string at the time. Now I play a hand made fretless 6-string, which is just my dream for an electric bass. I designed the instrument and had couple friends of mine make it; it's just incredibly beautiful.

I got into classical music by sleeping in the afternoon to Chopin. At first, I thought classical music was really boring, you know all scales and arpeggios was all I could hear. I was pretty arrogant, a kid you know. At a certain point, I was like jazz is the only thing that's good, you know - a sort of jazz elitist, because that's what I was around. Everyone that I was around had that competitive jazz elitist mentality. But I was also suspicious of that, in some sort of subconscious way. All of my friends were going off to study jazz at the Boston Berklee School of Music. I totally did a complete 180 and I caught a lot of grief for that. I didn't know how to play acoustic bass and I figured if I was going to play jazz then I wanted to be able to play acoustic bass. But then I was also really starting to hear this thing that was going on in classical music. This sort of cosmic panoramic beautiful, you know colors and scapes of sound and stuff. So I went and studied classical music not knowing anything. I started playing acoustic bass.

Yes, a stand up bass. I was pretty insane because I started practicing 8 and 10 hours a day.

At first I went to this school, it's called Truman State University now, it was North East Missouri State then and not a great place. I went there for a year and half. Then I met the principle bass player in the St. Louis Symphony, Henry Loew, whom my album is dedicated to. I was studying cello and bass and of course I was playing electric bass because I was good at that. He had come in to do a Master class at the Symphony and I couldn't really play, I mean I knew I couldn't play because I could really play electric bass so I knew the difference between not being able to play and not having your act together. So nobody would play for him, everybody was too shy, too uptight to play for him. I said, "I'll play for you man, I mean you're the principle bass player and all. I'll try to learn something". And he really liked me and he took me out to lunch and talked to me, I was super broke, and he basically told me "Leave this place. If you don't have any money, don't worry about it. I'll teach you for free and I'll get you into the Conservatory".

He sort of conned me into the Conservatory (St. Louis Conservatory of Music) because I didn't know much. He ran the audition and I knew 2 pieces really well and that's about all I knew. I didn't really know how to read music very well or follow a conductor or all the things you're supposed to come into the Conservatory knowing. He ran the audition, because he was the big cat in the Symphony and I got the scholarship, I really owe a lot to him, he was really cool.

That's fantastic. So, now you were fully initiated to playing the upright, correct?

Did you find the transition from the electric to the upright difficult, the patterns and scales? Do you finger the upright or did you use a bow?

I was using a bow and I was also using my fingers. I was also playing jazz on it because that was what my experience was. I also have a lot of experience playing funk and all kinds of styles, because I played all kinds of styles in my dad's band when I was a kid. But I was now focusing on classical music, which is using a bow and it was a completely different world then the way you finger an upright bass. The way I was taught especially is not the same as the way you finger electrics. Actually, I had put my electrics away and didn't pick them up for about 6 years.

So at that point you became a student, where did you take it from after your studies?

Well, I went on and off. I'd go and study classical music and then I'd stop and play jazz or play the acoustic bass. I went for 2 years, then I quit for 2 years, and then I went for 2 years, quit for a year, a decade through school. So I was bouncing from playing jazz to classical music. Then I came back to electric bass and got into a lot of funk and stuff like that, which I really really enjoyed. Then I ended up being blown away by Indian music, and just went out and got a sitar!

No, I didn't abandon the bass. But I was at some party and I was in some neurotic stage at the time where I didn't feel like I could communicate or whatever, you know feeling uptight. I went into this room, like a sunroom or something, and there was nobody in there and there was this, well it actually wasn't a sitar, but it was a surbahar, which is a bass sitar.

Yeah, there was this CD playing, a guy named (Ustad) Imrat Khan who ended up like 6 years later being my teacher.

It was interesting. So, I went in there, you know, I was just chilling, and this music was playing, I wasn't really listening to it, then after awhile I started listening to it. It was super slow, majestic, incredibly cosmic. I mean incredibly, beautifully, cosmic, majestic sonic sculpting. Then I realized, this guy only played 5 notes the whole time! 5 different notes, not a lot of notes, but he was just playing pentatonic scale and it scared the shit out of me, because at the time I was playing avante garde classical music, very complex intellectual stuff, and this really intense free jazz, avante garde jazz too, explorative stuff, you know where you're playing all these notes all the time. Now, I was hearing this music that was in some ways really simple, and in some ways incredibly complex, and I was like "Wow, I am no where close to that stuff" and I loved it, I thought it was just incredibly beautiful. But it terrified me to think "Could I play that slowly and keep it so mesmerizing"? So, I went out and bought a sitar.

I was going to make a point that in Indian classical music, I was going to say there isn't really much of a bass type instrument, but now that you mention that…

Well, even the surbahar, compared to a Bazantar, sonically is much much thinner. It really doesn't have that earth moving quality. And I was just like you said just now, that Indian instruments don't have a bass instrument.

Right, the low drone on the tabla has that characteristic (mimics the sound), very hip, very very hip, tablas are amazing.

Well, I taught myself how to play sitar, which people just don't believe, and I ended up with some really unique techniques, which I really treasure.

Well, (laughs) not in the beginning. In the beginning I think I got some little Ravi Shankar book that told you how to tune it or something.

Yeah, you can give me any stringed instrument and I can start playing it reasonably well within a few moments, it's pretty much the same logic. What's different about it is it's just a different translation of logic. Since I play a lot of different stringed instruments, I'm used to making those transitions.

Now, during your period of sitar playing, did you keep playing the bass on the side as well?

There was a period in my life where I remember after a month of gigging, this was when I had already graduated and I was a gigging musician, I'd look back at this month and realize I just played some classical gigs, some jazz gigs, some blues gigs, some free jazz jam gigs, some free avante garde stuff, and a couple of solo sitar gigs. There was a point there, quite a few years actually, where I was gigging in almost every style all the time.

Well, yeah it was cool, but when I started to make the Bazantar, I would have a different string arrangement, different kind of strings, for a classical gig on my acoustic bass and then I'd have another set of strings, different arrangement for my jazz gigs and then I would have the whole Bazantar thing. So, I spent a huge portion of my life restringing and disassembling the Bazantar from, the prototype Bazantar actually, my instrument. After a couple years of that it got to be really tedious.

I can imagine. Well, now that we arrived at the point of Bazantar, let's jump on in. The Bazantar…quite an impressive instrument!

I'm sure the story is quite interesting. If you could tell us how you conceived of this instrument?

You want to know how it came up? Well, there's how it came up and also how the design came up.

Well, I had met Imrat Khan, he was my sitar teacher. I started studying with him, so I was really studying the sitar, plus I was doing all my other gigs just to make a living, and teaching and all that. So, he was under the belief that it would take a Western mind a really long time to learn, what's called in Indian music the 'sruties', and the sruties are these very fine, subtle variations in pitch. I wasn't too crazy about having it take me 20 years to learn these, I didn't think that was too cool. That was kind of his Indian belief of Western sensibilities. So I did 2 things, one thing was I just figured out mathematically what the sruties were and put them into a tuning computer and then learned them from that, but the other thing I did was play Indian music all night long in my sleep.

Yeah, I would take a CD and I would just put it on auto reverse. I particularly liked using Sarangi music, which is an indigenous bowed Indian instrument, which is one of my favorite instruments in the world. It's just an amazingly haunting and beautiful instrument. It was taboo to play it in public for years, because it was played in the bordellos and whorehouses in India. It was only in the last 50 years or so that these 2 guys, I can't remember their names, these 2 Indian cats, brought it into the classical realm. Anyhow, I was listening to one of these guys, and I was playing this CD in my sleep and I was dreaming. As I was dreaming, I was hearing the music, but I was playing my bass and since it was a dream I just put sympathetic strings on my bass and I was playing the music that I was hearing. I was hearing it over and over again.

Sympathetic strings are the extra strings, well, the Bazantar has 3 different kinds of strings. It has the main strings, which are like strings on a bass, my bass happens to be a 5-string bass, so it has the 5 main strings, normally on a bass it would be 4, but mine has 5. Then it has 4 extra drone strings, which in Indian music are called 'chakari' strings. Those are the strings I strike and keep rhythm with and they sit off to the side, but they can be struck, they're like drone strings. Then, the Bazantar has 29 sympathetics. The sympathetic strings are what make an Indian instrument distinct, that's the thing that's most characteristic about a sitar or sarode, these extra strings. Say when you pluck a note, say the note you are playing on the instrument, this other note, you'll hear your initial note, which will be like 'dung', then you'll hear the 'dung, neeeaarrrrone' (mimics sympathetic sound), and that rising up of that other sound comes from the sympathetic strings.

Yeah, the drone strings are meant to be plucked as a rhythmic kind of, well a sitar has drone strings on it also, but the Bazantar has drone strings too. The sympathetic strings are not normally plucked; they normally vibrate in sympathy to whatever you are playing. The trick is you have to play perfectly in tune.

If you don't play in tune, they don't really do anything, so that's the key. The Bazantar has 4 octaves of sympathetics. You've heard the Bazantar right?

Absolutely, I saw you do one stroke with the bow on it and in that one stroke, I don't think I've ever heard that much resonance and tone!

Right, the Bazantar actually does it to much greater degree then other Indian instruments, and that has to do with why I have a patent.

Well, similar in concept, not similar in mechanics. I put sympathetic strings on and what I saw in the dream was pretty much what the first prototype was like.

No, I awoke the next day and I walked around going "What was that article I read about bass sympathetic strings"? It was really getting on my nerves. I did this for like 2 or 3 days, I mean you know I wasn't thinking about it all the time, but it was in the back of my mind, I had no conception of it being a dream. The only way I remembered the dream, it was another night like 2 or 3 nights later, I put the same CD on. And when I put the CD on it was like the whole dream was downloaded very clearly into my mind, and I went "OH, it was a dream"! The whole dream came back to me very clearly.

You know it was, but it wasn't like I immediately said "Bass sympathetic strings = Bazantar, OK this is something I'm going to do and it's going to be this great thing". It took me 6 months to even get the nerve up to consider altering my bass.

Was it something that during those 6 months kept coming back to you like, "What is it about this dream"?

I think it probably did, but I have a hard time really remembering. Well there's a lot of barriers, psychological and social, to altering an instrument. I have had a lot of people be very unhappy that I had the audacity to change a classical bass and turn it into a Bazantar. No matter what this thing sounds like they just don't like the idea.

Interesting, was there on the flip side too from the Indian perspective?
I know how they consider instruments.

Like "Holy Moses, what is this"? (laughs) Especially when people are able to hear it. If they hear it live, then they realize it's not some sort of trick.

I've had a lot of people in the International Bass Society who could not wrap their head around the idea that it was one instrument. I remember sending my demo CD of the prototype to them and I told them very specifically that it was a live, not overdubbed, recording. But still, when I talked to them over the phone they were like "Well, your bass playing is really nice, but what are those other instruments in the background"?

I lost my patience, which is not the coolest thing to do, I'm like "That's the thing I made"! and they…

Well, initially they said, "Well you can come to the Convention" just like any other joker who's paying for a ticket, but they wouldn't have me. I don't know, I made myself known.

Nice, so in that 6 months you got the nerve up to even consider making a prototype?

Yeah, then I went with my intuition and built the first prototype, which really didn't work at all. There were some real good reasons why it didn't work that I didn't understand yet.

I made this sort of tongue, this long piece of wood that had a bunch of tuners on it, and then I fashioned a bridge between the feet of the bass bridge. You know there's that big arc, I stuck another bridge in between there, I thought that was a really cool, brilliant idea. So I did that, and then had this thing that looked like it was out of Hellraiser or something, this contraption of fine tuners, fishing weights, I experimented with so much stuff, I became so obsessed. It was great because I learned a whole lot, but there was one really good reason why it didn't work and that was because of what's called 'leakage of energy' basically. I didn't understand how that worked on an instrument, but I had to figure that out. One thing that I luckily didn't do was start studying instrument-making books, but I started studying physics. If I would have started studying instrument-making books, I would have come up with a more traditional design, a different design, but I wouldn't have come up with this totally radical, really unique design.

So was it after you started the prototype that you actually studied physics?

I have always been really interested in physics, I've studied Buddhism and Taoism and all these other spiritual practices which are very interesting to me also. So I have studied all these different books, 'The Dancing Wu Li Masters', 'Holographic Universe', all these esoteric physics things I just find really really interesting. I just dig it and that gave me some interesting background. But then I had to really get into the Bazantar and how to get physically what I wanted the instrument to do out of the instrument. So I started looking deeper into just how is sound generated, what makes sound not translate. What I was doing was, I could get the strings to vibrate, but I couldn't get them to be very loud, so that's what I was struggling with. I could talk a little more about that, but it can get pretty technical.

Well, in the interest of time, lets move along. How many prototypes did you go through?

Well, I went through, one totally built prototype that didn't do it. Then I started on the second prototype and I was in the middle of working on that and I was really exhausted. I was exhausted emotionally, physically, and mentally. I had a lot of people telling me I was really crazy, good friends of mine, kind of doing an intervention, "Hey man, you've lost it. What are you doing? What do you think you're doing? You're crazy". And I wasn't really getting what I wanted. I was frustrated and I ended up just being exhausted and sitting in my apartment on my bed just looking at the instrument. I don't know if you ever stared at something for a really long period of time and if you keep staring at it, it gets these weird auras around it. Have you ever done that?

Yeah, so if you keep staring at it, I used to do this when I was a kid, looking in a mirror, I don't know why I did it, but it was pretty cool, pretty freaky, pretty bizarre.

Yeah, I had this full length mirror that if you opened my closet door you could sit on my bed and look at it. And all this amazing stuff would happen, at a certain point, you would even disappear.

Yes, very interesting. But I wasn't doing that, thinking, "Oh, I'm going to figure out how to make a Bazantar", but I was doing it because I was just exhausted and I was just doing it, not thinking at all. I was doing it for a really long period of time, I don't know if you ever get in like a catatonic state, when you're just totally frustrated and exhausted?

Yeah, and I wasn't even moving or anything, just sitting and, it was cool because the Bazantar started blinking in and out of my vision, I don't know what that means, but it was really hip.

No, I was kind of sitting across the room. I had a pretty small apartment. I had all my tools and everything and all of the sudden, I think it's called a 'thought ball' or a 'fuge state' or whatever, and the entire design landed in my mind at one point, just BOOM, the whole thing! This is exactly what I needed to do, "I need to make a rigid housing that holds all the tensions, translated onto the instrument, so the energy is driven into the instrument, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…" I knew it was it.

Yeah, it was this critical mass thing. All this stuff I had studied that had not connected at all. I had been trying to go on all these traditional ideas, this sort of, well this is what you do, you string the strings to the instrument, which all the extra strings are strung to the body of the instrument.

Yeah, the math and this one thing that I had to figure out was that I don't string the strings to the body of the instrument, I string them to this other housing.

That's the patent, or the genius or whatever. So all the tension is held within this other housing, and then I load that housing on to the instrument, so none of its tension is translated.

Yeah, but it did more then that, because I could have plugged the leak by still stringing the strings to the instrument, it did more then that. It plugged the leak and relieved the instrument of tons of stress, so I can load up so much energy into the instrument without stressing the instrument. That's why the Bazantar has so much more volume and has those really low sympathetic strings that sound like a tambora and that all came at one moment. Then I was very excited and wanted to go out and tell everybody. So I went out and started telling people this new design I had and everyone rolled their eyes and I was like "No way"! Then I got really mad; I was like "No, no, you don't understand, this will REALLY work"! I took it to different instrument makers and they were like, "Get out of my face, get away from me, you crazy guy". Finally, I took it to, well, pretty much a maniac, I mean I say that in the most respectful terms.

Is this because to put the casing part into it, you needed a more technical craftsman?

Yeah, well, I wanted to have somebody, who wasn't me, say "Yeah, we think it's a great idea, we think it's going to work".

Yes, because it's so much work to build. I knew what it would entail; building this whole other thing with all these tensions…I mean I'm a musician, I haven't spent my life building stuff and I was just trying to go around, checking stuff out. I met this guy, Hal Zental, and he was like, "Mark, that's crazy". He was this guy that worked on sonar for submarines or something, but he was a total freak, totally cool and I was just like "Please, just tell me why. Come back and tell me why it won't work". And he came back in a week or two, and said, "It will totally work. Totally, great idea"! He was like a real technical math cat, and just a real expansive kind of crazy thinker and we built the prototype Bazantar together in St. Louis. The initial prototype was made out of maple wood, it was very rough, I still have it.

I went to a patent attorney and went through 3 years of what it takes to get a patent, which seems awfully beaurocratic, seems like you're against Big Brother, the Machine. The patent experience was pretty interesting; they sent me 300 years of instruments I was just supposed to look at. I got to look at all these other instruments that people had added extra strings to. They refused my patent, but everybody told me they'd refuse my patent the first time so don't get excited. I got excited anyhow, I got pissed. They refused my patent for 2 of the most obtuse reasons I could even think of. My patent attorney said they refuse every patent the first time, so she was ready to refile for it and I got the patent.

Congratulations! That must have been some feeling at the time. What year was that?

No, I had been applying for the patent since the first successful prototype, so it took 3 years to get the patent finalized. But the Bazantar, that I play now, was finished in October of 1997, I think.

A lot of different projects. First, I just started practicing the instrument all the time pulling out all these new techniques. There are these techniques for playing it that are like nothing I've ever done on a bass and are really cool and it was really cool to "invent" them.

Oh yeah, I guess now you have the instrument and you have to also actually develop the technique for it?

Yeah, these techniques are wild, so I wanted to start recording and put a CD out pretty quickly, because you know, here's this new instrument and you want people to hear it, so let's make a CD. So, I pretty much, for the first year, practiced and recorded solo, which is what my CD, "Fool", is. The CD is interesting because a lot of the things I do in the CD I had just figured out how to do. It's cool because they are really fresh, real fresh techniques. I was somehow able to download them into my neurology really fast just because I really wanted to.

I pluck it as much as I bow and I think it's much different sounding, it has much different character bowed then it does plucked.

Where would you like to see the evolution of the Bazantar go, what kind of plans do you have in store for it?

Well, today I was talking to someone about making cello Bazantars, which is a smaller version based off a cello. That's one thing I am really interested in doing. But building and making this instrument totally cashed me out financially, that's why people were getting kind of worried because it took everything I had. So now I am trying to find venture capital to promote the instrument. I don't have the funds to make the cello Bazantar, but I have the prototype, which allows me to sell the ideas I have.

Hmmmm, you were asking me about the kind of styles I played…well, I've played with a lot of jazz artists, which is just really interesting. There's a live recording out with a DJ, an electronic musician, and this totally freaked out saxophone player.

And I'm playing both my fretless, the 6-string and the Bazantar. So I've been playing it over a bunch of funk grooves, trance grooves and stuff.

That comes from a thing that I organized in St. Louis called "Massamalgam". Massamalgam is an organization that I started where I would bring all these musicians together and my idea was not a lot of rehearsal, maybe no rehearsal, a little bit of talk, and put these musicians in a position where they could be really comfortable and play successful. This improvisational event.

Yeah, really successful and I have had a lot of concerts recorded. So that was one of those concerts, it was actually the first one. I'm doing one in August, which I'm really excited about. I have this trumpet player from New York, Roy Campbelll, who's just a GREAT trumpet player. Then, I have a Chinese violinist who's the principle violinist with the Peking Symphony. Her name's Yang Yin, she plays a 2-string, not sure if I'm saying it right, but it's like the "Erhu". But she's great, and then I have a friend of mine I met in San Francisco, Diana Tremble, a vocalist, she's amazing. I can just sit and play with her and she'll go wherever I go, we just have this really nice relationship.

And there's an incredible drummer, Gary Sykes, in St. Louis I used to play with, he's totally telepathic, he freaks me out.

I used to have him and me as the rhythm section for 3 completely different bands that I was running. I had a jazz quintet, a mo-town funk blues thing, and this acoustic rock thing. He's my buddy, and he's going to be there, he's right there.

A place called the Galaxy in St. Louis. Now that I'm living in San Francisco, I'm driving across the country doing gigs.

No, no, no…I just messed with it big time. It's a banjo, but it sounds like Appalachian meets the Ganges.

I've been messing with that ever since the very first night I showed up in San Francisco and drank too much tequila. Someone kept bugging me about playing the banjo, which harkens back to my days as the trained seal in my dad's band, and I didn't like playing banjo because we were playing Dixieland, I mean Dixieland's fine but…

Yeah, I woke up in the morning with this banjo sitting in my hands after drinking all this tequila and I just started messing with it, messing with the strings, then I messed with the tuning, I messed with the whole thing. It's become an instrument that….that I like! (laughs) I took it to Burning Man. I went to Burning Man and was playing banjo the whole time.

I think it's going to stick! Well, hey that ensemble sounds real exciting, are you going to be doing any other gigs with them?

Well, I put these ensembles together. I'm working with Diana here in San Francisco, and I'm working with Roy in New York. I'm doing a bunch of gigs when I'm with Roy in New York City and then Yang Yin, I did some stuff with in Chicago and Champaign. This chick is amazing, I think the first time she ever really improvised was the first time I played with her, or she had just started to improvise and I was so blown away. I mean so passionate, so great, and she had a great time. The Massamalgam thing is always me converging a bunch of people together and trying to get them to do what they do very best and having the environment that really is supportive of that. We'll go anywhere from nasty funk, to super ambient.

Yeah, supposed to leave on Monday, maybe not until Tuesday, but that's the plan.

We look forward to seeing you on the East Coast. Thanks a lot for taking the time to speak with us, we appreciate it!

It's such an incredible instrument that you've invented.
We wish you best of luck with it!

LISTEN to tracks from 'Fool...' > >
The Painted Bird :: stream | download (shift.click)
(First Movement of Eight) 13.51mins

Avodah :: stream | download (shift.click)
(Fifth Movement of Eight) *sample only - 6.47mins

Order 'Fool...' Now - Deutsch's first CD to showcase the Bazantar.
More info.

Don't miss Mark Deutsch on tour playing Bazantar, bass,
and sitar in a variety of exciting ensembles >>

Friday Sept 6th : Philadelphia, PA
North 3rd Tavern @ 3rd and Poplar St : 9:30 pm
featured performers:
Mark Deutsch: Bazantar, bass
Elliot Levin: saxophone, flute
Jason Finkelman: berimbau, percussion
John Wieczorek: percussion
Charles Cohen: Buchla music easel

Thursday Sept 12th : NY, NY
"Massamalgam New York"
Merkin Hall : 129 West 67th Street
Box office 212.501.3330 : Concert info 212.627.0990
Compositions by:
JD Parran: clarinet, saxophone, flute
Mark Deutsch: Bazantar, sitar
David Darling: cello
Kevin Norton: drums, percussion
Joseph Kubera: piano
Thomas Buckner: vocals
http://www.interpretations.info

Sunday Sept 15th : Woodstock, NY
Colony Café : Rock City Rd : 8pm : $12
featured performers:
Roy Cambell, Jr: trumpet, flute
Mark Deutsch: Bazantar, sitar, bass
Jason Finkelman: berimbau, percussion
Steve Gorn: bansuri flutes, soprano sax
John Wieczorek: tablas, frame drums
Geoff Gersh: electric guitar
Charles Cohen: Buchla music easel
http://www.creativemusicstudio.org

Wednesday Sept 18th : NY, NY
CBGB's Gallery : 313 Bowery (north of Bleeker St)
212.677.0455 or 917.656.1587
http://www.cbgb.com

Thursday Sept 19 : Philly, PA
Roy Campbell's Pyramid Trio
w/ Special Guest Mark Deutsch
more info soon...

Sunday Sept 29th : Sleepyhollow, NY
"Po'Jazz"
Hudson Valley Writers Center
300 Riverside Dr : 914.332.5959
3:15pm (doors open 12:30) : $10 members : $12 non-members
featuring:
Mark Deutsch: Bazantar, sitar
JD Parran: saxophone, clarinet, flute
Vijay Ayre: piano
http://www.writerscenter.org

Friday Oct 11th : St Louis, MO
Unity Christ Church : morning performance
more info to come ...

Saturday Oct 12th : St Louis, MO
MacroSun International
Webster Store : 8165 Big Bend Blvd
314.961.9595 : 3-5pm
*Solo Bazantar, Sitar
http://www.macrosun.com

Sunday Oct 13th : Clayton, MO
Living Insight Center : 6361 Clayton Rd
314.721.4457 : 7-9:30pm : $25.00
Cost includes concert and lecture
http://www.livinginsights.com

Wednesday Oct 16th : Champagne, IL
The High Dive : 51 Main St
9pm-12am : $5 door only
featuring:
Jason Finkelman's Nu Orbit Ensemble
with Special guest Mark Deutsch on the Bazantar
http://www.thehighdive.com

Saturday Oct 19th : St Louis, MO - C A N C E L E D
Galaxy : 1227 Washington Ave : 314.231.2404

Thursday Oct 24th : Boulder, CO Boulder
Museum of Contemporary Art : 1750 13th St
303.443.2122 : 7pm : $5 museum member / $7 non-member
*Solo Bazantar
http://www.bmoca.org

Friday Oct 25th : Nederland, CO
Acoustic Coffee House : 95 East First St : 313.258.3209
8PM : $12.00

Saturday Oct 26th : Boulder, CO
Chautauqua Festival
Chautauqua Community House : Morning Glory Drive
303.442.3282 ext 10 : 7:30pm
http://www.chautauqua.com

Sunday, October 27 : Denver, CO
Up Close Avant Series
Stella's Coffee House : 1476 S. Pearl St.
More information: 303.759.1797
or visit www.creativemusicworks.org

For more info on MARK DEUTSCH and the BAZANTAR, please visit www.bazantar.com.

A VERY special thanks to Christy Silness and Jeff Hirsch,
and to Mark Deutsch for speaking with us!