the viper matrix vol.1
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Good friend and frequent collaborator David Virelles wanted to see what we could do with a particular harmonic and rhythmic matrix. I told him the sky was the limit! After much tweaking, a few hits and bowed pianos, we came up with this little gem.
The coolest part about this piece is that it is very intuitive to perform. This track is easily performed live, and is constructed so that no matter how hard you try it will sound different every time. This opens up many ways to improvise and interact with additional instrumentalists… As a bonus, all of the samples are acoustic. The goal was to make a live, interactive patch that sounds as if it were a musicological field recording.
the sound of midnight minnewanka
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
During my time at the Banff Centre a bunch of fellow artists-in-residence took a midnight trip to Lake Minnewanka, a glacier-fed mountainous valley in order to get a closer look at the stars. Luckily I had my sound recorder with me and was fortunate enough to capture the innocent sound of water rolling agaist the base of the mountains. It was one of those spectacular moments in nature that instilled a great sense of peace in all of us. Eventhough it was rather cold outside, the more I listened the warmer I felt.
at the tea lounge
The Curtis Macdonald Group:
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax
David Virelles – Piano
Chris Tordini – Bass
Greg Ritchie – Drums
Wednesday, February 17th at 9pm at The Tea Lounge in Brooklyn, NY.
curtis macdonald and friends III
Hello
Friends! Come to Coco68 on Friday, January 15 to hear:
9PM
Kyle Wilson – Tenor Sax
Hayden Hawkins – Drums
Ryland Kelly – Bass
10:30pm
David Virelles – Piano
Alexandra Grimal – Tenor Sax
Pascal Niggenkemper – Bass
Cody Brown – Drums
Curtis Macdonald – Alto Sax
sound design for dance
Last summer at the Banff Centre for the Arts, I met a brilliant choreographer Aszure Barton. I was blown away when I first saw company in rehearsal and was fortunate enough to sneak into her Ballet commissioned by the NBOC (The National Ballet of Canada) in Toronto. This past weekend she asked me for some help with the sound editing and design for her recent premiere at The Juilliard School. I saw the performance on opening night and was so glad to have been able to contribute to the production.
After now having seen a handful of her work, I am particularly inspired by how she employs counterpoint – her content is so compositional and ripe with richness. If you have the opportunity to catch a performance of hers, it will certainly not disappoint. I look forward to next time already, and I have something new to study for it’s compositional content – choreology!
Here’s a little sample of her work with her company, a piece that I saw them work on intensively:
rose live music
Here we took the stage of Chris Conly’s Brooklyn Experiments Series at Rose Live Music.
Special thanks to Syndrome Design for creating our poster!
The Travis Reuter Group:
Bobby Avey – Piano
Andrew Carrico – Bari Sax
Cody Brown – Drums
Greg Chudzik – Bass
Travis Reuter – Guitar
The Curtis Macdonald Group:
David Virelles – Piano
Cody Brown – Drums
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax
Pat Reid – Bass (Special Guest!)
Pascal Niggenkemper – Bass
Curtis Macdonald – Alto Sax
telematic music performance for peace
Telemusic mastermind Chris Chafe brought this new project to my attention last week. The same concept-project I worked on over the summer is now flourishing with a huge global consciousness arising as a result. This concert is sponsored by the United Nations, and featured some of today’s most respected creative improvisers. This is truly breakthrough technology being used for all the right reasons – bringing people together to create.
Jane Ira Bloom
Oliver Lake
Joan LaBarbara
Marty Ehrlich
Dave Taylor
Samir Chatterjee
Mark Dresser
…just to name a few! see the complete line up of all the performers and locations by clicking here.
More info (from their website)
curating brooklyn part II
The Curtis Macdonald Group
Chris Tordini – Bass
Cody Brown – Drums
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax
David Virelles – Piano
Yours Truly – Alto Sax
The Aki Ishiguro Group
Aki Ishiguro – Guitar
Nick Anderson – Drums
Pascal Niggenkemper – Bass
Sean Wayland – Keys
Alex Terrier – Sax
The Bobby Avey Trio
Bobby Avey - Keys
Cody Brown – Drums
Chris Tordini – Bass
inspiring reads
Often I post the latest gig or recording I’m scheming, but perhaps it’s time for an expansion of perspective. I subscribe to about 100 blogs and so far this past week I have come across a few remarkable paragraphs that are worth sharing:
Here is composer Eric Whitacre’s post on composition competitions and losing:
As a composer you are going to get turned down a lot, by conductors, by music publishers, by critics; it’s all just part of the gig. Entering competitions and not winning is a great way to get used to the lifestyle, the drive to just keep writing, forging ahead. For me, it’s been a way to develop an ‘inner-compass’, a sort of quiet confidence that it doesn’t really matter if I win or lose; the work alone is it’s own reward.
If you are unfamiliar with Eric’s work, particularly his Choral pieces – I highly recommend. Truly gorgeous, beautiful writing. I’ve been following him for quite awhile now. I was particularly stunned when he said he never won an ASCAP Young Composers Award… I thought everybody gets those things! He goes on:
But here’s the thing: I’m glad I’ve never won. It makes me feel like an outsider, makes me feel misunderstood, keeps me hungry, all the things that are essential tools for being a composer. You’ll be better for losing, because in your heart you’ll know you should have won, and the injustice will help drive you forward.
That’s an important point to remember: it is injustice. Composition competitions are hopelessly biased. The juries do their best, but they are just human beings looking at a lot of scores, all through their own personal opinion of what constitutes a ‘good’ piece. (Years after a student competition at Juilliard I was told by a jury member that they had rejected the score to my string transcription of Water Night – without even listening to the recording – because it looked too ’simple’ to be a sophisticated piece. I remember thinking, “but the simplicity is the whole frickin’ point!”).
Over here, Roger Bourland writes about leaving behind the comforts of academia:
I love being a composer and what it has afforded me in this life and this world. I have loved the time spent composing it, playing it in progress for my close friends, and most especially, having premieres of new pieces. I went into this profession knowing I would not ever be “famous” like the Beethoven club, and have accepted that.
It shouldn’t be relevant to anyone as to whether what you’ve done in our life lasts beyond your lifetime. You’ll be dead, or at least, not here. Your music is important here and now, and that’s enough.
extra style in the word “curate”
Tim Gough - NYTimes
New York Times reporter Alex Williams caught wind of how I used the idea of ‘curating’ to add a sense of community to venue promotion, people for recordings, and my overall ideals for production in general. Clearly, as his article examines, the term “curate” is no longer reserved for museums, or at least not here in New York City:
“They’re young, discerning and enterprising, and they’ve got a code word to tout it.”
“They don’t simply put on an event, they have an eye for it.”
Curtis Macdonald, a Brooklyn musician, also says that “curate” precisely describes his job: hiring bands for a local site.
“When given to opportunity to curate an evening of music, choosing the right bands is very similar to curating a museum,” Mr. Macdonald explained in an e-mail message. “Since I, the ‘curator,’ choose personnel based on a particular aesthetic, I am able to think of creative ways of presenting music beyond the traditional ‘call-up a venue and ask for a gig’ way of presenting.”
Check out the Full Article.
cmac produces JB3
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
I like seeing my old friends from school take necessary initiative and elevate their music to the next level. Ever since graduation, I have been impressed with how much of a following my colleague, RnB artist Jesse Boykins III has generated for himself. He’s been busy all over the U.S. showcasing his music, touring with one of my best friends and outstanding drummer, Adam Jackson, has been featured on numerous blogs and rose to the near summit of the BETJ charts; not to mention fostering several noteworthy collaborations with producers such as JMost, who is also a hugely notable school chum.
Jesse and I have always talked about doing a track together but this summer we finally made it happen. He gave me a scratch a capella vocal track and then I proceeded to mix in the rest. Hopefully this will just be the beginning of a very warm series of collaborations. You can follow Jesse on twitter: @Jb3Music
DOWNLOAD the entire remix album Here.
good times @ sweet rhythm
Sweet Rhythm has been hosting my band since it’s early beginnings and it makes me happy to return to their stage with the new and improved Curtis Macdonald Group.
Greg Ritchie – Drums
Craig Akin – Bass
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax/Clarinet
Yours Truly – Alto Sax/Tunes
Thank you to the New School University’s Jazz & Contemporary Music Program for supporting their alumni and booking us for this gig.
cmac group at solo kitchen bar
Greg Ritchie – Drums
Chris Tordini – Bass
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax
Yours Truly – Alto Sax/Compositions
Solo Kitchen Bar is a venue in Brooklyn faithfully curated by fantastic guitarist Aki Ishiguro.
Click Here for a Map on how to find Solo Kitchen Bar.
curating brooklyn
Coco66, a venue in Greenpoint Brooklyn asked me to curate a evening of music… I jumped at the offer! This sort of thing is right up my alley. This will be a night of solid, no-cover music starting at 9pm. A central stage is conducive to creating the good-summer vibes perfect for a Friday night in NYC! (…my favorite night to play :)
Here was my thought process in choosing these groups:
Each bandleader is a great composer: Corey King (Trombone/Composition) writes some awesome music inspired by jazz history both past and current, and is a formidable sideman in here in New York, having performed with Dave Binney, Mos Def, Ludacris, and Jason Moran to name a few. And Kenny Warren (Trumpet/Composition) writes for his band in the style of a Balkan dance party! On top of that, he stretches the music to it’s primitive, creative, most transcendent essence…
Curtis Macdonald and Friends Part I
Corey King’s Band:
Kyle Wilson – Tenor Sax
Hayden Hawkins – Drums
Peter Schlamb – Vibes
Clay Schaub – Bass
Corey King – Trombone/Tunes
The Curtis Macdonald Group:
Adam Jackson – Drums
Chris Tordini – Bass
Jeremy Viner – Tenor Sax/Clarinet
Yours Truly – Alto Sax/Tunes
Kenny Warren’s ‘Hala Hala’:
Ila Cantor – Guitar
Greg Chudzik – Bass
Jeff Davis – Drums
Kenny Warren – Trumpet/Tunes
the bonus track for the 2009 compilation
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Every year, the Banff Centre releases a compilation album of all the best recordings from the International Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music, fittingly they title it “Centre Pieces”. And yes, that’s centre - the Canadian spelling of “center” :-)
Artistic Director, composer and trumpeter extraordinaire Dave Douglas asked me to create a remix track as an addition to this year’s jazz compilation album. In doing so, I recorded as many sounds as I could from the participants during my time at the workshop. All in all, I sifted through approximately 8 gigs of source material all of which were recorded with nothing more than my pocket-sized field recorder (the Sony PCM-D50 to be exact).
Then the fun began!!
I loaded everything up in a session and played around with all the various individual sound bites. Please note: everything on this track is ‘programmed’ – that is to say these clips were all live, acoustic, and improvised recordings. They were then later re-sliced, effected and synced in an entirely new context quite unique from their original:
Featured on this track is original sound from these musicians:
(in order of appearance)
Adam Miller – Tablas
Michal Vanoucek – ‘Extended’ Piano
Brian Seligman – Acoustic Guitar
Ryan Butler – Electric Guitar
Anu Junnonen – Voice
the joker is released!
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Last year I showed you all an excerpt of a piece I created for recorderist Terri Hron (to see the previous post, click here). Well, I am happy to say that her album “bird on a wire” has just been released throughout Europe, Canada and the U.S., It’s really a great example of several artistic collaborations on many levels. The album’s music is comprised of several composers Terri commissioned for this project, and the audio production is of the highest, warmest quality possible – something that is difficult to achieve when electronics and real-time processing are so widely (or should I say wisely?) utilized. This is a really unique and special album that I am happy to be apart of and encourage you all to seek out.
Terri Hron – Recorder
Dan Porter – Engineering
Yours Truly – Producer/Composer
