Education
- 1989–1992 California Institute of the Arts (Composition)
- 1985–1986 UC Berkeley / UCLA (Music and Mathematics)
Performance
Crickets with Mungo Thomson
Field recordings of crickets transcribed into a 25-movement score for 17-member classical ensemble. Composed, orchestrated, and conducted by Michael Webster.
- 2013 The High Line, New York — High Line Art / Make Music New York
- 2012 Greystone Mansion, Los Angeles — The Ball of Artists, Pacific Standard Time Public Art and Performance Festival
- 2010 REDCAT, Los Angeles
Score published by LAXART / Christoph Keller Editions / JRP|Ringier, 2014
Still/Restless Rosanna Gamson/World Wide
Evening-length score for two-act dance work choreographed by Rosanna Gamson.
- 2017 El Camino College, Marsee Auditorium, Torrance
- 2016 REDCAT, Los Angeles (premiere)
Shakey’s with Joe Sola
Ongoing performance collaboration combining comedy, art historical critique, slapstick, props, sculpture, drawing, music, and destruction.
- 2013 Der Hintern in Der Luft, 356 S. Mission Rd, Los Angeles
- c. 2010 Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE)
- 2007 Bananas at the Hammer, Billy Wilder Theatre, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
- c. 2007 Shakey’s Mining Adventure, FR8 Festival, Angels Gate Cultural Center, San Pedro
- 2005 Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE)
- Happy Lion Gallery, Los Angeles
Other Performances
- 2008 Whitney Museum of American Art — Mungo Thomson, Coat Check Chimes (audio consultant)
- 2005 MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Los Angeles — Fade on Family (Scores for the Moving Image)
- 2005 Lulea Summer Biennal, Sweden — Songs from Los Angeles for the People of Lulea, with Simon Leung
Opera
- 2006 Hell — PS122, New York (11 performances). Produced by Beth Morrison Projects
- 2004 Hell — St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, New York; Hammer Museum, UCLA, Los Angeles; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco; Centro Cultural Tijuana (CECUT), Mexico
- 2003 The Side of the Mountain — REDCAT, Los Angeles (LA Independent Film Festival)
- 2002 The Side of the Mountain — Santa Monica Museum of Art
- 2018 Nice Day for the Races — The Box, Los Angeles
- 2013 Nice Day for the Races (screening) — 356 S. Mission Rd, Los Angeles
- 2025 Return to Tomorrow
- 2017 Fade on Family (video) — “storefront: THIS KNOWN WORLD,” Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles
- Fade on Family — Poetic Research Bureau, Los Angeles
- 2005 Fade on Family — MAK Center, Los Angeles (premiere)
Video
Kitty 54
- 2014 “Another Cats Show,” 356 S. Mission Rd, Los Angeles
The First Karaoke: ENKA! with Bruce Yonemoto
Arranged and recorded by Michael Webster. Bruce Yonemoto’s multi-channel video installation reviving the political origins of Japanese Enka music.
- 2019 Art Basel Hong Kong (Chi-Wen Gallery)
- 2017 Doizaki Gallery, Japanese American Cultural & Community Center, Los Angeles
- 2017 Chi-Wen Gallery, Taipei
- 2015 “An Asian Survey,” Hong-Gah Museum, Taipei
Soundtracks
Sharon Lockhart
- 1997 Goshogaoka — 16mm film, 63 min. Premiere Venice Biennale
Kerry Tribe
- 2016 Exquisite Corpse — video, 51 min
- 2015 Aphasia Poetry Club — three-channel video installation
- 2012 There Will Be ___ (Greystone) — 35mm film
- 2009 H.M. — double 16mm projection, 18 min. Premiere Hammer Museum
- 2017 Standardized Patient
Maura Brewer
- 2024 Offshore
- 2024 Leverage
- 2021 Private Client Services
- 2021 1550 Blue Jay Way
- 2020 Jessica Manafort
- 2019 X
- 2016 The Surface of Mars
- 2015 :/nterstellar
- 2014 Zero Dark Birthday
Joe Sola
- 2007 Hunter — premiere LACMA
- Brown Sound
- 2005 Rescue — premiere American Cinematheque
Installation
- 2017–2018 5-0 — with Monique Prieto. The Great Poor Farm Experiment IX, Little Wolf, Wisconsin. Curated by Michelle Grabner and Brad Killam. Supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
Discography
- 2008 Tracy Chapman, Our Bright Future — Atlantic Records (piano, vibes)
- 2008 Joe Moe, Mainland — PuluPhonic Records (piano, writing, production)
- 2005 Tracy Chapman, Where You Live — Elektra Records (vocals, keyboards)
- 2002 Songs from the Book of Pooh — Buena Vista Records (writing, production)
- 2002 Tracy Chapman, Let It Rain — Elektra Records (arrangement, conducting)
- 2000 Michael Webster, Lotus Festival — Lovethink
- 1994 Native Shrubs of the Santa Monica Mountains — Relentless Records
Reviews & Press
- 2017 “The First Karaoke: Enka!”, ArtReview Asia
- 2016 Still/Restless at REDCAT, Bachtrack
- 2016 “Choreographer Rosanna Gamson delivers a ‘Restless’…”, Los Angeles Times
- 2013 Travis Diehl, “Joe Sola and Michael Webster”, Artforum (review of Der Hintern in Der Luft)
- 2006 “Eileen Myles’s Hell”, Culturebot
- 2006 “Eileen Myles and Michael Webster go to Hell”, jameswagner.com
- 2006 Leonard Lopate Show, WNYC (interview)
- 2005 Josef Woodard, “Summer Brings a Deep End Dunking,” Los Angeles Times
- 2004 Justin Davidson, “Bass Notes of Sadness, High Notes of Rage,” Newsday
- 2003 Christopher Miles, “Concert Notes from Near the Side of the Mountain,” X-tra, Vol. 5 No. 4
- 2002 Peter Frank, “Pick of the Week,” LA Weekly
- 2001 Gerhard Honekamp, “CD Neuerscheinungen: Lotus Festival,” California Saga
- 2000 Gwynne Garfinkle, “Michael Webster: Lotus Festival,” New Times LA
- 1999 Stephen Prina, “Music: Best of the Nineties,” Artforum
- Lane Relyea, “Joe Sola”, BOMB Magazine
Grants
- 2006 Jerome Foundation; Puffin Foundation
- 2005 Meet the Composer
- 2011 Foundation for Contemporary Arts