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Michael Harren

pianist. composer. performer. educator.

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seeds

June 19, 2011 by Michael Harren

I couldn’t wait. I bought a copy of Ableton Suite 8. It’s kind of mind-blowingly great and while the onboard lessons and online tutorials I’ve found are quite helpful, I have a ton to learn. I love it though, and it already feels much more intuitive that programs I have used before. I went ahead and sequenced in all of the parts for “When It WIll Bloom” and am working out the drummy/samply/loopy/glitchy stuff I have in my mind. My vision about this project is to record the whole album with live instruments (string and woodwinds, primarily with me on piano), so it’s still a little unrewarding to hear computerized version, especially of the string quartet. Somehow, sampled oboe and piano are much more tolerable. I think the strings on my keyboard are quite good, but it’s hard to play them the way a real string player would do it. I just keep reminding myself that what i am doing right now is creating demos and this isn’t the finished product.

Writing still on the musical that I don’t want to name for the theater that shall also remain nameless. The closing song started to come to me tonight and I wrote what seem to be a sort of verse or two. not perfectly happy with the lyrics, but extremely happy with these moments at the piano where I feel myself clicking in (or maybe just getting out of the way) and letting the music happen.

I have one more week of full on teaching and then free time opens up for the summer. I have a couple of pianist gigs this summer, a show for the New York Musical Theater Festival, and my friend Steven’s one man show, Methtacular! looks like it is a go, though I don’t think I can officially talk details about that either. I am also visualizing my life in which I work only as a composer/performer. Feel free to join me in this. 🙂

So movement forward is happening. I am always thinking about writing music with a passion I have not felt for a long time. I love this.

In other news, this new Elan Tamara is really lovely.

Category: Bloggy

About Michael Harren

Brooklyn-based composer and performer Michael Harren combines elements of classical composition with experimental electronics and storytelling to create hypnotic and boldly intimate work that walks the line between Laurie Anderson, Peter Gabriel and Dead Can Dance.

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