Terika BIO
Instrumentation
- Tenzin Choegyal: Tibetan vocals / druyen (3 stringed lute)
- River Petein : saxophones / electronic production
- Katherine Philp : cello
Biography
When I asked Tenzin how he learnt to sing the way he does, he replied by saying “First you have to find a big waterfall, stand right in front of it with the water at your knees, then sing as loud as you can. keep singing untill you can hear yourself above roaring water, this could take several weeks, then when you can hear yourself, you have to find a bigger waterfall.”
Terika achieves the seemingly impossible by uniting musical styles that are worlds and centuries apart. Combining tibetan traditional with 19 century classical cello, ‘new school’ European style jazz saxophone and deep electronica. Terika creates a unique sound that is truly genuine and heart felt.
Featuring Tenzin Choegyal, River Petein and Katherine Philp, the Terika project began in august 2004 with a performance at the Brisbane Powerhouse (a part of the DisOrientation series). Three years and several children later, Terika is extremely pleased with their debut album titled Acoustica Electronica. This project is a double disc package offering both a raw acoustic recording -[produced by terika, recorded at ultrasonique brisbane] as well as a disc of electronic mixes [produced by river petein, recorded at fishcreek studios brisbane]. The complete double album was mastered by Daniel Fournier at Sony Studios, Tokyo, Japan, giving it a world class sound unlike any other, which is then wonderfully complimented by the artwork and design of artist Patrick Petein.
Terika : world music with electronic edges, where ancient tradition meets modern technology.
PERSONAL BIOs
Tenzin Choegyal
Tenzin Choegyal draws on his traditional Tibetan roots to create music which expresses his thoroughly modern life. Since his world music debut in 1997 in Australia, Tenzin's cantering rhythms, soaring vocals and flute have enchanted audiences around the globe.
In the recent years Tenzin has worked with numerous prominent Australian musicians from many different genres: Michael Askill, Shen Flindell, Spiros Rantos, Ash Grunwald, Paul Coppen, Stringmansassy, Oscar and Marigold, Riley Lee, James Coats , Tsering Dorjee Bawa, Baattar Sukh, Cathedral Band, Marchelo Milani and Monks of Tibet allow Tenzin room to experiment with rhythm and structure, to challenge deeply entrenched Tibetan musical norms and find a place in the complex tapestry of global sounds.
Tenzin plays the dranyen (long necked lute), lingbu (transverse flutes) various ritual objects and is well-known for his extraordinary vocal ability.
As a child, Tenzin would listen to his mother singing in the nomadic style and he attributes much of his passion for that genre to these early influences. Tenzin feels a particular connection to the music of the wandering people of his homeland. Since coming to Australia, Tenzin has made his mark on the world music circuit performing at such events as Woodford Folk Festival, Port Fairy Folk Festival, the National Folk Festival and Womadelaide.
river petein
river petein is a conservatorium graduate who majored in jazz saxophone. He has always been heavily involved in the Australian music scene, performing, recording and touring with some of the country’s best jazz, funk, electro, hip hop and world acts including: resin dogs, soma rasa, stringmansassy, taxi, elixir, neighbourhood groove colective, rivernova, terika, pty ltd, afro dizzy act and many others.
His vocation has allowed him to travel across Australia performing at festivals and events such as Big Day Out, Livid and the Woodford folk festival. Before leaving Australia to pursue a solo career, he was a resident musician on board the Great South Pacific Express (Australia’s Orient Express)
While traveling abroad to perform at World Expo 2000 in Germany with Australian jazz duo stringmansassy, he was exposed to (and heavily influenced by) the electronic music scene in western Europe and Britain. He was fortunate to have the opportunity to collaborate with and learn from such fine European electronic acts including : Mystery School Ensemble and Brown, Smith and Grey. [recordings can be found on labels: Artifact records (UK), Good looking records (UK) and SPV records (Germany)]
Since returning to Australia, river has fully immersed himself in music production, focusing on the electronic aspects of new music and technology. His goal is to produce electronic music heavily laden with acoustic instruments and the human spirit, something he believes can be easily lost in modern western music.
Katherine Philp
Katherine Philp In a few short years of music industry experience as a classical and world fusion cellist Katherine has performed in a number of major music festivals around Australia. She has performed and toured for the Australian Festival of Chamber Music, performed in the Canberra International Chamber music Festival, Bangalow Music Festival, and toured for the Four Winds festival. In string quartet ‘Fyra’ Katherine competed in the finals of the Australia Chamber Music competition and won the 4MBS Chamber music competition. As a soloist Katherine was the winner of the Vada Jefferies Bach prize at Queensland Conservatorium 2004, and later this year will perform at the Tyalgum Classical Music Festival in the Young Virtuoso concert.
Katherine’s musical career began at age 16 when she was accepted to the Queensland Conservatorium, majoring in cello performance. In addition to her role with Terika, Katherine has been involved with other classical and folk groups and performers, including indigenous Australian icon William Barton, touring regional Queensland and NSW and performing at Woodford Folk Festival, Brisbane Powerhouse and the Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts.