Projects for 2008

Photos of October 13th Barnes, Becker and Wright vs Ballroom Dance Is Dead show courtesy of Kim Gilmour.

Thanks to everyone who came out to our gigs with guest bassist Grant Curry. We had a lot of fun – Saturday night in particular was pretty hot. We played the first two numbers without a break, with little introduction and at a much hotter volume than the previous evening. There was a nice momentum to the show that was a result of a few suggestions Grant had before we began playing. I discovered that I can and should talk less in between numbers.

Some of my dancer friends told me later they had to resist the urge to get up and dance during the middle section of my Shanty Town Suite which of course made me feel great. It was good to see some people I haven’t seen in awhile who I met back when Rachel Cohen and I were putting together If The Shoe Fits.

Grant has returned to New Orleans where he has a recording studio in Algiers. Hope to work with him again soon.

Coming up in February 2008. Another installment (two performances are scheduled along with open rehearsals) of Thrown - an ongoing collaborative work involving dance, music and clay with choreography by Rachel Cohen. We will be working with artist Patty Rosenblatt for this performance. I'll be composing the music and performing it live with Flip, Lynn and special guest Helga Davis on vocals. Future posts will outline the compositional and rehearsal process. Working with a live vocalist will be exciting and presents new challenges to me as a composer.

I am also collaborating again with Rachel as well as Nobel Prize-winning chemist Roald Hoffmann, and light artists Clare Brew and Kenny Greenberg for an multidisciplinary performance piece exploring light, color, and movement that will premier as part of the first annual World Science Festival in June 2008. More news on that too as it develops.

In other news…

Composer Carl Stone was kind enough to reference this blog in a recent article he wrote for NewMusicBox. Carl’s CD “Mom’s” made a big impression on me when I first heard it as a composition student at Capital University - particularly the title cut, but the whole CD was revelatory.