Since 2009, Rhythmplex has presented the music and multi-disciplinary projects of drummer and percussionist Jon Mueller. Project partnerships have included organizations such as AIGA, Alverno Presents, Eaux Claires Festival, Shaker Heritage Society, Bjorklunden and Viva! Art Montreal. Whether involving teams of people from various disciplines or simply Mueller himself, the aim for all projects is to reveal something personally meaningful that resonates onward.

The following people have contributed to Rhythmplex projects: Marielle Allschwang, And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Crumbs, Martha Bayne, Matt Blair, Betty Blexrud-Strigens, Stacy Blint, Jeff Bradley, Sarah Bradley, Reverend William Bradley, Jesse Bransford, Amalinda Burich, Alison Chesley, Hans Christian, Faith Coloccia, Tyler Damon, Starlyn D'Angelo, Mark Dawursk, Chris DeMay, Loren Dempster, Ariele Ebacher, Kim Eckstein, Mark Fairbanks, Scott Fields, Niki Feijen, Jaime Fennelly, Mark Franke, William Ryan Fritch, Angelique Grandone, Sally Haldorson, Samantha Hall-Saladino, Ken Hanson, Adam Heathcott, Chris Hefner, Nathaniel Heuer, Ania Hildago, Rebecca Hinsdale, Dixie Jacobs, Chris Koelle, Jessi Kolberg, Andrew Lange, Sharon Lanza, Rollie Layman, Tom Lecky, Laura Lippert, Jeff Lipton, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Jeff Lutsey, Andrew McKenzie, Grace McKirdy, Blyth Meier, Ann Marie Meiers, Janel Meindersee, Jon Minor, Meredith Miller, Andrew Morgan, Gretchen Morganstern, Jon Mueller, Teresa Mueller, Margaret Muza, Sara Padgett-Heathcott, Margaret Paek, Ken Palme, Bruce Collin Paulson, Natasha Pickowicz, James Plotkin, Jeremy Popelka, Hal Rammel, Lillian Rammel, David Ravel, Alexandria Reindl, Jessica Reinke, Jordan Reyes, Maria Rice, Chris Rosenau, Jen Schattschneider-Roach, Aaron Schleicher, Dylan Schleicher, Molly Shanahan, Kaveh Soofi, Daniel Spack, Dawn Springer, Damian Strigens, Katie Stimson, Phillip Sudderberg, Rory Trainor, Stephanie Trenchard, Aaron Turner, Matt Turner, Todd Umhoefer, David Utzinger, Ken Vandermark, Christal Wagner, Mark Waldoch, Jim Warchol, Erin Wolf, and Milan Zori.

The fire illustration on the the homepage was done by artist Chris Koelle. This site was designed by Jon Minor. Photo below by Stephan Anderson-Story.

Renowned percussionist and drummer Jon Mueller is celebrated for his uncommon technique, rigor and virtuosity.

Mueller’s aim has been to move drums, percussion and rhythm from its anticipated backbeat to a central musical focus, something more intuitive and natural than usually imagined. Audiences throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Japan, and the United Kingdom have experienced this idiosyncratic point of view as, paradoxically, both ‘cathartic’ and ‘meditative’. Notable solo performances have taken place at the Guggenheim Museum, New Museum, Issue Project Room, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal, Alverno Presents, Columbia Experimental Music, Festival, SXSW, Big Ears Festival, Hopscotch Fest and Witching Hour Festival. His solo recordings have been released by Table of the Elements, Type Recordings, Important Records, Taiga Records, SIGE Records, American Dreams, and others.

Jon Mueller plays Dream Cymbals.

Two examples illustrate Mueller’s goal of an ever-deepening mindfulness on the part of both performers and audience, joining the two as equal participants in the act of creation.

INITIATION is a record by Jon Mueller. Written and recorded over the winter months of 2014, using four bass drums, voice, and bells, the compositions reference ritual, trance and origins of music at a hypnotic and rhythmic bpm. This record, however, is not available on an LP, CD, DVD, or even digital format. Instead, the recorded compositions are only presented during venue-based events incorporating projected video (Chris Hefner) and live dance (Dawn Springer). In essence, each performance venue becomes a discreet, non-reproducible media format. INITIATION is intended as an exclusive live experience, a new way of living inside a record. INITIATION premiered at the 2015 Eaux Claires Festival.

From 2013-15, Mueller created and directed the multi-disciplinary project DEATH BLUES. DEATH BLUES is a multivalent project that boldly asks big questions: “What happens when we thoroughly hold and understand that our lives are finite?  How does this understanding of our end shape our present?  How do we become more ‘present’?” DEATH BLUES utilizes a number of methods of communication, writing, recording, images, movement, video, taste, performance, and more, creating an experience that’s understood in a more personal way that develops over time. At the premiere of its first iteration at Alverno Presents in November 2012, each of the audiences’ five senses was consciously engaged – a menu of small, custom confections that asked, among other things, what was the taste of your first kiss – a labyrinth from the lobby to the stage with artisanal scents at each turn – all leading the audience to join 30 plus performers on stage. Mary Louise Schumacher of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel wrote “It makes such sense that a drummer, as a sort of ascetic, would offer up a meditation on the measure of time. And what it means to end. “

The project issued four critically acclaimed recordings. Rolling Stone cited Non-Fiction as one of the ‘20 Best Avant Albums of 2014’. Ensemble, created with multi-instrumentalist William Ryan Fritch, was featured on NPR’s ‘First Listen’.

In the late 1990s/early 2000s, Mueller was the drummer in the bands Pele and Collections of Colonies of Bees, both of which released numerous records and toured internationally. He later joined with band mates from these groups and vocalist Justin Vernon of Bon Iver to form Volcano Choir. Volcano Choir’s 2013 record Repave debuted at number 40 on the Billboard charts. The group performed on the NBC show Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, experienced multiple sold out tours in the US, Canada, and Europe, and performed at international festivals such as Primavera and Osheaga.

In 2016, Mueller began working as part of the expanded lineup of Jaime Fennelly's Mind Over Mirrors. The initial record featuring this lineup, Undying Color, received critical acclaim from NPR, The Quietus, and more. The group toured the U.S. in support of the record throughout 2017. In 2018, they released Bellowing Sun, a large-scale performance beneath an immersive light installation that premiered in April 2018 at Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. 

Mueller has also worked with artists Jason Kahn, Asmus Tietchens, Z’EV, Aaron Turner, Faith Coloccia, Andrew McKenzie, Rhys Chatham, Jarboe, James Plotkin, Duane Pitre, Jonathan Kane, and Raymond Dijkstra.

From 1999 – 2009 Mueller owned the record label and promotion company Crouton, which published and promoted over 40 releases in deluxe presentations from artists such as The Hafler Trio, Asmus Tietchens, Z’EV, Osso Exotico, Daniel Menche, Jason Kahn, Raymond Dijkstra, Richard Chartier, Lionel Marchetti, Robert Hampson, Jarboe, and more. Crouton also organized events in the Milwaukee and Chicago areas with artists from around the world. These were documented by the press and filmed as part of a PBS documentary on jazz musician Ken Vandermark.

Mueller has given talks about listening and creativity at Bard College, Witching Hour Festival, Loyola University, Viva! Art Action, Wesleyan University and PechaKucha, focusing on how to think of one’s work outside of the usual parameters, in other words, preaching what Mueller has long practiced.

In 1990, Mueller studied music theory at Columbia College. Private drum lessons with Hal Russell led to the frantic energy of Pele and was further distilled during Collections of Colonies of Bees. As he focused further on minimalism, repetition and overtones, with a goal of achieving ecstatic states of being, his practice led him to private voice lessons from La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela in 2018.