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Soundpainting is a holistic framework for interdisciplinary art, spontaneous creation, and live composition. Guided by the Soundpainter, performers across disciplines and skill levels (music, dance, theater, visual arts) collectively create the composition in real time. Beyond performance, Soundpainting is a powerful training ground for interdisciplinary collaboration, improvisation, and creative risk-taking. It helps dissolve performance anxiety, nurtures community, and brings joy and levity into the act of making art. Soundpainting was started 50 years ago by Walter Thompson and now has over 1500 signs used around the world.
Drew Pattison is in his ninth year teaching bassoon at Oberlin Conservatory, where he also teaches Soundpainting, an interdisciplinary framework for live composition, and a chamber music fundamentals seminar. His teaching emphasizes first principles and specific practice techniques, in order to help each student develop their own unique artistic path.
Drew has performed with the Chicago, Detroit, Cincinnati, and Milwaukee Symphonies as well as the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and previously taught at DePaul University. His primary teachers have been George Sakakeeny, Bill Buchman, Richard Beene, and Walter Thompson. Each summer, he teaches bassoon and soundpainting at the Round Top Music Festival.
Outside of music, Drew enjoys pickleball, disc golf, meditation, new technology, and wellness practices.
Improvisers Exchange Ensemble is an eclectic student performance group of the School of Music exploring sound and music through collective improvisation. Under the direction of Jason Finkelman, the ensemble develops a practice of omni-idiomatic improvisation, where musicians of all backgrounds and experiences create meaningful music in the moment. In addition to the ensemble, Improvisers Exchange is a multidimensional programming line of Global Arts Performance Initiatives offering concerts, workshops, lectures, artist residencies, and other engagements promoting broadly the field of music improvisation.