Dr. Adam Zanolini (he/him) (Musician, Executive Director of Elastic Arts Foundation) is a multi-instrumentalist, ethnomusicologist, writer, and arts organizer based in Chicago. He is the Executive Director of Elastic Arts Foundation in Chicago and former Associate Director of Arts for Art, presenter of the annual Vision Festival of avant-jazz in New York City. He is also co-founder of the Participatory Music Coalition. He is an active member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, and he serves on the Board of the Live the Spirit Residency, producer of the annual Englewood Jazz Festival. Adam plays flute, double bass, saxophone and other instruments, performing regularly with PMC, the AACM’s Great Black Music Ensemble, Sura Dupart’s Sidepocket Experience, with Angel Bat Dawid and the Brothahood, and Gira Dahnee in addition to his own projects, including the Heliacal Rising of Sothis. He received his PhD in music with a certificate in Africana Studies from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York in 2016. Adam’s highest ambition is to be a community musician: to cultivate and share knowledge through music in order to help heal, strengthen, and empower the Black community.
Bio as of 2023