Jazz Improvisation Workshop with Lesley Mok

Take part in a hands-on workshop, learning basic musical improvisation alongside jazz artist Lesley Mok. Lesley will introduce a structural improvisation method called Conduction Technique which was pioneered by American cornetist, composer, and improviser Butch Morris.

The class will consist of learning a series of hand and baton gestures, and attendees will even have a chance to lead a conduction! No musical experience or training required! You’re encouraged to bring in your own instrument if you have one, use one of our keyboards, or simply clap and sing along. Segments of improvisational themes may later be heard at the 8:00pm “Thursday Night Jazz” event with Lesley and fellow artist Phillip Golub.

About Lesley Mok

Lesley Mok is a drummer, composer, and improviser based in Brooklyn, NY. Interested in the ways social conditions shape our beings, Lesley’s work focuses on transposing, augmenting, and overacting humanness to explore ideas about normalcy, alienness, and privilege. She explores this by writing in a way that subverts traditional instrumental roles, often utilizing extreme ranges and unconventional timbres, while creating a context that allows for simultaneously different musical perspectives. By maintaining an agile and improvisatory approach, Lesley creates fantastical and evocative sound worlds through the use of dissonance.