Tag Archives: mendoza

STS / Ava Mendoza, Episode 5

Guitarist and composer, Ava Mendoza, is an essential member of the SF Bay Area creative music scene. She is part of a breed, comfortable in a wide variety of situations – playing the yearning rock of Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista, note-y guitar sparring with Nels Cline, or performing a live score to a Buster Keaton silent film with Tune-Yards. Her recent focus has been Unnatural Ways, a jazzy rock(or rock-y jazz?) ensemble with Dominique Leone on keys and Nick Tamburro on drums.

Unnatural Ways is Ava Mendoza’s current project. It started as a duo, with Nick Tamburro on drums, but evolved into a trio when they found the perfect person to fulfill the bass parts on synths, a familiar face  – Dominique Leone.

more about Ava:
avamendozamusic.com
weirdforest.com/store/bandPages/mendoza.html#quit

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STS / Ava Mendoza, Episode 4

Guitarist and composer, Ava Mendoza, is an essential member of the SF Bay Area creative music scene. She is part of a breed, comfortable in a wide variety of situations – playing the yearning rock of Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista, note-y guitar sparring with Nels Cline, or performing a live score to a Buster Keaton silent film with Tune-Yards. Her recent focus has been Unnatural Ways, a jazzy rock(or rock-y jazz?) ensemble with Dominique Leone on keys and Nick Tamburro on drums.

The combination of film and live music is an age-old idea in cinema. In 2011, the San Francisco Film Society commissioned her to score a silent film for their Cinema By The Bay series. She chose The Bat (1926), a strange and goofy mystery by Roland West. In this episode she shares here thoughts on why she picked that film and her approach. Her longtime cohort, Nick Tamburro, played drums with her for this project.

Thanks to the SF Film Society.  Learn more about them at  – SFFS.org

more about Ava:
avamendozamusic.com
weirdforest.com/store/bandPages/mendoza.html#quit

STS / Ava Mendoza, Episode 3

Guitarist and composer, Ava Mendoza, is an essential member of the SF Bay Area creative music scene. She is part of a breed, comfortable in a wide variety of situations – playing the yearning rock of Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista, note-y guitar sparring with Nels Cline, or performing a live score to a Buster Keaton silent film with Tune-Yards. Her recent focus has been Unnatural Ways, a jazzy rock(or rock-y jazz?) ensemble with Dominique Leone on keys and Nick Tamburro on drums.

She is also a teacher. In this episode she explains what she gets out of teaching besides a paycheck.

Thanks to San Francisco Rock Project – rockprojectsf.org/

more about Ava:
avamendozamusic.com
weirdforest.com/store/bandPages/mendoza.html#quit

STS / Ava Mendoza, Episode 2

Guitarist and composer, Ava Mendoza, is an essential member of the SF Bay Area creative music scene. She is part of a breed, comfortable in a wide variety of situations –   playing the yearning rock of Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista, note-y guitar sparring with Nels Cline, or performing a live score to a Buster Keaton silent film with Tune-Yards. Her recent focus has been Unnatural Ways, a jazzy rock(or rock-y jazz?) ensemble with Dominique Leone on keys and Nick Tamburro on drums.

In this episode she discusses her reasons for expanding the sonic palette of her electric guitar by adding various pedals to the signal chain and the use of conventional and unconventional ways to physically coax sound from her instrument.

For more info about Ava go to:
avamendozamusic.com
weirdforest.com

STS / Ava Mendoza, Episode 1

Guitarist and composer, Ava Mendoza, is an essential member of the SF Bay Area creative music scene. She is part of a breed, comfortable in a wide variety of situations –   playing the yearning rock of Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista, note-y guitar sparring with Nels Cline, or performing a live score to a Buster Keaton silent film with Tune-Yards. Her recent focus has been Unnatural Ways, a jazzy rock(or rock-y jazz?) ensemble with Dominique Leone on keys and Nick Tamburro on drums.

In this episode we start where we usually finish – a performance.  Let the music do the talking. This is Ava’s take on “Goodnight Irene,” and American folk standard from early 1900’s.

For more info about Ava go to:

avamendozamusic.com
weirdforest.com