December 12th, 2006
This piece focuses on voices entering in rounds. The entire opening 4 measure statement is repeated by each section of the string orchestra as they enter. The round eventually breaks, but call and response techniques still are used throughout. Read the rest of this entry »
December 2nd, 2006
This piece is a chaconne. I created an eight bar chord progression and simply worked on a few layers of melody to put on top. In the middle of this piece, the chord progression itself becomes the focus, as the viola part highlights the dissonances within the chords on top of downbeat pizz from the other sections. This piece features an “anti-climax,” that is, it reduces down to almost nothing in the middle rather than building towards a dramatic climax. Read the rest of this entry »
November 16th, 2006
This is the first of my string serenades, originally inspired by Dvorak’s Serenade for Strings. This piece inverts the Dvorak motif for the primary source material. Read the rest of this entry »
October 15th, 2006
The themes in this piece all come directly for the initial background music I composed for the terrain video. While writing, I discovered a motive in the music which I dubbed the “Project Wish Motive” and used in many variations throughout the piece. The melodic motive, A-C-E-A-F#-E, and its permutations appear in virtually every piece composed for Project Wish.
May 4th, 2006
I created this piece while taking a class about 8-channel music with Dr. Jon Welstead. I took the class out of sequence, taking it as my second technology course rather than my last. Working with 8 discrete channels was a lot of fun, but I feel that my piece could have been a bit better had I been more familiar with all of the tools involved while creating it. This piece features sounds recorded from my apartment on North Farwell Avenue. Sadly, the jet engine-like sounds come from unedited recordings of our furnace. Read the rest of this entry »
April 2nd, 2006
This piece is the product of an entire semester of uninterrupted effort. I spent nearly half of the semester planning and experimenting before I actually began to write this work for solo piano. I developed my own harmonic system for the piece by rethinking the way triads are formed in a scale. Read the rest of this entry »
March 12th, 2006
This whimsical piece was written for an electronic music course at UWM. The sounds are sampled from the stairs of the music building, and the plunking melody is created by looping tuned sounds at different beat intervals. In a semester full of dark, intense, droning sounds, this was a much needed break. Read the rest of this entry »
December 15th, 2005
This is the final project from my first electronic music course at UWM. We were given a bank of sounds, a few videos to pick from, and told to go to work! The project was a lot of fun and I think it still holds up really well today.
September 22nd, 2005
Irresolution first began as a duet written with a floor mate from the dorms my freshman year. We worked on the guitar chord progression together, he wrote some vocals, and I wrote the cello part. During the Fall 2005 semester, I reinvented the piece by finding the original cello part, and piecing together the rest. The acoustic guitar part is similar to the original, and the piano melody is based on the original vocal melody, or at least what I remember of it. The mandolin and classical guitar parts were added to better use my fellow members of the Contemporary Music Ensemble, whose performance of this piece can be heard on the CD. Read the rest of this entry »
August 15th, 2005
A Life Elided began in the summer of 2005 as a side project with the guitarist from Effigy. We had so many unused song ideas and finally realized a good way to finish them. By using digital drums, a heavy compliment of background effects, and melodic synthesizers with the recorded guitar and bass parts, we were able to create a new style for ourselves. The project continues to serve as a way for otherwise unused or off-style band ideas to see the light of day. Check out aLifeElided.net »
A Life Elided:
An industrial/hard rock band I founded. I play guitar and serve as the main songwriter.
{ELSE} »
My Lo-fi glitch pop side project.
Hey, Barely »
Dabbling in dark ambient.
Akin to Being »
I sub in for this bluegrass string band on spoons, snare, and suitcase bass drum. Pay the Devil »
I have several string quartet arrangements for sale on MusicNotes.com »
A techno side project since 2005, I write most of the music and perform bass, guitar, and FX. A Life Elided »
I wrote album and concert reviews, thinkpieces, and music news forThose Who Dig »
My wife and I played in Whiskey Doubles, an orchestral-folk outfit. Whiskey Doubles »
I played drums, wrote most of the songs, and acted as a manager for Effigy from 2002-2008. Effigy »