the LISTENING GARDEN PRESENTS

Saturday December 14th, 6–10 PM, Ojai

Nate Mercereau

ft Carlos Niño & Aaron Shaw

and

Sharada Shashidhar

ft Caleb Buchanan

+ resident DJs

and meditative/food/drink offerings by friends

SCROLL DOWN FOR TICKETS

ABOUT

The Listening Garden is a sonic salon in Ojai with live ambient, jazz, and experimental music, immersive audiophile sound, earthly arts & plant life.

Now arriving at our 8th edition, the quarterly series has hosted transcendent performances by musicians including Ami Dang, Colloboh, Fabiano Do Nascimento, Frankie Reyes, Low Leaf, Matthewdavid, the trio Surya Botofasina, Nate Mercereau & Carlos Nino, Turn On The Sunlight ft Mia Doi Todd, Celia Hollander, and V.C.R.

JOIN

The Listening Garden now presents multiple hi-fi music & community centered gatherings on the same weekend, every quarter as the seasons change. Come to listen, commune, and immerse in sound, setting, and culture.

Friday December 13th ~ Dance Ground
Saturday December 14th ~ The Listening Garden
Join for one or both gatherings. Full refunds until December 9th.

PLEASE NOTE: EARLY BIRD TICKETS & BUNDLE DISCOUNTS AVAILABLE UNTIL DECEMBER 1ST

By securing attendance you agree to hold to simple principles to ensure a safe space for all:
KEEP SHOES, USE OF PHONES & CONVERSATION OUTSIDE
CLEAR CONSENT BEFORE CONTACT
BE FREE WITH RESPECT TO OTHERS’ FREEDOMS
All ages welcome. Light and Space is an indoor/outdoor environment. Bring: easy on/off shoes. Don’t bring: your dog.

Questions? Contact inthelisteninggarden@gmail.com

GUEST ARTISTS

SHARADA SHASHIDHAR

Sharada Shashidhar is a Los Angeles based vocalist, composer, and producer. Her remarkable voice takes inspiration from jazz and Indian classical music, and her elaborate harmonies, vocal creativity, and rich, swirling productions come together in a new beat-orientated spiritual jazz.

Sharada graduated from the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in NYC and released her debut EP, Rahu, on Leaving Records in March of 2020. Her freshly released sophomore album, Soft Echoes, finds her voice soaring within ever more expansive compositions, leading to Gilles Peterson proclaiming her as “The Jazz Kate Bush”.

Though Shashidhar has an extensive resume as a collaborator in LA’s experimental jazz scene, notching work with the likes of Carlos Niño, Zeroh, and the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, Soft Echoes marks Shashidhar’s first outing as a bandleader. For The Listening Garden she brings a performance scaled back for exquisite intimacy, accompanied by bassist Caleb Buchanan.

NATE MERCEREAU

Nate Mercereau is a songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist whose solo and recent collaborative work explores the instrument he is most known for, the guitar… but in far from the usual way.

His recently released album Excellent Traveller, following the critically acclaimed Joy Techniques and SUNDAYS, is described as a type of diary, a “moving sonic photo album”, created by mapping samples of studio sessions and life on tour – including musical snapshots from living legends Laraaji, Idris Ackamoor, André 3000, Kamasi Washington, Shabaka Hutchings, Dwight Trible, and many others – across his guitar’s fretboard.

Mercereau returns to The Listening Garden, having previously joined as a member of a trio with Surya Botofasina and Carlos Niño. All three’s tour schedules have indeed been full over the past year, thanks to their key contributions to the André 3000 album New Blue Sun and their ensuing roles as core band members. Mercereau is also known by many in the industry for writing and production credits on records by household names such as Jay-Z, John Legend, Leon Bridges, Lizzo, and Rhye. Like this edition’s other guest, this artist has multitudes.

It’s Mercereau’s commitment to the improvisational, bringing his fullest self and whole life to the moment of spontaneous composition, that inspires and excites us most for his performance, supported on Saturday December 14th by Carlos Niño on percussion and Aaron Shaw on saxophone.

AUDIOPHILE SOUND

OUR SOUND SYSTEM WILL COMPRISE

Altec Lansing Model 19 loudspeakers

Mark Levinson No. 29 Dual Mono power amplifier

Alpha Recording System Model 9100B rotary mixer

Technics 1210 turntables w/ Nagaoka cartridges & Jelco headshells

Pioneer XDJ-1000MK2s w/ SimAudio Moon DACs