Hi friends!

After making the rounds at film festivals across the globe, The Real Charlie Chaplin, a documentary featuring my original score, will premiere on Showtime Saturday, December 11th at 8:00pm ET/PT.

If you want to watch the film before December, it will be presented live at DOC NYC (November 12, 6:45pm at the Cinépolis Chelsea) and AFI FEST in Los Angeles (November 14, 12:15pm at the TCL Chinese Theatre). DOC NYC will also be streaming the film November 13-28, 2021. There will also be a limited theatrical release Cinema Village (New York) and Laemmle Monica (Los Angeles) starting Friday, November 19. The film will premiere in UK cinemas on March 4th, 2022.

I am very proud of the final score which features about 60 minutes of original music cues. The score was recorded in March and the film premiered at Telluride in September. On the music side of the project, I’d like to give a shout out to the musicians who recorded the score as well as those that helped behind the scenes:

Issy Gleicher, flute
Gleb Kanasevich, clarinet
Brad Balliett, bassoon
Karl Larson, piano
Matt Evans, percussion
David Degge, dulcimer

Clara Kim, violin
Lauren Cauley, violin
Hannah Levinson, viola
Mariel Roberts, cello
Pat Swoboda, bass

Bridget Samuels, music supervision
Jon Senge, copyist
David Stevens, project manager
Ryan Streber, Engineer, Oktaven Audio

Thanks for tuning in,
Robert

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We are excited to let you know about three important releases this fall!

1. Evergreen, for two percussionists, had its live premiere in September, featuring the outstanding Seattle-based Arx Duo. They have upcoming performances in Bellevue, WA (livestreamed), Omaha, NE, and Mission Woods, KS.

2. The brand new Echolocate, commissioned for saxophone and percussion by the Hutchens/Myers Duo, receives its premiere October 26th at the University of South Carolina.

3. My first film score for The Real Charlie Chaplin is making the festival rounds this Fall. See a review here. It premiered a Telluride and will be released in theaters this fall and then air on Showtime.

THE REAL CHARLIE CHAPLIN. Courtesy of SHOWTIME / TELLURIDE FILM FESTIVAL

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Arx Duo premieres Evergreen, a 30-minute, five movement percussion duo, presented by Seattle’s Sustain Music Project.

Presented by Sustain Music Project
Performed by arx duo (Garrett Arney and Mari Yoshinaga)
Artwork by Eva Vernitska

Lost and Found was premiered on September 22 by Michael Compitello in the Tribeca New Music Festival at the Cell Theater, New York, NY.

Drawing on years of close collaboration with percussionist Michael Compitello, the resulting piece is a multi-movement new work for solo marimba with distinctive approach to the instrument that seamlessly integrates traditional playing with unconventional sounds and objects. Lost and Found, builds a narrative of nostalgia and memory from the idiosyncratic union of marimba and junk objects.

Commissioned by Michael Compitello, this work owes it’s creation to the consortium of thirty-three percussionists, including: Megan Arns, Mark Boseman, Michael Burritt, Matthew Carey, Benjamin Charles, Gabriel Costache, Gwen Dease, Corey Denham, Matthew Ernster, Thomas Faulkner, Maria Finkelmeier, Ben Fraley, Adam Groh, Piero Guimares, Sean Harvey, Ji Hye Jung, Ayano Kataoka, Tony Kirk, Terry Longshore, Colin Malloy, Dan Morphy, Chris Jackson, Yun Ju Pan, Robert Rocheteau, Matt Sharrock, Chris Sies, Neil Sisauyhoat, John Smigielski, Jeff Stern, Jen Torrence, Mike Truesdell, Eric Willie and Andrew Wright.

Please visit the work page HERE for the recording, perusal score, and full program notes.

Orchestra (2.pic.(afl).2+ca.2+bcl.2+cbn/4.3.3.1/timp/pf/str) and Solo Percussion

In Ancient Rome, Juvenalia were coming of age festivals featuring games, theater and ritual celebrations. Ironically, these events were noted for the childish behavior of their participants, youth and elders alike. Accounts from the time suggest wild, debaucherous display was not only encouraged but required. Anyone not acting sufficiently irreverent risked expulsion or worse.

In my concerto, Juvenalia, I seized on this idea of youthful carousing. At the same time, I considered the linguistically similar notion of juvenilia. Sometimes disowned, often discarded, these early works are at best a footnote to otherwise noteworthy catalogs. Yet these raw, unpolished efforts contain portentous kernels: seemingly insignificant ideas that may grow in surprising, beautiful ways. Looking back at my own early compositional efforts, I’m convinced there are connections between my youthful creations and the music I write today. As I grow older, I listen to these first attempts and think perhaps there’s more to discover. Maybe these capricious, unrefined pieces hold secrets yet to be revealed.

Tapping into both the wild energy of Juvenalia and the elusive premonitions of juvenilia, the concerto begins with music reminiscent of my high school garage band. Playing a modified drum kit, the soloist careens through a series of loud, bombastic episodes, overflowing with youthful energy and wild abandon. The second movement takes a step back. Moving from kit to vibraphone, the soloist leads the orchestra on a slow and spacious soliloquy. Lyrical and contemplative, the music evokes a restrained, classical sensibility. Finally, the third movement revisits the frenzied exuberance of the opening, but now with even greater urgency. A reckless, unrelenting momentum pushes the music forward as the soloist unleashes a torrent of sixteenth notes in a furious drive to the finish.

Commissioned by the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition at Brigham Young University for Colin Currie and the Albany Symphony.

Premiered Saturday, March 9, 2019, the Palace Theater, Albany, NY by Colin Currie and the Albany Symphony Orchestra, David Alan Miller, Director.