Philip Montoro

Bin Chen is a research associate professor in the chemistry department at Northwestern University, where he manages a team of 30 people within the 80-member lab led by Canadian scientist Ted Sargent.

Improvising cellist and Elastic Arts curator Ishmael Ali wants to bring together crowds from siloed subsets of the experimental arts scene.

Polymorphous prog prodigies Sleepytime Gorilla Museum share a bill at Lincoln Hall with Chicago weirdos Dead Rider and Cheer-Accident.

Joseph Guzman: The Star Partyer

“Power should be more equally distributed—it should be a wide variety of people,” says drummer and Option series curator Lily Glick Finnegan. “It shouldn’t just be one person deciding this is what jazz is and this is what improvised music is.”

Kokoko! are oddballs even in their hometown of Kinshasa, and now they’re bringing their cosmopolitan junkyard beats to the Empty Bottle.

What the freezing temperatures of Chicago’s winter lakefront can give you

The best prodigal son in a rock band is Jonathan van Herik returning to Facs.

An excerpt from the music memoir You’re With Stupid, by Kranky label cofounder Bruce Adams

The touring musician