FESTIVAL MUSIC, ARTIST, AND FARM INFORMATIONPROGRAM
CLOSED LOOP by Pamela Z NEW WORK by Nicholas Gaudette and Maggie Bergeron SPARROW GRASS by Heather Barringer LIKE A FRESH PLANTED SEED by A.J. Isaacson 
Closed Loop (2024)
By Pamela Z Every gardener and farmer is deeply familiar with the cycle that moves from soil to sustenance and back again. Closed Loop, Pamela Z's work for Zeitgeist, celebrates that cycle with chamber music for piano, clarinet, and a percussive arsenal including marimba, vibraphone, drums, mixing bowls, whisks, and...an immersion blender. Partnering the live musicians is an electronic score featuring samples of MN and WI chefs, farmers, and livestock. Closed Loop includes the sampled voices of Colleen Rice, Caroline Glawe, Beth Fisher, Ryan Rickman, Dean Engelmann, Abbie, Brianna Baldus, Caleb Stellmach, Molly Castle, Mathew Janczewski, Scott Mellencamp, Kirsten Mellencamp, Heather Barringer, Tristan Barringer Kenny, Maria Alvear, Sergio, Armando, Eartha Borer Bell, Rick, Rachel Wandrei, and Laura Getch. 
EXCHANGE (2025)
By Nicholas Gaudette and Maggie Bergeron Exchange explores humanity's complex relationship with agricultural resources and our responsibility as stewards of the earth. This interactive performance invites audience members to become active participants in examining how our choices impact both sound and sustainability as a metaphor for human farming practices. Throughout the performance, audience members are invited to engage with real crops provided at the venue. As you place these materials into designated bins, buckets, or mills, your actions will directly influence the sonic landscape created by the musicians. Each contribution becomes part of the performance's evolving soundscape, creating a tangible connection between human action and selected musicians participation. The piece attempts to challenge us in consider the environmental and social consequences of modern agricultural practices, particularly the risks associated with monoculture farming, the cultivation of single crop varieties, and the long-term effects of over-farming on our ecosystems. Through direct interaction with these materials, we hope audiences experience firsthand through sonic representation how individual choices accumulate to create larger patterns of change. Whether you choose to actively engage with the materials or observe the collective impact of others' choices, you will witness how our ongoing EXCHANGE with the earth reflects broader questions about consumption, cultivation, and consequence. Additional Notes: *All crops used in this performance will be repurposed as feed for wild animals following the event, ensuring that no materials are wasted. *If you have a bird feeder at home, you are welcome to take any of the milled crops home at the end of the last performance! *Participation is entirely voluntary. 
Like a Fresh Planted Seed (2025)
By AJ Isaacson-Zvidzwa Never one to garden, a year and a half ago, as I was fixing my morning eggs with my usual leaf of store bought basil, I thought to myself: maybe I could grow my own. And my life was forever altered. I now have 8 hydroponic cubes in the basement “garden room” and a backyard full of raised beds, terra cotta pots, three brand new fruit trees, and did I mention the new raspberry bushes? I started off with a hydroponic cube and was absolutely giddy when my first seed sprouted. For me, the excitement of gardening comes from watching the plants develop in their own unique ways. It’s like reading a chapter of a book every night before bed because there’s always that anticipation of wondering what’s going to happen next. “Like a Fresh Planted Seed” is inspired by the lifecycle of a plant, broken into the following sections: dormancy, the seed awakens, imbibition, the seed coat ruptures, the shoot grows towards the light, begin photosynthesis, photosynthesis, blooming, and reseeding. — AJ Isaacson-Zvidzwa 
Sparrow Grass (2025)
By Heather Barringer Sparrow Grass is grounded in the history, biology, horticulture, and family lore surrounding that most delicious spring perennial, asparagus. A perennial, it's origins are in Asia, but it has been cultivated and foraged around the world and arrived in North America with early colonists. My mother tended an asparagus bed, patiently nurturing spring spears through the three years it takes to establish the crowns before a harvest can occur. After that, her asparagus nourished our family year after year. A properly tended bed will deliver culinary delight for 20 years or more, but grassy weeds and lapses in fertilization are a continual threat. Asparagus is one of the first vegetables to be available in the northland, with crowns poking through the wet and chilly May mornings. It's season, ending by the 4th of July, is brief. Midsummer, the plant explodes into tall, feathery fronds as it works to capture the energy of the sun and bustle it down to the cellar of it's roots. Fall and winter dormancy serves it well, and a nice insulating cover of leaves and snow bodes well for the following year. My grandmother did not bother with asparagus, and said that her family, and those around her, never ate the plant, being put off by it's abundance in ditches and proximity to graveyards. She said that in the times of her childhood people would plant asparagus on graves because of it's beautiful fronds and reliable annual rising. I follow in my mother's stead, and have established two asparagus patches and am soon to invest my time in a third. My children will also have plots of their own, having grown to value this reliable but brief visitor. — Heather Barringer 
Pamela Z, composer
Pamela Z is a composer/performer and media artist working primarily with voice, live electronics, sampled sound, and video. She has been commissioned to compose scores for dance, theatre, film, and chamber ensembles including Kronos Quartet, Roomful of Teeth, the Living Earth Show, Eighth Blackbird, the Bang on a Can All Stars, Julia Bullock with SF Symphony, and the LA Philharmonic New Music Group. Her interdisciplinary performances have been presented at venues including The Kitchen (NY), Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (SF), REDCAT (LA), and MCA (Chicago), and her installations have been presented at such exhibition spaces as MoMA (NY), the Whitney (NY), Savvy Contemporary (Berlin), and the Krannert (IL). Pamela Z has toured extensively throughout the US, Europe, and Japan. She has performed in numerous festivals including Bang on a Can (NY), Interlink (Japan), Other Minds (San Francisco), La Biennale di Venezia (Italy), Dak’Art (Sénégal) and Pina Bausch Tanztheater Festival (Wuppertal). She’s a recipient of numerous awards including the Rome Prize, Berlin Prize, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, MIT McDermott Award, United States Artists, Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the Guggenheim, Doris Duke Artist Impact Award, Herb Alpert Award, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award. She holds a music degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder. www.pamelaz.com 
Nick Gaudette and Maggie Bergeron have been co-creating movement and sound experiences for over 16 years. They perform, educate, curate, produce, and improvise in collaboration with each other and others. Their work has been seen at Studio Z with Zeitgeist, Bryant Lake Bowl, Red Eye Theater, and the Walker Art Center. They co-created the music/dance creation festival Hear Here!, which paired composers and choreographers to collaborate on original works and now has a satellite location at Keshet Dance and Center for the Arts in Albuquerque, NM.
When not creating works, they find themselves immersed in an endless stream of podcasts designed for 7 to 11 year olds (due to sharing the joys of parent hood for those children), absorbing everything from Minecraft strategies to the comedic stylings of The Listies, an Australian humor duo. Though these shows offer genuine educational value and moments of hilarity, they quietly yearn for the day when they can reclaim their headphones and choose their own soundtrack of music and radio programming. 
Heather Barringer is a percussionist/improvisor/composer who creates work that sits at the intersection of sound art and the rural experience and addresses issues such as land ownership/accessibility/equity, rural community, food production, and sustainability. Through creating innovative arts experiences, her work brings rural and urban people together to further understanding and strengthen our food systems, environment, and democracy. Sparrow Grass is part of a body of music compositions grounded in rural culture, history, and social issues, real and imagined.
Photo by Shruthi Rajasekar 
Minnesota composer, violist, violinist, and music history enthusiast, AJ Isaacson-Zvidzwa (she/her), has an eclectic artistic resume. As a composer, she has collaborated with members of the Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Accordo, Artaria String Quartet, Isles Ensemble, Zeitgeist, Voices of Hope Prison Choirs, and Minneapolis Guitar Quartet. Her upcoming premieres include “For Those We Lost” for flute/alto flute, cello, and harp; “Songs of Enchantment” for voice, viola, and piano; and “Piano Trio in A minor”.
AJ holds a Bachelor of Music degree in viola performance from Augsburg University where she was a winner of the Augsburg Symphony Orchestra Concerto/Aria competition and was named a 2014 Presser Scholar. In addition to performing and composing, AJ enjoys writing and researching including articles for the Journal of the American Viola Society (JAVS) and American String Teacher Journal (ASTA). She’s lectured internationally and if she has spare time, AJ is working on writing a book about famous composers and what they were doing in their 32nd year of life. Recently bitten by the gardening bug, AJ has a hydroponic garden in her basement as well as an elaborate backyard garden. When she isn’t composing, practicing, researching, writing, gardening or spending time with her husband, AJ is a full time caregiver for her brother. 
Barringer Family Farms is a third generation family farm located in the verdant Trimbelle River valley in western Wisconsin. They grow vegetables, hay, CBD hemp products, present arts and education events, and host community celebrations.
Barringer Family Farms centers the production of healthy and delicious food in a sustainable manner that nourishes our customers, improves our land, and connects with community. Their food can be purchased at local farmer's markets, through a CSA, online, or at the farm. 
Oxheart Farm
Oxheart Farm is located in Hager City, Wisconsin. They raise a diverse mix of vegetables, flowers, mushrooms, pastured pork, beef, milk, yogurt and eggs for sale on their farm through Community Supported Agriculture 
Rising Sun Farm and Orchard
Rising Sun Farm and Orchard is a certified organic, diversified family farm located in the St. Croix River Valley of Western Wisconsin. They take pride in providing their community with healthy, nutrient dense food as well as being good stewards to the land. 
Warm Fields Farm
Warm Fields Farm provides healthful and fresh produce to the local community and nearby marketplace. Organic, free range, and GMO-free. 
Rising Sun Farm and Orchard
Rising Sun Farm and Orchard is a certified organic, diversified family farm located in the St. Croix River Valley of Western Wisconsin. They take pride in providing their community with healthy, nutrient dense food as well as being good stewards to the land. |
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