Nico Muhly
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Born in Vermont in 1981 and raised in Providence, Rhode Island, Nico Muhly graduated from Columbia University in 2003 with a degree in English Literature. In 2004 he received a Masters in Music from the Juilliard School, where he studied composition under Christopher Rouse and John Corigliano.
Muhly’s orchestral works have been premiered by the American Symphony Orchestra, the Juilliard Orchestra, the Boston University Tanglewood Institute Orchestra (It Remains to Be Seen , a commission celebrating their 40th anniversary in 2006), the Boston Pops (Wish You Were Here, 2007), and the Chicago Symphony (Step Team, in 2007).
In 2005, the Clare College Choir broadcast Muhly’s evensong canticles live on BBC3, and New York’s Saint Thomas Church commissioned and performed his Bright Mass with Canons, a work that has entered their regular repertoire. With designer/illustrator Maira Kalman, he created the "finely wrought" (New York Times) cantata on Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style that premiered in the New York Public Library, landing him on 2005 year’s-best list of New York magazine.
Film credits include his scores for Choking Man (2006) and Joshua (2007), and he has worked extensively with Philip Glass as editor, keyboardist, and conductor for numerous film and stage projects. Recently, he conducted excerpts from Einstein on the Beach for a new ballet by Benjamin Millepied at the Opéra de Paris. In October, 2007, the American Ballet Theater premiered Muhly and Millepied’s collaboration From Here On Out, a commission for their 2007-2008 season, and in October of 2008, the Paris Opéra ballet will premiere Triade, a newly commissioned collaboration between Muhly and Millepied.
He has also lent his skills as performer, arranger and conductor to other musicians, including Björk (Medúlla, Drawing Restraint 9, Volta), Bonnie "Prince" Billy (The Letting Go), and Antony of Antony and the Johnsons. His work with Antony has included performances in Arnhem, Leeds, and New York City, and in February 2007, they worked together on a new Shakespeare setting for The Sonnet Project, a program curated by Gavin Bryars for Opera North and the Royal Shakespeare Company. 2008 saw the release of such collaborations as Ekvílibríum, the highly anticipated solo debut of Icelandic musician Valgeir Sigurðsson, and All Is Well by American folk singer Sam Amidon. Sigurðsson released both discs on his own Bedroom Community records, a label he inaugurated by producing Muhly’s first album, Speaks Volumes (2007). In the months leading up to Speaks Volumes’ American release, Muhly was invited to present concerts of his chamber music at both Carnegie Hall and the Whitney Museum. Future recording projects include a second solo record, titled Mothertongue.
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Doveman
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First of all there is his voice. First you will hear it -- maybe hate it -- but then, eventually, it will begin to transform how you think voices are supposed to sound. A frog in the throat, a kink in the heart, a rasp that doesn’t go away…
Then, hopefully, you will be overhwhelmed by the music -- an ebbing then swelling, oceanic thing, it comes than goes; tickles your ears then pokes you in the ribs; has unstoppable momentum (“Sunrise”; “Chasing Clouds,”) when it is not finding new ways to climax (“The Sunken Queen,” “Happy”) or standing absolutely stock still (“Tender Mercies”; “Castles”).
Doveman is 25-year old Thomas Bartlett and a select group of collaborators. On his sophomore album, With My Left Hand I Raise the Dead, the band includes banjo player Sam Amidon, a folk singer and old childhood friend; drummer Dougie Bowne, sideman to Iggy Pop, the Lounge Lizards, and Cassandra Wilson; guitarist and conjurer Shahzad Ismaily, who has previously appeared with that magical trifecta -- Marc Ribot, the Master Musicians of Joujouka, and Rage Against the Machine; and trumpeter Peter Ecklund, an expert in genres like swing and dixieland jazz. At various times there are various others. Doveman does not rehearse, but they sure can play.
When listening to this music you should keep in mind artists such as Frederic Chopin, Cat Power, Keith Jarrett, Talk Talk, and Chris Whitley -- unless you don't know any them or are not a fan, in which case you should keep in mind Nick Drake, The National, Mogwai, Explosions in the Sky, and other, trendier bands whose music has recently appeared in car commercials.
Together Doveman -- the Dovemen? -- make lovely, interesting, heart-rending sounds, like a broken wing flapping and starting to take flight.
In 2005, Doveman released his debut, The Acrobat, ten songs, most of which had one-word titles. For all intents and purposes self-released, Pitchfork rated it an 8.0, proclaiming it, "A fascinating debut... One wants to build a seedy yet expensive wine lounge somewhere in East Village just to be able to play this album around last call." Stereogum.com said his music was “wistful, emotive, and delicately piercing.” Time Out NY called it “soul music for heady loners,” and commended a frontman who “often sounds as if he’s on the brink of passing out from heartache fumes.”
With My Left Hand I Raise the Dead was produced, engineered and mixed by Grammy Award winner Patrick Dillett with assorted creaks, clinks and interludes recorded by Thomas at home. (Dillett’s previous recording and production credits include Aaliyah, Mary J. Blige, David Byrne, and Caetano Veloso.) The record sounds simultaneously more mature and more precocious than its predecessor. Weighing in at over an hour in length, the record is of a piece, its interludes as intriguing as the songs.
Thomas Bartlett grew up in Vermont, and began playing ukelele at age three, after the wardens at his daycare found him strumming a block and decided he could probably put resonant strings to good use. He began playing piano at age five, and never stopped -- dropping out of high school to study in London with Maria Curcio, one of the 20th century’s greatest classical music teachers, responsible for shaping Radu Lupu, Mitsoku Uchida, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and many other top notch pianists who pop and indie rock fans haven’t heard about, and probably never will.
Thomas went on to Columbia University for a year but dropped out – again -- this time to concentrate on his classical music studies, until he dropped out – again! -- this time to play with bands. He quickly become one of the most in-demand sidemen in New York City, insofar as New York City equals “the world.” In the last year, Thomas has played or recorded with Antony & the Johnsons, Laurie Anderson, David Byrne, The Frames, Bebel Gilberto, Arto Lindsay, The National, and Yoko Ono. And that's just the famous ones. Not bad for a 25-year old serial dropout.
He’s still young so there’s not much else. Thomas has lived in Harlem since the year 2000, and enjoys cocktails, his large collection of top shelf liquor, home cooking, and complaints about his singing voice.
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Sam Amidon
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And so, Valgeir Sigurðsson's Bedroom Community has welcomed another member to the fold with open arms and a steaming Hot Toddy. After the phenomenal success of their last three releases, both artistically and commercially, the stakes were high for Sam Amidon as he boarded a plane for Reykjavík, Iceland . Away from his modest home-recording setup and thrown head-first into Sigurðsson's state-of-the-art Greenhouse Studios, Sam was left to concentrate on his intuitive interpretations of ageold folk-songs, a skill on which he proves himself to be a unique talent, drawing simultaneously on his experiences growing up a child of folk musicians in Vermont, and his more recent work in New York with the experimental indie-rock bands Doveman & Stars Like Fleas.
From the opening notes of the first track, 'Sugar Baby', it's as clear as an Alabama night that All is Well is a different album to his previous offerings, and by the album centerpiece, the wistfully poignant 'Saro', its obvious that this album is very special indeed. With horns erupting and dissipating around the listener, Amidon's trademark delivery is perfectly offset by the tenderly plucked notes of his six-string. Nico Muhly's orchestration is not the only addition to Amidon's barrel of sounds. A dizzying amalgam of trombone, Eyvind Kang's ghostly viola, and processed percussion convert a children's singing game from the Georgia Sea Islands into the ominous ambiguity of 'Little Johnny Brown'. The distinctive bass of Ben Frost is evident on the pensive 'Fall on My Knees', while subtle layers of electronics add an intrinsically modern aspect to the proceedings. Couple this with Sigurðsson's production wizardry and you'll realize that despite links to the Appalachian folk music of the past, All Is Well is an album that could only exist in the present.
As the album closes with its title-track, Sam leaves the listener with a feeling of resolution parallel to that of a keen reader thumbing the last page of a favorite novel. He sings of death's spindly fingers finding him, a prospect he handles with no trepidation – for he has Muhly's flourishing orchestrations to give him courage and form a stable bed for his tender lyricisms. In the length of an album, Amidon has struggled through gunfights, paternal tensions, religious guilt and the lonely life of a nomad, but he leaves us with the message that 'all is well'; a defining statement on an album that, despite its shadowy underbelly, is bound to warm the hearts of even the of coldest moonshine-swilling gun-slingers and bring strength to every yellowbelly in town.
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