I am a composer, producer, bassist, and business owner. My job is to make music. I've been professionally engaged in music-making for over 20 years and in that time have been involved with hundreds of recording projects encompassing just about every single conceivable circumstance one could possibly imagine... and a thousand-something performances along with 'em, the exact number likely being determined depending on whether you count theater concerts and garage parties with equal weight.
As bassist/composer with Dreadnaught, the ensemble I co-founded in 1996, I have recorded and released half a dozen albums, shared the stage with some of my very favorite musicians like John Entwistle, Tony Levin, and NRBQ, and performed in more than half the states in the union.
As an independent composer and producer, my work has been featured in award-winning projects by companies such as Universal, Wander Films, and OxRock Productions, and can be heard daily as the theme music for the current events radio program "The Exchange" on New Hampshire Public Radio.
Since 2005, I have been the Music Director of The Music Hall/NHPR series "Writers On A New England Stage," for which Dreadnaught serves as house band. We've composed and arranged music for artists such as Stephen King, Madeleine Albright, Ken Burns, Alan Alda, E.L. Doctorow, Dan Brown, Mitch Albom, Elmore Leonard, and Gregory Mortensen, among others, and we were publically insulted by John Updike (OK OK, it was more of a lighthearted tweak, but still).
In 2008, I founded PARMA Recordings, a music production house based in the New Hampshire seacoast that works with orchestral ensembles, chamber groups, conductors, composers, and solo artists in the U.S. and Europe, and is focused upon, in the company's description, "the development and implementation of unique and immersive musical products and production solutions." In other words: we make music, and we make it well. My other companies include the Navona, Big Round, Ravello, MMC, and Capstone label imprints, which are the release conduits for PARMA-produced material as well as independently created content, and we are distributed by industry leader Naxos. As of the end of 2011, we have produced over 120 releases, have a team of more than 15 dedicated and talented workers, and continue to grow.
My work with The Music Hall and NHPR continued in 2011 as on-air host for Live@The Loft, a broadcast collaboration from the venue and station featuring notable musicians in a live performance and interview setting. Who knew being onstage without a bass could be so fun?
2012 will see
the launch of the double-disc electronic music album METHOD MUSIC (Navona Records) by the composer Lawrence Ball, a release I co-produced with Pete Townshend of The Who, which is an outgrowth the legendary LIFEHOUSE project that eventually yielded the classic WHO'S NEXT. Check it out here.
Also on the docket for 2012 is a new album by Dreadnaught, which after 15+ years is still pushing the proverbial envelope right into the shredder and creating records that nobody in their right mind would ever even think to make... and we're damn proud of it!
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Fall & Winter 2011 Update
///Method Music
My company PARMA Recordings is pleased to announce the launch of the double-disc electronic music album METHOD MUSIC by the composer Lawrence Ball, a release I co-produced with Pete Townshend of The Who. The album is an outgrowth the legendary LIFEHOUSE project that eventually yielded the classic WHO'S NEXT and will be released by Navona Records on January 31, 2012. Check out our online mini-site with information about the project.
///New Dreadnaught Album
Work on the new Dreadnaught album is officially underway, and we've got a serious rock-prog-Americana epic on our hands here. If you have barn doors, please secure them, because they will be blown off. Check back here for release details.
///PARMA Sessions & News
We've just completed a round of excellent sessions in New York City with Harold Rosenbaum and the New York Virtuoso Singers, and I'm gearing up for a run of orchestral recordings in Nov/Dec in Europe with the Moravian Philharmonic (do I have time to pack?). In 2012 I head to St. Petersburg, Russia in 2012 for recordings, and we'll conduct some more here in New Hampshire with our very own PARMA Orchestra.
We've also seen strong results from our Licensing efforts, with PARMA securing on-air placements on MTV, Lifetime, and PBS, among others, and will have more announcements soon.
/// Performances
In addition to gigs with Dreadnaught and the newly-formed Bling Cherry, which parties like it is 1979, my band The Gaudy Baubles will again be featured in the holiday comedy/music extravangza, A MERRY FUNNY NEW ENGLAND CHRISTMAS featuring Comedy Central star Juston McKinney at the prestigious Music Hall in Portsmouth NH.
Last year's show was a sell-out smash and this year we've got two shows (December 8 and 9), so get your snow-cap on and be ready to see a comedy show unlike any other. You can see a clip from last year's show here.
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"Country-rock, avant-garde blues, prog-funk, experimental rock - any and all of these labels are accurate, yet each only begins to brush the surface of the band's style." (ALL MUSIC GUIDE)
"This is Art. This is the realization of a dream. This is intention and ambition married to execution and creativity... This is lights-off, lying on your bed, staring into the blackness stuff. Or something to have weird sex by. Your call." (THE PHOENIX)
"Talk about nuts - who else would have the stones to kick off their CD with a reference to Isaac Asimov ("R. Daneel Olivaw") by bouncing tinkling ivories over a thudding industrial beat? Or to name a song after a feisty freshwater game fish ("Northern Pike”), haul out that industrial beat and layer it over with whimsical harmonica, twangy blues guitar, and zippy strings? Gots to be Dreadnaught." (PROGRESSIVEWORLD)
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My company PARMA Recordings LLC is the parent organization of the Navona, Big Round, Ravello, MMC, and Capstone label imprints. Our work spans classical, jazz, rock, blues, family, film, custom audio, and more.
Our releases feature work by artists such as Grammy-winner Richard Stoltzman, Pulitzer Prize-winner Lewis Spratlan, renowned session and live drummer Steve Gadd, Pixar/Randy Newman orchestrator Jonathan Sacks, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra conductor Marin Alsop, singer/troubadour Raffi, and NY Philharmonic concertmaster Glen Dicterow, and Pete Townshend of The Who among others.
PARMA and its companies are exclusively distributed by Naxos.
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