Hudson Valley-bred experimental electronica multi-instrumentalist, composer, and producer Evan Shornstein—better known by his performing name, Photay—will bring his dazzling and immersive sound back to the area this month. Ahead of the show, he answered the questions below by email. Photay will perform at Assembly in Kingston on November 15 at 7pm. Eucademix (Yuka C. Honda of Cibo Mato) will open. Tickets are $30.
—Peter Aaron
You grew up in Woodstock and started out as a drummer. How and when did you first encounter electronic music, and what drew you the genre?
I had various encounters with electronic music and unique sounds at a young age. Sounds were both equally interesting and frightening to me. The haunted pitch of wind blowing through a small crack in a window or a distant train whistle at night. I’ll never forget a second grade field trip to see David Van Teigem perform at UPAC in Kingston. It was there that I heard a waterphone [stainless-steel resonator bowl or pan with a cylindrical neck and bronze resonating rods around the rim] for the first time; the sound stayed in my head for weeks. In third grade, I stepped into an after-school dance class and heard ’90s trance music for the first time. My mom caught wind of this excitement and how the music was miraculously focusing my energy. With a recommendation from the lifeguard at the local public pool, she got me an Orbital record for Christmas. Around this same time, a classmate’s parent made me a mix CD with Aphex Twin and other ’90s electronic music. My folks played plenty of Beatles, Bob Dylan, The Band, etc. in the house, but they also played a lot of music from Africa, India, Mongolia, and beyond. It was really the non-Western and electronic music that took hold of me. My friends and peers of the time hated electronic music. It really wasn’t until college that I connected with people who had this deep mutual appreciation.
Your self-titled 2014 debut EP came out of your studying African drumming in Guinea. What was that experience like? Reaching back to your own roots, how has the Hudson Valley shaped your music?
Growing up in the Hudson Valley was definitely isolating at times, but it was also magical and exposed me to a lot of meaningful things at a young age. I was very lucky to grow up playing West African percussion with my teachers, Pam and Mimo Camara. During my first year in college, they invited me to study with them for a month in Conakry, Guinea. I witnessed a new level of musical devotion and musicianship on this trip. We played music together all day, every day, in a place where music and community were inseparable. Another important thing to note is the landscape and environmental elements of the Hudson Valley: The forests, the seasons, the rivers, and the mountains have grown in importance to me over the years. What started as maybe an unconscious appreciation has become the main driving force in my music and my life: snow, wind, foliage, frost, lightning, rain, and so on.
You describe your new album, Windswept: Expansions, as a “sonic exploration of the wind as a ‘powerful, deep, unpredictable and at times overwhelming spirit.’” Can you expand a bit here on the backstory of the theme? Where did the inspiration for the concept come from, and what was the process of manifesting it like during the making of the album?
The album concept and palette were informed by the song “Derecho,” which I had started back in April 2020. It was obviously a very heavy time in the world, and while the social stillness was alarming, it also opened up new sensitivities. The winds were very intense that spring and I remember working on music one afternoon while observing the deep hum of wind roaring across a 40-mile radius. Through listening, I felt connected across miles of land. I become increasingly drawn to weather and shifts in the atmosphere as a reminder of the Earth’s aliveness and our vulnerability to it. Almost every song on the record features a synth patch that I created to express this feeling. It’s a deep bass tone with white noise swirling above. Similar to the wind, it’s hard to tame—sometimes gentle and other times temperamental.
Recently there has been much talk about AI and how it’s altering the creation of music, along with so many other aspects of life and humanity. As an artist who works with technology, what are your thoughts about the rise of AI and the future it points to?
If you’re a forward-thinking artist, then you probably embrace new forms of technology and find ways to interact with a changing world through your medium. AI has long existed in digital music software as a tool for artists. However, this new wave of AI feels threatening and unregulated. My biggest concern are the tech monsters like Spotify who are using this technology to actually replace artists all together.
On a positive note, I recently saw the legendary group Autechre perform in Los Angeles. They created their own software nicknamed “The System” back in the early 2000s. It opens up a sort of generative field for improvisation and a never-ending stream of musical ideas. It’s sonically mind-blowing and completely unique to them. The music is also pretty deranged and not for everyone. I’m not someone who lives in nostalgia, but I also don’t believe in losing ourselves in technology. Some of my favorite electronic music is still connected to the body and the Earth. When it becomes too intellectual, too heady, too carried away, it loses its soul. I’ve always been interested in the intersection of our earthly qualities and technology. There’s a nice balance in the middle. Especially if you’re a drummer.
Your music is perhaps identified as living more within the home-studio recording process and the controlled listening experience of those who encounter it via your releases. How does your music differ in that setting, compared to the recordings? What do you most hope that people get from attending your shows?
I grew up performing in bands. It’s a huge part of my life. Although the studio process is a big part of my music, I always strive to find ways to represent it live. The shows are usually a blend of unreleased material and reimagined pieces from my records. The live show is textural, rhythmic, melodic, and experimental. I try to break down a lot of musical barriers by pulling influences across a large spectrum and hopefully bringing them into a unified sound. I hope it leaves people feeling a bit more connected to one another and connected to their environment or in other words, present.
This article appears in November 2025.
