Sean Ali

The Harmonica in My Life scatterArchive

The Harmonica in My Life is my fourth solo album and the second one to feature an exploration of instruments beyond my primary double bass. My third solo album, Quartets for Plucked Strings (Neither/Nor Records), documented a time in my life when I was an expectant father. The music on The Harmonica in My Life documents my inner life as I was experiencing the first year of fatherhood. Those experiences are responsible for the dual and somewhat paradoxical nature of the music on this album. On the one hand, there is a yearning for calm, peace, and the assurance and stability provided through ritual. On the other hand, there is dread, unease, and tension as I ponder what it means to have brought a child into a world that is marked increasingly by fascism, war, genocide, and environmental disaster. Although the music doesn’t propose resolutions to these problems, it hopefully offers some navigational path through these vicissitudes. The first piece on this album, “The Wine of the Mystic,” is scored for two chromatic harmonicas, double bass harmonica, bells, chimes, and frame drum. It reflects a longtime interest in Sufi poetry, particularly the work of Rumi and Attar, which I return to again and again as a kind of spiritual balm during challenging times as it helps reorient my place in the universe when I feel myself getting lost in the myriad and overwhelming details of the mundane world. Nature is another place I look to for this type of spiritual centering, and it underscores the approach to the second piece, “Ohio Nocturne.” This piece is scored for field recordings and a quartet of two chromatic harmonicas and two double bass harmonicas that have been slowed down to different speeds and then layered and woven together in an attempt to suggest endlessness. The field recording of the insects was made on a summer night in the Ohio countryside where I grew up. The field recording of rain on an awning was made in my backyard at my current residence in Queens, NY. Thus, these three components represent three aspects of my experience of time: my past, my present, and my own imagining of eternity. The title of the album is a nod to the great Morton Feldman, whose music has guided, shaped, challenged, and nurtured me over the years. Sean Ali - May 2026

Find It Here: The Harmonica in My Life (scatterArchive)

release date: June 22nd, 2026

Sean Ali: chromatic & double bass harmonicas, bells, chimes, frame drum, field recordings

Field Recordings Live at The Prospect Series -Sean Ali (mandolin) -Webb Crawford (tenor banjo) -Eivind Opsvik (double bass) -Carlo Costa (drums) -Flin van Hemmen (drums)

Crushed documents a live duo performance by tap dancer/percussionist Reona and double bassist Sean Ali at a small anarchist bookstore in Brooklyn in early February of 2025. The album captures an all-too-brief reunion between two artists that originally met in 2014 when Reona was visiting from Tokyo. The two played several sessions and a few performances, where they quickly discovered a kindred love of noise and improvisation augmented with found objects. Eleven years later, the duo found themselves sharing the stage for a small audience of eager listeners enthralled by the sounds of hands and feet. Please enjoy at a maximum volume.

Find It Here: Crushed

released December 4, 2025

-Reona (tap, metal percussion) -Sean Ali (double bass)

Recorded live for the Outlier Series at Property Is Theft in Brooklyn, NY on February 2nd, 2025.

Sometimes, against all better judgement, you just have to lug your double bass into the woods, even if it is still a tad bit cold. There, dead wood communes with live trees, plaintively calling for resurrection. There, metal and alloy pines to return to the soil. This selection was distilled from brisk air and fallen leaves and aged for 3.5 years, ready for your aural delight. Enjoy responsibly.

released November 17, 2025 Sean Ali: double bass, audio samples Recorded at Forest Park in Queens, NY on March 22nd, 2022.

Quartets for Plucked String Strings Neither/Nor Records

Sean Ali's third solo album on Neither/Nor Records consists of a collection of four compositions performed on a quartet for plucked string instruments: two mandolins of different shapes, an octave mandolin and an acoustic steel string guitar. The instrumentation is a variation on, and a tribute to the classical string quartet. The pieces were written when Sean was an expecting father, something which profoundly influenced the music, and include unabashedly lyrical moments along with abstract weaves of sound. Primarily known for his masterful improvising and extended vocabulary on the double bass, over the past years Sean's solo work has increasingly included compositional elements.

Find it Here: Quartets for Plucked String (Neither/Nor Records)

Sean Ali interviewed by Webb Crawford in January 2025 for the release of Quartets for Plucked Strings (n/n 027)

release date: June 20, 2025

Sean Ali - mandolins, octave mandolin, guitar, compositions

I recorded this one on a mellow, bird-enriched day in mid-June. Just days before the solstice, a little low mandolin to herald in the coming longest day of the year. Enjoy~! released April 17, 2025

Sean Ali: octave mandolin, audio samples

Recorded at Forest Park in Queens, NY on June 15th, 2023

Throughout this recording, you will hear samples of "Greensleeves" that are out of sync with each other. I found myself in a gift shop one day and activated all the Christmas toys, which were playing that song, at roughly the same time and recorded it. The other customers were possibly perturbed, but who can say? This little sample threaded its way through a bass guitar improvisation at Turtle Pond in late August. Since it was still summer, I had to pun on the title. Hence, "Greenleaves." Enjoy~!

released December 7, 2024 Sean Ali: acoustic bass guitar, audio samples

Foster/Ali/Meehan Live at Threes Brewing -Michael Foster (curved soprano & baritone saxophones) -Sean Ali (double bass, chromatic and bass harmonicas) -Sean Meehan (snare drum)

São Miguel Island presents recordings of ambient sounds found throughout various locations on Ilha de São Miguel in the Azores recorded between July 29th and August 6th, 2023. Tracks are presented as-is: unedited, unmixed, unmastered. Please adjust speaker/headphone volume accordingly.

released November 10, 2024 Sean Ali: field recordings

One unseasonably warm day in February (it was something like 75 degrees Fahrenheit, if memory serves), I took my mandolin to the banks of the Little Miami that runs through John Bryan State Park in Ohio. I was visiting from NY. I go back as frequently as I can, since I was born and grew up in the Dayton, OH area and still have many family members who live there. It marked a time in my life where I was deeply searching for connections to nature, to shed some of the existential malaise that had marked my musical aesthetics up to that point, and to focus on peacefulness of mind and health of body. Even so, there were feelings of uneasiness that were on my mind at the time. On this particular trip, I wanted to spend time with my maternal grandmother, whose health had begun failing. She passed away less than a month and a half later. Furthermore, the pleasant weather that I was enjoying so much on the day of this recording was underscored by climate change anxiety, of how the nature that I was trying to connect with to heal is under threat. "John Bryan" is my mediation in times of crisis that I humbly offer to anyone inclined to listen. credits

released September 25, 2024

Sean Ali: mandolin, voice (whispered poem)

Recorded at John Bryan State Park in Yellow Springs, OH on February 23rd, 2023.

August 13th, 2024 Improvisation at Turtle Pond -Sean Ali (tremolo and bass harmonica)

Oakland Lake Self-Release, 2024

On February 22nd, 2024 after getting a haircut, I took a walk at Oakland Lake in Queens and stumbled upon some amazing bird sounds. Fortunately, I had both my audio recorder and my bass harmonica with me. This mini-album, Oakland Lake, presents two tracks. The first track captures the ambient sounds at the lake. The second track is a continuation of the same sounds but with some long tones from my trusty bass harmonica. The recordings are presented without any editing, mixing, or mastering. In so doing, I feel it better encapsulates the unreality of that moment. However, it may mean you need to adjust your speaker/headphone volume accordingly (apologies).

released August 13, 2024

Sean Ali: field recording, bass harmonica

Recorded in the afternoon on February 22nd, 2024 at Oakland Lake in Alley Pond Park in Queens, NY.

Moritz/Ali/Costa Live at The Prospect Series -Jonathan Moritz (soprano & tenor saxophones) -Sean Ali (double bass) -Carlo Costa (drums)

Mattrey/Bordreuil/Ali Live at The Prospect Series -Joanna Mattrey (viola) -Leila Bordreuil (cello) -Sean Ali (double bass)