Meridian Music presents a solo set by Oakland-based guitarist/composer Ava Mendoza. Mendoza writes, "My solo work draws a lot from early country and blues tunes, reworked (mangled?) in my own way. In any music context I tend to tread a wobbly line between melodicism, atonality and sonic abstraction. Solo guitar writing and arrangement started out for me as a kind love letter to some classic songs that were near and dear to me. It has turned into more of a love letter to the endless adaptability of songs, to all the different ways they can be personalized--whether through subtle arrangement idiosyncrasies, or through melodic and sonic foraying to the point of waywardness, unrecognizability, and transformation."

Ava Mendoza has played in a wide variety of groups - heavy rock, free jazz, improvised music, and contemporary classical. She recently released her debut solo record, Shadow Stories, on Resipiscent.

"What obscure, overlooked master playing in some slashing, raw-yet-virtuosic manner is this?" - Nels Cline

Photo by Peter Ganushkin.

See photos from the concert.