September 28, 2023

Hindisght and Seven Visions CDs

Also pleased to announce the availability of my Hindsight and Seven Visions CDs on the new SoCo Local marketplace site. Will be adding digital downloads, song production for reggae artist Caesar Myles, and lots more of my music soon.

September 4, 2023

Scottish Voices: Crossing Musical Frontiers

I'm very pleased to announce the availability of the new album, Crossing Musical Frontiers, by Scottish Voices, which includes a recording of my piece The Well, for three female voices and electronics. It is available on Spotify, as well as on the Naxos Music Library subscription service. And will be available on CD later this Autumn.

August 21, 2019

Film Music for ZWEEN

Recently I was asked by filmmaker (and friend of mine) John Slattery, to create some music for a short film of his. He asked for four pieces: two pop beats for contemporary teens, an 80s-inflected lo-fi electro pop piece, and a short pseudo-classical children's piano piece. Having spent the better part of last year studying, creating, and producing hip-hop beats, I am increasingly comfortable creating beat-driven music of various kinds. The music is being used diegetically; i.e. played back on set as part of the film production (rather than layered in post-production). Here are two of the short pieces I created: Dance Pop, Pub Pop.

July 18, 2019

Harpers Ferry is the name of a very historic town in West Virginia, which I visited while on a trip to the Easy Coast in April of this year. It is the site of John Brown's famous but unsuccessful attempt to mount a slave insurrection, as well as numerous civil war battles. On the same trip I had met harpist Jacqueline Pollauf at Radford Virginia, where she was involved in a concert with Scottish Voices, and played harp in a performance and recording of my piece The Joyous. Impressed with Jacqueline's sensitivity to my music, I decided to write a solo harp piece for her. And with impressions of Harpers Ferry still fresh in my mind, they began to feed into my work on the harp piece. While writing the piece I also received a lot of helpful feedback from Jacqueline about harp practicalities, which I am grateful for. And consequently, I am very happy with the way the piece turned out. And therefore very excited to learn of its upcoming premiere at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC on October 25. In lieu of Jacqueline's performance, here is a mockup of the piece.

May 18, 2019

I recently returned from a trip to Virginia where I attended a performance and recording of my piece The Joyous, given by Scottish Voices, at Radford University. This was part of Scottish Voices' week-long residency at the university, hosted by composer and faculty-member Bruce Mahin. And included a concert at the Covington Center on April 10, and recordings of compositions by Graham Hair, Bruce Mahin, Kendall Kennison, and myself. I was very happy with the performance and recording of The Joyous, and really enjoyed the collegiality during the whole week. It's very gratifying that Scottish Voices are including my female-voice pieces in their reportoire, performing them frequently at concerts. The recordngs of these pieces are slated for CD release on the Ravello label. The first of these is The Well, a preview of which is available on the Scottish Voices website.