Duo Chronicles Videos: Recent Episodes
Duo Chronicles
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k8M-zIQms8 Well, we made it. 52 weeks later, we’ve put up a new video every single Tuesday. Every week, a new arrangement, a new recording, a new video, and most of the time, a new composition altogether. Most people’s reaction to me mentioning that we’re finishing the project is that they can’t believe it’s been … Continue reading Week 52 – The Final Week
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SWD2MKhiJU True North, is thought of as the direction along the earth’s surface towards the geographic North Pole. This the title for this weeks composition. Throughout this project it has been more challenging to write about the music than to work on the music. There is no time really for analysis in the moment, one can … Continue reading Week 46 – True North
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=lteWWU2x_yI In the bebop era, it was a common practice to take a popular song and write a new melody over the familiar chord changes. Charlie Parker wrote many of his tunes this way, including Donna Lee (the changes are from Indiana), Ornithology (on How High the Moon), and Koko (Cherokee). For “Affirmation,” I chose … Continue reading Week 45 – Affirmation
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmgf9JSR1iA The title “The Road Taken” is based on of one of more popular Robert Frost most poems, “The Road Not Taken.” The whole idea for the music stems from a particular chord that I like to use, a major chord with the 4th added so a kind of consonant dissonance occurs between the 3rd … Continue reading Week 44 – The Road Taken
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkhPsSUQ0Jk Quadrivium — from Latin, meaning “a crossroads. A place where four roads meet” This composition is a modern choral of sorts, with four clarinet parts playing what might be more traditional sung in four part harmony, or played on an organ. My inspiration came from the fabulous ECM recordings of saxophonist Jan Garbarek improvising … Continue reading Week 43 – Quadrivium
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=hr0yHx-88fA For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been at Portland Center Stage as part of the orchestra for a production of the “25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.” The show is a musical comedy, following a rather unusual group of children (as well as some audience volunteers) through a farcical spelling bee in which the word the students … Continue reading Week 41 – Be Smart, Be Cool…
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkPZMC0Vmko Influence is all around us whether we are conscious of it or not. Ultimately what resonates with us comes out in how we express ourselves and in our art. Chances are if a thought or idea resonates with you, it probably does with someone else as well. I like to think of this as … Continue reading Week 39 – The Valley Below
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAMUdSSRJNo The title for this weeks composition is a ode to the ending of the popular television show “Lost,” which is ending this month after six seasons. Much of the appeal of the show for me is not only the individual characters and their stories, but also the use of time as well. Flash-backs, flash-forwards … Continue reading Week 38 – The Island
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=f342tJieuzc A ritual has an inherent shape or form built in. From this one can let the story unfold in this space. This space is the possibility of sound or rather one possibility at one given time. Improvising to me is like observing and observance is a ritual. I really like the vibe John and … Continue reading Week 37 – Ritual
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGAVENHlAwc I wrote “Open Road, Closed Door” just a couple of weeks after moving from New York to Portland in November of ’07. If I remember correctly, the first performance of the song was at the Portland Jazz Festival in February 2008 when I was featured at Darrell Grant’s young artist series at the Old … Continue reading Week 36 – Open Road, Closed Door