Katt Hernandez

Katt Hernandez (born May 16, 1974) is a violinist living in with strong connection to Boston, Massachusetts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Baltimore, Maryland. Katt's violin playing employs many virtuosic extended techniques, as well as microtones. Her influences range a vast gamut of music, and her own work is entirely improvised. She has been noted for her unique playing in many publications and on-line review sites, including Cadence Magazine, Signal to Noise, Arthur Magazine and All About Jazz.

As a teenager, she attended Community High School, an alternative, experimental school that was in her hometown of Ann Arbor, Michigan. As a high school student, she played in the Michigan Youth Symphony and participated in the voluntary Contemporary Improvisation Workshop held by a graduate student for the youth orchestra. She was admitted to the University of Michigan in 1992, and was among the first to graduate from the school with a degree in improvised music. There she worked extensively with the Creative Arts Orchestra, with her mentor Ed Sarath. She also studied composition with George Balch Wilson and Evan Chambers, as well as jazz with Donald Walden. She also played in several jazz groups in the area, and collaborated with Dr. Arwulf Arwulf and Frank Pahl.

She arrived in Boston in 1997, and quickly became a part of the city's rich landscape of improvised music. She regularly sat in on classes and sessions at the New England Conservatory in her first years in town, where she met her next mentor, Joe Maneri. There she also began her long collaboration with pianist and accordion player Jonathan Vincent. She began working extensively with performance artists, dancers, and video artists as improvisers. In addition to performances in the city's ever-dwindling supply of underground art-spaces, as well as appearances as a guest artist at more prominent venues, she began to participate in flamboyant street theater antics.

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