If this biography was a concert by David Sait, it would only begin this way once. All of his performances and recordings on the guzheng**, a Chinese zither are completely improvised with only the notion that there will be a starting and ending point. In between, there are no pre-planned themes, melodies, or agendas.
Born January 16, 1972 in Brampton, Canada, Sait is the son of Leon Sait***, a British jazz bandleader and composer. This explains but makes no less notable David Sait’s first public performance in 1980, at the age of eight, with an 18-piece Big Band under the guidance of Columbian percussionist Memo Esavedo.
As an adult he has blossomed into an increasingly global creative music arena. David Sait channels a variety of styles and disciplines crossing dysfunctional classical with notions both avant garde and tribal. He has performed in a park, a pub, a chapel, a rowing club, a video arcade, a valley, a theatre, an art gallery and countless other environments that influence the outcome while simultaneously allowing the outcome to influence the environment.
Sait brings a contemporary, free spirited mentality to the ancient guzheng, which dates back more than 3,000 years, paying respect to its rich history but honoring it by searching for a unique voice. On one-hand, David’s playing does not stray far from his personality, mirroring his calm, even-tempered and accommodating demeanor. Yet there are still choices within an instance to attack the instrument with loud exuberance.
All playing between these two occurrences are randomly stacked, sorted and shifted on the fly. Free improvisation works on impulses-- it's intuitive music, instinctual communication, sometimes knee jerk reactions to sounds intersecting and running away from each other in the moment. Another commitment Sait has made to the guzheng is to rarely tune it the same way twice, exploring the world of random, alternative tunings this grand instrument conveniently lends itself well to.
Sait is an active member of AIM Toronto (Association of Improvising Musicians Toronto) and the Guzheng One Club (China); co-editor of Sound List, a weekly e-newsletter representing Toronto Experimental Music, Free Improvisation, Sound Art...), and co-host/creator of the live monthly series "The Night Bazaar" where improvised music in odd musical pairings meets a chess club in a replica of an environment one might see at a night market in Morocco or Vietnam.
He has over 20 years of formal/private music studies, live performance and recording experience balanced between guzheng, guitar, and invented found object instruments. In performance and recording, Sait is a committed solo improviser, but also has been fortunate enough to interact with artists including: Parmela Attariwala (*p), Mick Beck (*p), DB Boyko (*p), Anne Bourne (*p), Allison Cameron (*p*r), Andrea Centazzo (*r), Eugene Chadbourne (*p*r), Eric Chenaux (*p), Christine Duncan (*p), Christine Duncan's Element Choir (*p), Paul Dutton (*p), Xu Fengxia (*p), Colin Fisher (*p), Glen Hall (*p*r), John Heward (*p), Michael Keith (*p*r), Germaine Liu (*p, *r), Gregory Oh (*r), John Oswald (*p*r), Sarah Peebles (*p), David Prentice (*p), Friendly Rich (*p), Gino Robair (*r), Mauro Savo (*p*r), LaDonna Smith (*r), Scott Thomson (*p*r), Rainer Wiens (*p), and frequently with various members of AIMToronto. He has also worked in
collaboration on separate occasions with dancer Claire E. Barrett (NYC) and painter Katherine Dolgy Ludwig (NYC).
Sait can be heard on these selected titles: "Guzheng Music", "Tortoise Ram", "Cracker & Shoeâ€, Michael Keith's "The Story of Karl", Friendly Rich and the Lollipop Peoples "The Friendly Rich Show†and more recently, David joins up with Eugene Chadbourne for a banjo/guzheng duet CD entitled "Auspicious Fish - Postage Paid Duets Vol. 1".
*r = on recording with
*p = in performance with**Guzheng From Wikipedia
The guzheng, or gu zheng (Chinese: pinyin: zheng) or zheng (gu- means "ancient") is a traditional Chinese musical instrument. It belongs to the zither family of string instruments. The guzheng is the parent instrument of the Japanese koto, the Korean gayageum, and the Vietnamese dà n tranh The modern-day guzheng is a plucked, half-tube zither with movable bridges and 21 strings, although it can have anywhere from 15 to 25 strings.***Leon Sait performed in many cities around the world. He had the opportunity to arrange for and perform with many jazz greats such as Buddy Rich, Count Basie, Oscar Peterson, Ray Charles and Ella Fitzgerald. David's grandmother Eugene Estel Propert also dedicated her life to music as a performing classical pianist in Russia.Eugene Chadbourne
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