Robbie Lee is an artist who thrives on collaboration. Among his recent partners: Guitarist Mary Halvorson, who won a 2019 MacArthur “Genius Grant,” and composer Lea Bertucci, whose album Resonant Field, named a top Jazz album of 2019 by the New York Times, featured Lee on flute. 

In the following exchange, which took place over several months via a shared Google document, the multi-instrumentalist, composer, and producer weighs in on David Bowie, his love of duos, NYC’s experimental music scene of the 1990s, and what it means to be a contemporary composer most comfortable in that liminal space between genres.