Member Directory

John H. Chalmers is a retired astrobiologist and prebiotic chemist from the University of California, San Diego. In addition to working in the fields of genetics, industrial microbiology, biochemistry and chemistry, he has had a long-term interest in microtonality and is the author of “Divisions of the Tetrachord,” a book inspired in part by Ervin Wilson’s work. Chalmers is also an actor with the Village Church Community Theater in Rancho Santa, California, where he resides, and has recently become a computer artist, having exhibited his music-theory generated polychrome plots in a number of venues in San Diego and one in San Francisco.

Stephen has composed most all the scores for the films of legendary Academy Award winning director, Charles Burnett, as well as the musicals, comedies and dramatic films of Robert Townsend. In 2009 Academy Award nominated producer Reginald Hudlin tapped him to write the main title song and underscore for the limited animated series, The Black Panther. His body of work encompasses shows and films from all the major studios. The score to Richard Tanne's feature film, "Southside With You" , received rave reviews, and his classical orchestral works have been performed by the Atlanta Symphony (1996 Olympics Opening Ceremonies), the Detroit Symphony and the Cleveland Symphony. After receiving his music degree from Stanford he went on to study privately for several years with Henri Lazarof (composition professor at UCLA), Dr Albert Harris (conducting), and microtonal scale pioneer, Ervin Wilson.

Gary David has led two lives simultaneously: musician and epistemologist. He was a professional jazz musician for 20 years. In the 60’s he formed a group called The Sound of Feeling, an innovative vocal-instrumental group. They recorded two albums for Verve, and Mercury records. Both won Grammy nominations. Studied pitch theory and practice with Erv Wilson from 1964 to 1995. Simultaneously, starting in 1964, Gary began his studies in epistemology, the theory of knowledge with J. Samuel Bois who was his mentor for the next 12 years. In 1975, he received a Ph.D. in epistemics. Since 1999, he has been engaged in a private counseling practice, as well as giving online seminars. called The Art of Learning with learning being the action by which we extend presence into the world. It has at its core his 40 year study of the biology of human emotion as the primary motivational system of the human being.

Bill Alves is a composer based in Southern California, where he teaches at the Claremont Colleges, co-directs LA’s MicroFest, and directs the HMC American Gamelan, a just intonation ensemble originating in his Fulbright Fellowship in Java and Bali, Indonesia. He is the author of Music of the Peoples of the World and coauthor of Lou Harrison: American Musical Maverick. His other writings have appeared in 1/1, the Computer Music Journal, Perspectives of New Music, and elsewhere. His recordings are available from MicroFest Records, Kinetika Video Library, and other labels. More information is at billalves.com.