Live Footage ︎
i met mike at my birthday/halloween party more than 15 years ago. we immediately clicked speaking about music and i was blown away by our similar taste. i was scoring a modern dance piece called ‘freedom happening’ and asked him to play drums. we began rehearsing and all the ideas were enhanced through our collaboration and it was obvious that it was more of a band than a solo project. we bonded through improvisation which is present in all of our albums minus the first two. we improvise all our albums and produce them out. some of our more modern stuff is through-composed and the instrumentation has changed the years. what began as cello and drums has evolved into compositions using woodwinds, cello quartets, synths, guitars and a plethora of percussion. we’ve toured europe many times. we’ve opened for nils frahm, robert glasper and pharoah monch. we’ve toured in asia. we’ve been nominated for an emmy, we’ve won a NAACP image award. we most recently did the music to the kanye west trilogy ‘jeen-yuhs’ on netflix.
i met mike at my birthday/halloween party more than 15 years ago. we immediately clicked speaking about music and i was blown away by our similar taste. i was scoring a modern dance piece called ‘freedom happening’ and asked him to play drums. we began rehearsing and all the ideas were enhanced through our collaboration and it was obvious that it was more of a band than a solo project. we bonded through improvisation which is present in all of our albums minus the first two. we improvise all our albums and produce them out. some of our more modern stuff is through-composed and the instrumentation has changed the years. what began as cello and drums has evolved into compositions using woodwinds, cello quartets, synths, guitars and a plethora of percussion. we’ve toured europe many times. we’ve opened for nils frahm, robert glasper and pharoah monch. we’ve toured in asia. we’ve been nominated for an emmy, we’ve won a NAACP image award. we most recently did the music to the kanye west trilogy ‘jeen-yuhs’ on netflix.
Salenta + Topu ︎
Salenta Baisden - Piano
Topu Lyo - Cello
Mixed by Salenta and Topu
Mastering Engineer - Nolan Thies
Artwork by Nadia Wescott
Design and Layout by Tori Huang
all songs written by Salenta and Topu
credits
released February 5, 2021Salenta Baisden - Piano
Topu Lyo - Cello
Mixed by Salenta and Topu
Mastering Engineer - Nolan Thies
Artwork by Nadia Wescott
Design and Layout by Tori Huang
all songs written by Salenta and Topu
Moon Set, Moon Rise
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New Indiana
i met randy back in 1999 in tucson az. we started a band called dali’s trio which was a mix of gypsy kings and bela fleck in my mind. in reality it probably was nothing similar. the songs were earthy tunes with long instrumental improvisations. this really began my songwriting and improvisation mind set to which i carry this day. our relationship and music has ever been evolving. together we’ve self taught ourselves how to play: jazz, bossa nova, choro’s, gypsy jazz and transcribed hundreds of tunes that we’ve recorded. we’ve learned so much from our many projects and co-writing, producing through the years. this is a life long project.
i met randy back in 1999 in tucson az. we started a band called dali’s trio which was a mix of gypsy kings and bela fleck in my mind. in reality it probably was nothing similar. the songs were earthy tunes with long instrumental improvisations. this really began my songwriting and improvisation mind set to which i carry this day. our relationship and music has ever been evolving. together we’ve self taught ourselves how to play: jazz, bossa nova, choro’s, gypsy jazz and transcribed hundreds of tunes that we’ve recorded. we’ve learned so much from our many projects and co-writing, producing through the years. this is a life long project.
