KAETHE HOSTETTER's heritage is intellectual off-grid coastal California soup. Her multi-instrumentalist parents were friends with R. Crumb, Tom Lehrer, Paul Bowles; her midwife was Slime Queen, one of Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters. She grows up amongst the tall tall redwoods, with a revolving door of filmmakers, storytellers, archivists, experimental chefs, her father’s lutherie shop hosting traveling musicians of all ilks. Striking out from the tripped-out half-camping drugs scene of Santa Cruz in the late 90s, Kaethe goes to the most contrasting place she can think of: Boston.
The strategy: to arrive cleans-late with just her instrument, and see if she can weasel into the New England freelance classical scene. Finds music friends, punk and DIY community, experimental art, the outlaw bike messengers, circus music, puppeteering, naturally gravitates back to her cultural underbelly roots. Forms an organic 20-piece marching band that tours New England by bike. Living in a semi-legal loft in colorful Dudley Square, starts an unofficial Ethio culture enthusiasts club with friends– collecting cassettes, transcribing music, cooking vats of vegan Ethio glop, hanging with the Eritrean ladies on Green Street. This crew signs with Subpop, and grows into a national touring Ethio groove ensemble, hitting the festival circuit, with sometimes 14 people on the road.
Continues touring, the posse is invited to Addis Ababa, and they land in the midst of what is agreed to be an incredible cultural heyday and economic boom of the only un-imperialized African nation. Swept into the vortex, she’s soon biking around hilly Addis with fiddle and amp, through the rubble of new and rushed construction, as sweaty music clubs start popping up every weekend, she is jamming Ethio stylings with musical legends that have never left, and legends that are reigniting their flame after expat years in Washington DC, Stockholm, Denver, and fresh young talents. Meanwhile begins independent anthropological documenting of the traditional deeper sounds by hanging with all the traditional musicians during the days as they chewed their khat, killing time before work at the nightclub. Shadows annoyingly the man she deems the best masinko [single-string fiddle] player in the land, just hopping in his car and inviting herself everywhere with him as he zooms around the chaotic streets Addis, dodging livestock on the way to recording studios and gigs. Gaining her own voice in this scene, she forms QWANQWA, an experimental/traditional ensemble, joining with the baddest traditional instrumentalists she could find, eventually bringing in a female Azmari vocalist to front the group. Kaethe’s guest spot on Ethiopian singer-songwriter superstar Teddy Afro album and performance in front of 120,000 people brings notoriety and is played on local TV stations and in Ethiopian restaurants worldwide to this day.
Gurgling political unrest soon becomes fully inflamed civil war, coinciding with 2020’s COVID related international border shutdowns. She flees Addis suddenly for safe harbor at the family homestead back in redwooded Santa Cruz. Three years of living the organic dream gave her time to book a 60 date debut tour of US for QWANQWA, and release of several albums. Her need for a robust cultural ecosystem prompts her move her headquarters to New York, where she currently resides, picking up where she left off with friends in the experimental music scene and circus performers. Addis life never far from her thoughts, she develops a solo body of work called Impressions of Ethiopia: for solo violin & electronic, which is a dreamy electronic multimedia presentation drawing from her experiences in Addis.
Curriculum vitae
TOURS/CONCERTS OF NOTE:
Solo
Featured Performance, Chicago Jazz Strings Summit, 2020
Live Solo Show, WFMU, Transpacific Sound Paradise, 2020
Solo Experimental Performance alongside David Lynch, filmmaker, Boston, 2011
Farmers’ Market Santa Cruz, 2020-present
Globalquerque World Music Fest 2023
Residency Barbes, Brooklyn, NY 2023
Flushing Town Hall, Mini Global Mashup, Queens, New York, 2024
QWANQWA
45 date US National tour, Spring 2024
20 date Europe tour, Summer 2024
60 date US National Tour, 2022
Italy and Switzerland Tour, August, 2019
Sardinia Tour, September, 2018
WOMEX showcase, Katowice, Poland, October, 2017
Europe: Prague, Berlin, Paris, Geneva, Copenhagen, etc. Fall, 2017
Europe: Belgium, France, Summer, 2016
Roskilde, Denmark, July, 2016
Debo Band
US Tours, including Lincoln Center, Out of Doors, Kennedy Center, Gobal Fest, Bonorroo, Bumbershoot, New Orleans Jazz Fest, Festivale
Internationale Lafayette, Calgary Folk Festival, Montreal Jazz Fest, Nuits d’Afrique, Chicago World Music, Roskilde, 2008-2019
Lamb Soundtrack
Europe tours: Slovenia, Vienna, Germany, UK, Denmark, 2017
Zanzibar, Sauti Za Busara, January 2010
Debo Band with Ayalew Mesfin
Europe Tour: Holland, October, 2019
US Tour: Denver, LA, San Francisco, January, 2018
Fred Frith’s Gravity Ensemble
Moers Festival, Germany-Nijmegen, Holland 2015
Roulette, NYC, 2014
Victoriaville, Canada, 2014
Circus/Cirkestra
Bindlestiff, A Cardboard and Duct Tape Spectacular, National Tour, 2018
Smithsonian Folk Festival, Washington DC, 2017
Gardner Museum, Boston, 2007, 2011
Circus Smirkus Tour, 2002, 2003, 2007
Bindlestiff, From the Gutter to the Glitter, National Tour, 2005
Soundtrack, Circus Dreams, 2012
many variety shows in and around New York
Classical
Free lancing around greater Boston & New York 2002-current
Grace Chorale, concert master 2019
String Orchestra of Brooklyn, principal viola 2019
Boston Philharmonic, violist, under Benjamin Zander 2002-2010
Paul Bowles & Third Man Duo
Quarantine Happy Hour Feature, 2020
Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, faculty featured concert, 2020 Concert at American Legation, Tangiers, Morocco, 2015
Thalia Zedek & K8A
Music of Paul Bowles, NYC 2023
J.P. Harris and the Tough Choices
Southern Tour, US 2012
Blackpot Featured Artist, Main Stage, 2012
Monk Earl
collaboration with Crystal Camino, 2021
WORKSHOPS/MASTERCLASSES/PANELS
World Music Institute: Music of Ethiopia Inside and Out, 2021
String Panels and World Music Violin Panels: Milwaukee, Keene State, Old Towne School of Folk Music, Lowell Folk Fest, Montana folk Festival, Vancouver Folk Festival Quebec City—workshops/panels, 2013-present
Manhattan String Quartet: Bartok in Budapest, Smetana in Prague, Haydn in Vienna, coach, 2005, 2015, 2018
Guest Masterclasses at Berklee College of Music, 2006, 2011, 2014
TEACHING
Saint Ann’s School—chamber music coach, violin & viola, group & individual classses, Brooklyn, 2023-present
Introduction to Ethiopian Music at Labyrinth, San Francisco, 2020-Present
Private teaching violin/viola beginning to intermediate, group and one on one, all ages, 2006-Present
Santa Cruz Youth Chamber Strings, 2020-Present
DISCOGRAPHY
Solo Album, forthcoming, 2024
Untitled duo album with Maxwell Poulos, forthcoming, 2024
