Hi ~ ~ my name is Ben Seretan.
I make music - different types, more often than not with a guitar, some singing, some songs, sometimes with a band or other people. I like things that are long or too much or over the top or too personal or bursting at the seams. I like music that changes very slowly over time or is repetitive. I like things that like life. I like music that changes a room and performances that acknowledge their particularity.
I like playing normal shows at venues but I might prefer more unusual or more intimate places - I’ve played in an apartment bathroom with a mattress in it and at pop up roller rink in a former greeting card factory, but I’ve also played in churches, living rooms, galleries, olive groves, and once standing on the wheelhouse of a tall ship that was anchored off the coast of Maine. I am open to basically whatever if you’d like me to come play in your space and you’re not lame.
Currently I’m running a project called My Big Break - a newsletter with writing and a new slice of freshly recorded music every Thursday. You can subscribe to that here.
In June I put out an album-length track of celestial rippers with my buddy M. Geddes Gengras - our band is called Friends Meeting and the recording really sprawls out, cosmic chaise lounger.
Also earlier this year I put together a Bandcamp-only compilation of tracks I recorded for My Big Break, called it Heaven is a Void Between Load Screens. They’re really evocative and kind of lonely but to my ears they carry a deep warmth, too.
In 2022 I was commissioned by Tiny Showcase to put together four weeks worth of writing and music - the result is sandhills music, a cassette tape that soundtracks the emotional wallop of a storm rolling in one afternoon in North Carolina. You can read the entire text + listen to the music here.
My most recent kinda more traditional album release is called CICADA WAVES - a collection of serene, barely-there piano recordings I made while the cacophony of nature raged all around me one summer in Georgia. You can listen to it here.
I live in Climax, NY right now but I lived in NYC for a a long time, lived in Connecticut for a while, and I grew up in California, which I think about a lot. Right now I work doing basically a little of everything for Basilica Hudson. I take freelance work recording stuff, designing stuff, writing stuff, etc (don’t be shy). I also still do live sound sometimes, mostly at the Avalon Lounge.
Here are some other things you might find interesting about me:
My undergraduate thesis was a collection of short essays about Arthur Russell paired with a concert of interpretations of his work
I once sang some of my songs at the national gallery of Albania
I am a certified notary public in the state of New York (update: my license lapsed)
I once shook hands with Neil Young and he made fun of me (in a nice way)
I lost 60 lbs in 2018 (and probably gained it all back during COVID)
I have a stick and poke tattoo of the Del Taco logo
I briefly cared for a famous turtle professionally, I also once worked for a painting dog
I briefly starred in a web series about a professional cuddler