20 Facts About Constance Demby

Constance Mary Demby was an American musician, composer, painter, sculptor, and multimedia producer.

Constance Demby's music included new age, ambient, and space music styles.

Constance Demby is best known for her 1986 album Novus Magnificat and her two experimental musical instruments, the sonic steel space bass and the whale sail.

Constance Demby continued with her music studies, during which Demby took to painting and sculpture and received an "Excellence in Art" award for her work from Pine Manor College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.

Constance Demby studied sculpture and painting at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where she received a Highby Award for excellence in art in 1960.

In 1960, Constance Demby quit her studies and moved to Greenwich Village in New York City.

Constance Demby continued to work as a musician and sculptor, combining these disciplines with her first sheet metal sound sculptures, built in 1966.

Constance Demby was torching a sheet of metal in her sculptural practice when she noticed the low tones and unusual sounds that the vibrating metal produced, which subsequently led to the development of her first handmade instruments.

In 1967, Constance Demby used these sculptures in a series of happening-style events at the Charles Street Gallery named A Fly Can't Bird But a Bird Can Fly, owned by Robert Rutman.

Constance Demby welded a curved metal sheet to several steel rods which she played as a percussion instrument.

Constance Demby studied yoga with Ajaib Singh and, in 1977, co-formed the Gandharva Performing Arts Company, a duo featuring the flute, tabla and dulcimer with Robert Bennett.

Constance Demby made her studio recording debut on Dorothy Carter's debut album, Troubadour.

In 1979, following a pilgrimage to India, Constance Demby settled in Marin County, California, just north of San Francisco.

Constance Demby founded the record label Sound Currents to release her second album, Sunborne, inspired by the Emerald Tablets of Thoth the Atlantean, a 20th century work by occultist Maurice Doreal.

Constance Demby's hammer dulcimer-oriented album Sacred Space Music followed on the Hearts of Space Records label.

Constance Demby performed at the Alaron Center in Sausalito, spawning her Live at Alaron album which displays themes the in her definitive studio album, Novus Magnificat.

In 2000, Constance Demby left California for Spain, eventually settling in Sitges near Barcelona, where she recorded Sanctum Sanctuorum, a reworked version of Faces of the Christ with added keyboard parts and choral and Gregorian chant.

Constance Demby returned to the US in 2004, touring the West Coast presenting concerts and healing workshops.

The International Space Science Institute commissioned Constance Demby to create a score for the film I AM, and Constance Demby's album Spirit Trance features four selections from the film.

Constance Demby died from complications of a heart attack in Pasadena, California, on March 20,2021, at age 81.