Matthew Daher: The Wisdom to Know the Difference

Detroit artist Matthew Daher’s creative work is an exploration of mental health, empathy, spirituality and masculinity. His practice is informed by over 15 years of experimentation in ambient, electroacoustic, jazz, hip-hop, and folk music, meditation practice, and experimental movement practices.The Wisdom to Know the Difference is Matthew Daher’s electroacoustic solo project exploring the limits and possibilities of control and agency on both a sonic and spiritual level. Using Ableton Live, contact mic drum triggers, and samplers, Daher processes acoustic drums and vocals, blends them with lush textures, and triggers other sonic events from the drumkit at varying degrees of randomness. Song-structured webs of intended and unintended sonic consequences emerge in compositions that explore grief, ancestral communion, astrology, social anxiety, archetypal parts of self, and other themes related to mental health and healing. Daher has performed the project in over 20 cities across the eastern US and Canada, including performances at the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.