Skip to main content
Skip to main content
Updated 4/6/2022

Ghost Ensemble

  • M

    MA

Institution/Business Type: Performing Group

Ghost Ensemble is dedicated to new experimental music that explores the act of listening, expands perceptual horizons, and encourages a common immersive experience, demonstrating its potential for individual and community transformation. Collaboration with living composers is the ensemble's primary focus. Rethinking the norms of composer/performer interaction, Ghost Ensemble begins by meeting and improvising with each composer, developing new works over time through exploratory workshop sessions. Through this process, we nurture truly innovative music that would not be possible otherwise. Since 2012, Ghost has premiered 29 such works by a diverse range of composers.

The works and Deep Listening practice of Pauline Oliveros are also central to the ensemble's identity. The ensemble's direct collaborations with Oliveros included the 2013 New York release event for her Anthology of Text Scores; since the composer's passing in 2016, Ghost has aimed to perform and record many of her less well known works. Ghost Ensemble's approach is well expressed by Oliveros's Imaginary Meditations: "Can you imagine listening beyond the edge of your imagination?"

In 2018, Ghost Ensemble released debut LP We Who Walk Again, featuring works by Sky Macklay, Pauline Oliveros, and Ben Richter. Critics hail Ghost’s music as “prodigious … a thrilling listen”, “wonderful work … both exhilarating and a bit scary”, “beautifully performed … a body-felt sound mass … evoking the primeval“, and “cloudy, mysterious, and dark … Beckettian in its slow spread … certainly a group to keep an eye on”.

Find Me

Ben Richter
Job Title: Director
Address:
Amherst, MA 01002

Additional Content:

About

Overview

Institution/Business Type:

Performing Group

Legal Status:

Nonprofit - Independent

Year Founded:

2012

Overview

Institution/Business Type:

Performing Group

Legal Status:

Nonprofit - Independent

Year Founded:

2012

Disciplines

Primary Discipline:

Music - New

Additional Disciplines:

  • Music - Opera

Activities and Services

Activities and Services:

  • Creation of a Work of Art (Including Commissions)
  • Workshops / Demonstrations / Master Class
  • Performance / Concert / Reading
Seasons Active: spring, summer, fall, winter
Events Per Year: 9

Communities

Populations Engaged:

  • General Public

Languages Available:

  • French
  • German
  • Spanish

Geographic Reach:

  • International

Media Gallery

I Have Worked With

Affiliations and Accomplishments

Professional Associations

Professional Associations:

  • Chamber Music America

Professional Associations

Professional Associations:

  • Chamber Music America

Awards

Awards:

  • Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation Grant-In-Aid, 2021
  • Chamber Music America Classical Commissioning Grant, 2021
  • Aaron Copland Fund for Music Grant, 2021
  • Best 10 Contemporary Classical Albums of 2018, Bandcamp Daily
  • FCA Emergency Grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, 2018
  • Aaron Copland Fund for Music Grant, 2018

Artist Info

Teaching Artist

Teaching Settings:

  • Arts and Cultural Center / Venue
  • Community Site / Center
  • Private Studio
  • School / University

Ages Served:

  • Pre-Kindergarten-age
  • Elementary School-age
  • Middle School-age
  • High School-age
  • College-age
  • Adults
  • Seniors

Subject Areas:

  • Music

Fee range:

$150 - $10,000

Teaching Artist

Teaching Settings:

  • Arts and Cultural Center / Venue
  • Community Site / Center
  • Private Studio
  • School / University

Ages Served:

  • Pre-Kindergarten-age
  • Elementary School-age
  • Middle School-age
  • High School-age
  • College-age
  • Adults
  • Seniors

Subject Areas:

  • Music

Fee range:

$150 - $10,000

Touring Artist

Technical Requirements:

  • variable

Fee Range:

$150 - $10,000

State of Residence:

Massachusetts

Minimum Number of Performers:

1

Maximum Number of Performers:

15