I sat down and re-recorded the entire album "In Rainbows" by Radiohead, except every sound was created using only a trumpet.  This is one of the cumulative tracks from the project, a cohesive expression of all the studio/recording production tricks I learned in the process of creating this album.

Listen to the full album here: 
 https://andyjarema.bandcamp.com/album/irt

Jigsaw Falling Into Place

A lullaby for my nephew Cliff.  It begins with a sample from "Two Minds: The Master Cylinder", a piece for brass quintet I wrote 11 years ago for my grandfather Cliff.  The piece expands by adding MIDI/electronics around the original sample, then half way through the piece I add various recordings of banging and smashing things in my dad's garage in up north Michigan.  It is a celebration of the long lineage of tinkerers in my family.  Enjoy Cliff!

Cliff's Lullaby

For the past year, I have been leaving out my Zoom H4 recording device around the house to capture my daughter's crazy sounds.  For my daughter's first birthday, I created an "audio timelapse" that strings together 12 months of her crying, cooing, and general nonsense.  The Rhodes piano you hear is like a sonic clock; each note represents one month gone by.

Etta audio yearbook (4 min long cut)

Etta audio yearbook (1 min timelapse)

The song "Avril 14th" is from the album "Drukqs" by electronic musician Aphex Twin.  It is a beautiful little piano piece that I decided to transcribe and then arrange.  Percussion ensemble seemed like the best fit, so I arranged it for glockenspiel, vibraphone, xylophone, marimba, tubular bells, and suspended cymbal.  When I played my arrangement through Sibelius, it didn't sound too good at all.  So, I recorded myself playing all of the instruments via a MIDI controlled keyboard.  I just wanted to hear how it might sound if it were performed live!

Here is the score, including the original piano transcription at the bottom:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&amp;pid=explorer&amp;chrome=true&amp;srcid=0B4bOQ5LBn1CMZjhhZDQ0OTQtZWE1Mi00NTRjLTk4NzktYzJhZjRhNGNjZmQx&amp;hl=en_US

And here is the original song just for reference:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfYl6_f2Mdg


Aphex Twin- Avril 14th (arr. for Percussion Ensemble)

I recorded sounds from my dog Aoife and made electronic music out of it.  I call it Aoife EDM.  Yes, this is apparently how I spend my free time.

1 MC Bone

A collaboration with a member of the Wayne State University dance studio.  

The choreography depicts the safe space of one's own room, so I started by recording sounds from around my own living room to make a percussion track: birds outside the window, a cup hitting the table, my dog monkeying around with my recording device (pictured).  The piece begins with seemingly no beat, but as the three disparaging tracks coalesce (guitar, percussion, piano), it is revealed that there was a hidden, underlying beat there all along.

I like the title "Room" because it refers to a physical space, but also refers to carving out space in one's life for something meaningful or important (i.e. "making room").

Room

It was a stark experience this summer standing in the desert of Joshua Tree National Park, bathing in an impossibly vast expanse of light, sand, and heat.  Days later, I plunged into the wilderness of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  The jarring transition allowed me to see a vision of the forest in sharper relief, one where trees and plants seem claustrophobic, feverishly overgrown, even a little psychedelic.  This track illuminates that darker, insidious side of the forest.  

The title quotes from the book Annihilation, while the guitar part quotes a melody found in the movie adaptation of the very same book.  The sound samples of birds, crickets, and people are field recordings taken during my time as Artist in Residence for the month of August in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  The psychedelic section was processed using Max/MSP.  The picture, oddly enough, was taken in a public garden at Balboa Park in San Diego.

Where lies the strangling fruit

Here is a collaboration I did with the artist Alyssa Coffin during my art residency at Great Smoky Mountains National Park this past August. We both recorded natural sounds at a specific trail in the park (Andrews Bald Trail). I took the sounds (flies, birds, breathing, etc) and electronically twisted them into music, which Alyssa danced to in order to create an ink drawing with her feet. Such amazing work!  See the artwork and a video of her dancing at the link below.

http://www.alyssacoffinart.com/movement-drawing-the-aftermath/

The Aftermath

Imagine if "Bolero" was written by Duke Ellington, along with an off-kilter Dilla beat and a touch of that southwestern Ennio Morricone vibe.  This was written as a collaboration with a choreographer in the Wayne State University dance studio.  Her starting point for me was to write something with lots of trumpet and drums and here is the end result.

Look

Part of the collection  " l  a  n  d  s  c  a  p  e  s " , a low-key celebration of the beautiful spaces disappearing on our planet.

https://www.andyjarema.com/landscapes

Musicians:
Michael Malis: electric piano
Andy Jarema: trumpet, arranging/mixing

o  v  e  r  s  t  o  r  y

An electronic dance remix of the song “Truman Sleeps” by Philip Glass, from the brilliant movie “The Truman Show” starring Jim Carey.  Most of the piece was made entirely from scratch using my keyboard, except for some of the beats were sampled from the program Acid Music.

As always, listen with headphones in to get the full effect!

Truman Sleeps (Trance Remix)

Music educator and composer living in the Metro Detroit area.  National Park Service Artist-in-Resident in 2018 (Great Smoky Mountains NP) and 2019 (Hawaii Volcanoes NP).

Andy Jarema

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