[ 31. Juli 2010 ]

INTERNET – Barry Schrader

Barry Schrader Mailing List
barryschrader.com
Summer 2010 Newsletter

There’s a new online video interview with me done by master
interviewer Martin Perlich. You can find the interview here. While
the interview deals with the Monkey King CD, it also touches upon
various other works of mine as well as my compositional and musical
philosophy. This is one of the best interviews I’ve done, and I think
you’ll find if of interest. Be sure to look at other interviews of
Martin’s that are available online. There’s a great deal of variety
and information available on his site. You can also listen to an
earlier interview that I did with Martin here.

The Monkey King CD has received a number of very positive reviews
during the first half of this year. The most extensive of these,
which also includes a review of the Fallen Sparrow CD, is by composer
Elainie Lillios in Computer Music Journal, Volume 34, Number 1, Spring
2010, pp112-114. While this review is not available online, there is
an excerpt of the review here which begins:

Barry Schrader entices and challenges audiences yet again with two
electroacoustic compact discs: Fallen Sparrow (2006) and Monkey King
(2008). Each release uniquely addresses Mr. Schrader’s creative spark
and expert technical skill, while simultaneously reflecting his
penchant for extra-musical inspiration realized through meticulous
attention to musical idea and development. These discs embody Mr.
Schrader’s purposeful compositional intent, featuring pieces that can
be listened to in many ways and studied from many different
perspectives.

Other positive reviews of the Monkey King CD include those by Arcane
Candy (…this disc will breathe new life into your listening day–
whether you’re a man or a monkey.“). There are also new reviews of
the Fallen Sparrow CD („The untypical soundtrack-like mélange of
classical and avant-garde elements make this work extraordinarily
intriguing and highly entertaining“) and the Beyond CD („His free-
style ambient of Beyond puts him across as a great free-thinker in the
world of experimental music.“) on DARKLIFE.

If you are a fan of horror and sci-fi films, you may be interested in
the new release of Galaxy of Terror on blu-ray and regular DVD by the
Shout Factory. This is part of their Roger Corman’s Cult Classics
Collection. I composed the music for Galaxy of Terror on the Buchla
200 analog synthesizer in 1981, and, as far as I know, this is the
only commercial electronic music soundtrack composed with that
system. The remastered release includes a new documentary on the
making of the film with new interviews with me and other cast and crew
members. For more information on this film and its music, please see
the article on the Matrixsynth site:

„Galaxy of Terror (1981) – Barry Schrader and the Buchla 200
via Barry Schrader
„Shout Factory has just released a remastered version of Galaxy of
Terror (1981) as part of their Roger Corman collection on both blu-ray
and regular DVD. I did the music for this movie entirely on the Buchla
200, with the exceptions of the use of a soprano voice and a sitar in
a few places. (Michael Hoenig is credited as „performer: synthesizer“
on this film, but I can assure you that I did 100% of the music
myself. Michael’s credit may refer to sound effects, however, which
were done separately; I honestly don’t know.) This was one of several
films I scored in the 70s and 80s, and, perhaps, the most unusual.
Working with the Buchla Electric Music Box for scoring a commercial
film wasn’t easy as there was no traditional keyboard, and as all of
the music is multitracked, sometimes using as many as sixteen tracks
mixed down to the final master. Of course, there was neither computer-
control nor digital recording of anything in those days, and the fact
that everything had to be done within a roughly three-week time span
make working very difficult. There was no way that I could compose in
the manner I was used to, which is rather slowly, as every day was a
deadline for something. The music was composed in CalArts‘ studio
B303, watching the work prints of the film on a 35mm moviola as I got
them from the studio. The synth setup I used was essentially the same
as for Lost Atlantis, with a large Buchla 200 system and the Fortune
Modules. The film hasn’t been available in the U.S. for many years,
but, even so, it’s achieved a sort of cult status, partially for some
truly outrageous scenes which almost got the film an MPAA „X“ rating.
I’ve been asked several times about releasing the music from the film,
but, of course, this is impossible for me to do: I don’t own the
music, and all of the original masters were delivered to the studio
for transfer. When they were cleaning up the film for this new
release, Shout Factory contacted me and I gave them all of the copies
of cues that I had left, and, now, I have no copies of any music from
this film. Perhaps that’s best, though, as I never thought of any of
the music I did for Galaxy of Terror as having much relevance away
from the film. The new release includes a documentary on the making of
Galaxy of Terror which has new interviews with myself and other cast
and crew members.“

I’m currently working on my new piece, The Barnum Museum, based on the
short story by authorSteven Millhauser. This will be a long multi-
movement work, and will be my next CD. I’m hoping to finish this in
the next year or two. I’ll write more on this later.

If you have questions or comments, I’ll be happy to respond to them.

As always, you can remove yourself from this list by clicking below.

Barry Schrader