Bob Becker has a great clinic available called Melodic Snare Drumming and Rudimental Arithmetic. Melodic Snare Drumming is a conceptual approach to playing snare drum that involves physically hearing or imagining a melodic accompaniment while performing. Bob says the idea “is in fact very old, and for centuries was the system through which military-style drumming… Read more »
Did you know that Toru Takemitsu commissioned Jo Kondo to write a piece for NEXUS for 25 cowbells? Titled Under the Umbrella, the piece was recorded at John Wyre’s home outside of Norland, Ontario in August 1980. Now the recording has been re-released by CP2 recordings, on an album that also features Jo Kondo’s orchestral… Read more »
Here’s an unusual bit of early NEXUS history. The Internet Movie Database references John Wyre and NEXUS providing the soundtrack for a 1974 film “Monkeys in the Attic: A Film of Exploding Dreams”. The film won the Prix Khalimer as well as Best Foreign Film at the Toulon Film Festival in France in 1974. Written,… Read more »
Thanks to everyone for the great turn out at the Fisher Center, Bard College, for this weekend’s revival of “The City Wears a Slouch Hat”, John Cage’s 1942 radio play. The evening was a great success. It was called “John Cage: On & Off the Air! ” and it was designed to spotlight Cage’s fascination… Read more »
If you have been following our blog posts this week, here is a more recent example of NEXUS’ film work: “Inside Time” an awarding-winning film by Jason Young from the National Film Board of Canada, 2007. You can view the whole thing by clicking here, or if you choose, skip through, finding parts of the… Read more »
Further to my last blog post, where I mentioned NEXUS creating the chilling score for the Oscar-winning “The Man Who Skied Down Everest”, you can hear some of it in this short trailer! Amazing visuals too! The music was entirely improvised. Robert Aitken played flute. http://vimeo.com/5375024
Thanks to Lauren Vogel Weiss for photos of NEXUS at PASIC 2012 in Austin. Check our Facebook page to see all of them (and please click that “Like” button while you are there, so that you receive updates to the page!) Ray Dillard, who conducted this revival of John Cage’s “The City Wears a Slouch… Read more »
Malletech introduced its new PhD (Premium high-Density) line of concert snare drum sticks last week at PASIC 2012 in Austin, TX. The three new models are made from Honduras rosewood, and were designed by Tony Cirone, Michael Burritt and me respectively. The specs for my model, shown in the details below, are: 17 3/16 inches… Read more »
NEXUS had a great “trial run” or “sneak peek” of John Cage’s “lost work” The City Wears a Slouch Hat at PASIC in Austin TX last Thursday. Great turn out! We will have some photos for you soon. Now NEXUS is preparing for the full premiere at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY on November 17th… Read more »
Bill, Bob, Garry, Russell and Ray are heading to Austin TX this week to take in the sounds and sights of the here, and a little bit of NEXUS’s PASIC and Austin history here. )
On Wednesday, October 24 I facilitated the second of two “Creative Music Making” workshops at Buffalo State College. The 2-1/2- hour afternoon session took place at the Burchfield-Penney Performing Art Center. There were 16 partticipants on a variety of instruments – electric bass, trumpets, flutes, violin, viola, banjo, oboe and percussion, including a homemade amadinda… Read more »
On Wednesday, October 17 I had the pleasure of presenting the first of two “Creative Music Making” workshops at Buffalo State College. The 2-1/2- hour session on freeform improvisation was based on my book “Creative Music Making” (Routledge, 2005) and it was the result of an invitation from Bradley Fuster, a member of the BSC… Read more »
Today, Drum Corps International spotlights a Guardsmen DVD and its percussion feature – NEXUS’ “Xylophonia”: “a delightful work written by Joseph Green, older brother of famed recording xylophonist George Hamilton Green. The piece had been identified in pre-season promotional materials as “Just Ducky,” due to the duck whistle sounds that were added in the “Nexus… Read more »
Click HERE to read about NEXUS’ performance for the 30th Anniversary Concert of Soundstreams in Toronto, Canada, on October 11th, 2012.
