Sword in the Shadow excerpt 1





This is an excerpt from the score to Sword in the Shadow, a film by Vincent Ferriero. The flute is performed by James Nyoraku Schleffer, a Brooklyn native and Shakuhachi virtuoso whom I hired to perform the score. The score also features Taiko drums which I sequenced using my sampler. The film is a period piece set in feudal Japan about a group of Samurai and the drama that unfolds in their camp when one Samurai steals and another cheats. I’ll keep updating on where and when the screenings are when they happen.

The Feed





Finally, I’m releasing these. This is the end credit music for The Feed, a film by Benjamin Berger that I scored earlier this year. The film is set in a dystopian future where every person has a computer in their brain making them capable of interfacing with every other human being and making instantly available all the information in the world. No one seems perturbed by the effects of this except a doctor by the name of Tobin, who is responsible for performing the procedure.

This is one version of the end credits, derived from a piano theme that served as underscoring to a flashback scene in the movie. Hopefully, the video will be available to me soon to post. For now, it should be screened several times in NYC over the next few months.

Quivering Filament of Incandescent Bulb – world premiere!


This is the audio from the World Premiere of Quivering Filament of Incandescent Bulb at Galapagos Art Space in DUMBO, Brooklyn on May 10th, 2012. Quivering Filament of Incandescent Bulb began as a short melodic motive inspired by an image I witnessed while sitting at my piano: a filament in an old light bulb in my desk lamp seemingly feebly quivering. I built a brief piano sketch out of the motive and then decided, while thinking up ways to work with live sampled audio as material for performance, that I would add a new electronic layer to the work. I have always liked the idea of creating electronic music organically, as with musique concrete, as opposed to synthesizing sound via oscillators and computer software (which can still be fun). For this piece, I sampled the performance via a mic placed inside the piano and used looping software to divide it into snippets and process them in various ways to create a unique palette of sounds that I later performed in tandem with Tania through the use of a MIDI keyboard. Read here for a description of how I set everything up with Mobius and Mainstage.

Improvisation with Tania Stavreva…





Improvising at Galapagos Art Space with Tania Stavreva. I used the same set up as with my piece Quivering Filament of Incandescent bulb, using a combination of Mainstage and Mobius to sample and loop the sounds of Tania plucking and strumming the strings inside the piano, and stretch those sounds in various ways, live, playing off of Tania’s improvisation.

The whole project was extremely fun, Rhythmic Movement, and this was one of the highlights of the night for me.

The Life



Working with George Perez on this very important project, a dramatic series to raise awareness about sex trafficking and child prostitution. I scored this project using an acoustic guitar and some affected electric guitar with delay and reverb. The chord progression is a stripped back version of the theme music I wrote for the series for full rock band, drums, bass and guitars. The opening title sequence is still in production but I will post as soon as it’s done.

Here is a link to the Facebook page for the project.