The shadow, a feature I scored last year is finally being distributed through www.indieflix.com. you can view a clip here. You’ll see it at the bottom right of the page.
It’s also got a screening in London on march the 17th at the Charlotte street Hotel. Woohoo!
Ok, so a blog entry has been well overdue, and I’ve been meaning to write about stuff for a long time now. Needless to say a lot has been happening. On a personal level and on a career level.
So to start where I left off last, brings me to announce my best news yet which is that we are expecting our first child in two months! This is immensely good news and we are naturally very excited. A much anticipated addition to our little family, even our hound Pia can’t wait. She told me so…
Things have been brewing on other fronts. The Feature film I did last year ‘The Shadow’ got picked up in the US by a distributer and is dually doing the festival rounds this year. And I just heard that ‘Crossing Borders’ another feature documentary I did the sound design for a while back, won the Illinois international film festival best Documentary award. Not exactly a top rung festival, but still something to add to the kudos collection.
In July of last year I was approached by Fiyah Films to work on two short films for them. One of them, I Was The Baker, is now almost complete and I will be posting a clip of it up here very soon. A beautiful and sad film about the Rwandan atrocities seen from the eyes of a British immigrant.
In the ever expanding world of music technology, and the ever expanding virtual studio, I was asked to write a review of an instrument that gets the most use for me- the piano. Although I have my very own and very old Bechstein upright piano, I will use a variety of virtual ‘computer’ pianos in my productions. This is because they are far more transportable, no tuning needed on them, (I know that doesn’t make sense, being a piano tuner myself), and they can fit into any kind of production with a little bit of tweaking. So I did a little shoot-out between the creme de la creme of the piano world. You can read it here .
My foray into blurring the boundries between music and sound design is proving well and I just finished a corporate advert for HSE. Working with the team at ESA Films was great as they are really good craftsmen and able to convey their ideas very clearly, both to the client and to me. Check the video out on my portfolio page
Next week I’m off to Berlin to complete work on Kaisen and the upcoming album P.u.u.u.rification. It’s been about a year since we started working on some ideas, and it has now grown into a full blown album. This is really great and it’s meant I’ve had the opportunity to marry both my love of piano improvisation, orchestral arrangement and electronic soundscapes into one coherent body. Plus I get to have a record in my hands. nonine I love you guys! A release date is not confirmed yet but will be early march. Stay tuned for a little preview soon.
I am now also being represented by Eaton Music, a well respected TV and Film publisher and composer agent. This is a step in the right direction for me I believe, and I’m very happy to be working with the very nice people at Eaton!
The new year has eased itself in very smoothly and I’ve not even noticed the change in gears, but things have shifted and we’re on a wider road now.
Stay tuned for more news as things progress
In attempt to sit down and write my entry in here for nigh on a month now, I’ve acumulated more and more events and news as the days went by. Which is great, but you end up sitting here reading this like it was my life history, instead of small titbits every few couple of weeks. But never mind, you can read my twittering for a daily digest….
Well, first off I’ll tell you about my canceled trip to the Seychelles. Actually there’s nothing to tell because I never went. Through an acquaintance in the piano business, I was offered the opportunity to travel to the Seychelles and maintain the pianos for the International Classical Music Festival there.
I was very excited. Firstly to travel to the Seychelles, as it’s not the kind of place you get to on a budget airline on a weekend break! My wife Keren, sadly couldn’t join me, as she had a busy week herself. Secondly, since the pianos had not been seen to over the past three years, who knows what condition they were going to be in. It was an exciting challenge to predict what kind of tools I should bring, and travel lightly at the same time.
I was trying to plan my next few weeks and work around scoring the soundtrack for The Shadow ( more about that soon) and as I was supposed to travel to the Seychelles on Saturday the 23rd of May, things were getting a little tricky. On the thursday I get an email from the Festival organizers to say the festival has been canceled! Due to serious logistical problems, they decided to cancel the whole festival. This had been relayed by email to 120 other musicians, technical staff and crew. Wow! Apparently things had not come together between the different organizations responsible for the smooth running of the festival.
Blessing in disguise? Maybe, as it gives me more time to finish the soundtrack for The Shadow. A few weeks ago, a friend and colleague of mine, Frank Ilfman, asked me if I’d like to collaborate with him to score a low budget feature. It was more of a favour to the director, but this has it’s merits.
So we started plotting and spotting, and delivered a cue sheet with no less than 34 cues! It’s a psychological horror flick without the gore. Actually very good, with a great film editor attached. Frank turns round a few days later and asks if I’ll take it on myself as he’d just got offered another film in Dublin.
This is my first Feature and I’m well pleased! So the heat is on and I am deep in scoring mode.
Another titbit is my new online music store hosted by youlicense. This is a great place for me to host my music, 3rd party free, and have direct contact with my customers. It’s also a great place to send people to listen to selected playlists from my catalogue. Check it out!
Our dog will be 1 year old next week. Thats 7 in doggy year. Boy does se act her age.
Febuary has been and gone and we are hurtling into spring at an alarming rate. Evenings are getting longer and we can take the dog out later in the afternoon without having to come back in the dark.
So I just came back from Berlin where I had an intense few days working on Kaisen, alongside nonine recordings owner Me Raabenstein, on some ideas we have been cooking up for a while. The idea was to collate some of these and start putting body to skeleton. The album concept is based around the exploration of space and form where each track is an aural picture of a real space; a busy airport, a side street in an urban jungle. The instrumentation is an interesting mix of found sound, glitch electronica and elements of classical orchestration, creating an edgy mix of down tempo ambient soundscapes. We are looking at sometime the end of the year for a release date, but we’ll most probably have an EP’s worth of material by the spring. Watch this space……
Another little project I was involved in recently was the East London Cycling Project which was part of the Do something different week at the Barbican.
‘Take a virtual ride and experience the boroughs of East London on different tours designed and run by Vitra London. Each tour is an exciting, interactive glimpse into the cultural myths of the East End and features the sights, smells and sounds of the kingdom on our doorstep.’
check it out here. I stitched together the music for this project.
Other things are on horizon, branching out and away a little from my film focus over the last couple of years, but that’s cool. I’m really open to new things and have a great feeling about forthcoming projects this year.
Tune in next month for some updates.
My excuse for not keeping some consistency up on my blog has been because I was just getting my head round it. My real reason was because I am lazy and too busy beavering away at something too important to write about. But yes, it did eventually dawn on my that I could let others know what I’m up to by posting in my blog! Yay! I have woken up.
So, to start off I have embarked on a very interesting collaboration on a project called Kaisen with a guy called Me Raabenstein who heads nonine records in Berlin. This is a journey into experimental electronica and contemporary classical/avant garde music. Some of the pieces on the album is material of mine that has featured on film in the past, and some of it is totally new. Watch this space…..and the album’s release in the spring. Also check out Kaisen.
Another great opporunity came my way a few weeks ago in the guise of the Royal Academy of Arts who commissioned me to write a series of pieces for a documentary that is being shown as part of the Palladio exhibition which runs till April at the Royal Academy. This was fantastic as I was reminded what one can achieve given such a short space of time. Check it out and go see it if you can- RA
The month is Febuary and London has not seen snow like today in 18 years they say. The many sounds of snow are just incredible….
Well the summer season is well and truly upon us (apparently) and it has been quite a busy couple of months.
Firstly I did the sound design and mix on a short documentary called the King of Laughter, a 3 Minute Wonder for Channel 4 following the laughing champion of the world, Belachew Girma, as he tries to cheer england up.
I then got going on the sound design for Crossing borders, a rather poignant documentary tracing a week long interaction between Morrocan and American students. This doc came at a time when the world was crying out for some positive stories between the great East meets West cultural divide. For me it was a great experience working with a very international team, and to do a feature length project for the first time.
Amidst getting a puppy named Pia and redecorating our bathroom, life rumbles on….
Hello, and welcome to my Blog. This is a space for upcoming news regarding what I’m up to, and any interesting collaborations I happen to enter as time passes.
The first of these is a project called Hotel Deville . Dreamt up by fellow composer and singer Rhett Brewer, this is an ever evolving musical and cinematic project. We currently perform in London and are about to embark on a studio recorded album of songs for piano, voice and other accompanied furry animals. Stay tuned….
Hatemail. A short film by a man with many credits. Frazer churchill…..
