”BREATHING UNDERWATER” ON ALL PLATFORMS: https://idol-io.ffm.to/breathingunderwater

Follow Calida Ray: www.instagram.com/calidaray_
Follow Kommerz: www.instagram.com/kommerz.fyi

“‘Breathing Underwater’ is a reflection of reverence for the vastness of nature, an overwhelming force of which I’m only a tiny fragment. At the centre is the element of water, which for me is a symbol of calm and safety, yet also of isolation and numbness. This ambivalence mirrors the timeless inner journey toward self-reconciliation and wholeness. Underwater, everything feels different — like being suspended in a surreal state. To escape it, I must rise to the surface. Until then, I breathe underwater.”

– Calida Ray, 2025

On his new EP “Breathing Underwater”, Berlin singer, producer, and pianist Calida Ray continues to explore immersive worlds between R&B, ambient textures, electronica, and experimental jazz. Across seven new tracks, the 21-year-old retains the ethereal and playful quality of his 2024 debut album “Between Me And Myself” while further developing and maturing his sound.

The EP features collaborations with Kommerz fellow artist and longtime collaborator INDOME, Nigerian-American multi-talent osaremen, rising New York artist AWET, and local trumpeter Paolo De Jesus Maido.

Composer: Frederick Schulze-Schilddorf
Lyricist: Frederick Schulze-Schilddorf
Producer: Calida Ray
Trumpet: Paolo de Jesus Maido (on 4, 5)
Additional vocals: Awet Aleu (on 4), Osaremen Uwaifo (on 5),
Candra Lorber (on 1, 2, 6)
Mixing Engineer: Calida Ray
Mastering Engineer: Mark Pfurtscheller - Chin Chat Studio
Graphic Design: Kim Winterhalter
A&R: Lukas Nixdorff, Jonathan Nixdorff
Label: Kommerz Records


Stream & Buy!

past stars/into blue

fever sleep (immersion)

calm.wav

awakening in presentness

This is Track #2 off of my FOUR CORNERS Album. It is a collection of violin classics. CHECK IT OUT!

Scherzo Tarantella - Wienawski

Epic, intense, fiery, powerful, triumphant, and combative.

My Melodic Flame

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Gary Gygax (1938-2008) - Given all of the artistic and scientific people I've covered so far, why write an Hommage to Gary Gygax, the creator of the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons? When I set out to write this series, I wanted to pay respects to people who inspired me to create. Gary was the first. I was introduced to D&D in the 3rd grade, and I became fascinated with it immediately. I used to sit in class drawing dungeon maps on graph paper instead of listening to my lessons. This was my first real creative outlet, and where I first encountered the mechanics of telling a story. For instance, if I drew a long hallway on the graph paper, and then drew in a secret door halfway down on the left wall, this in itself posed many questions - questions that I had to answer. Why is there a secret door here? What is it hiding? Is it an object of significance relating to the rest of the story? Is it a dangerous monster, sealed away forever? How does that relate to what the adventurers are going through? My 3rd-grade mind was sent wandering with almost endless possibilities. Through Gary's creation, I learned to craft a narrative - a skill that became invaluable in writing music. How could I not write an Hommage to Gary?

Hommage A Gary Gygax (Official Album Version)

VISPROINTIAMO No. 11 for piano, composed and performed by Gary Lloyd Noland. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

VISPROINTIAMO NO. 11 for piano

Holly Roadfeldt - Piano

Hommage a Eddie Van Halen (1955-2020) – Eddie Van Halen, guitarist of the band Van Halen, was, simply put, the person that inspired me to become a musician.  I remember the moment vividly.  It was 1984—I was 11 years old—sitting in my dad’s recliner, listening to Van Halen’s album 1984 on his Walkman.  The beginning of side B (of the cassette) starts with the song Hot for Teacher, and features this blazing explosion of finger tapping from Eddie.  I heard that, and right then and there, I decided I was going to learn to play the guitar.  Much of the piece uses the tapping pattern that Eddie used in Hot for Teacher, as well as nods to moments from Jump and Eruption.

Hommage A Eddie Van Halen (Official Album Version)

A punchy hard-rock rhythm section collides with jazz-fusion guitar runs and syncopated drums. Alto sax takes the lead with virtuosic lines and big melodic hooks while crystal-clear vocals ride above tight, vibrant textures. Inspired by Neil Armstrong and Apollo Eleven.

Neil Armstrong

⚠️ No paid parasites—promotion’s welcome only if it costs me nothing.

Forged in fire and wired for war, Synth Berserker is not just a sound—it’s a declaration.
Blending cinematic power, Viking fury, outlaw grit, and battle-scarred poetry, Synth Berserker smashes through genre walls with the force of a warhammer. From Norse chant to disco heartbreak, pagan country to searing metal, every track is a weapon—each lyric a curse, a blessing, or both.

Born of myth and rebellion, Synth Berserker channels divine wrath, betrayed honor, and untamed emotion into songs that strike deep and leave scars.

Genres: Norse folk, metal, cinematic country, outlaw country, country rock, soft/country rock, rock, Blues Rock, and disco-infused power ballads
Signature sound: crushing drums, soaring melodies, fierce vocals, and an unrelenting spirit

Resides in Portland, Oregon. Grew up in Berkeley, CA. Born in Seattle.  PhD, Harvard. “Gary Noland is one of the great composers of the 21st century.”—JACK RUMMEL, KGNU 88.5 FM, Boulder CO, “...iconoclastic, stylistic potpourri standards of giddy humor, no holds barred soup to nuts and high spirits.”—ROBERT LEVIN, pianist, musicologist, composer, "...a fleet-fingered, ebullient performer ... bright, witty and engaging.”—CHRISTIAN CAREY, SPLENDID MAGAZINE, “...distinctive, inventive ... subversive ... You can hardly be indifferent to Noland’s music and so I would urge you to try it.” —ROGER BLACKBURN, MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL, “...set in a dizzying harmonic language that loops uncontrollably through a wide-ranging gamut of possible and impossible tonalities ... The general effect is like watching wet paintings of 19th Century musical memorabilia drip into frazzled 21st Century oblivion...” —ALLEN GIMBEL, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “Mr. Noland writes as a ‘time traveler’ in styles long abandoned by most composers as well as styles so new as to not have been imagined but by him. This he accomplishes naturally, convincingly, with originality and true passion. His command of all musical languages and his ability to traverse musical time is nothing less than remarkable. Listen!”—DONALD MARTINO, Pulitzer Prize winning composer, “...mind-bending spiraling of focus which is truly breathtaking ... spectacular...”—CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN, composer, sound poet & radio producer, “I'm amazed at your harmonic skill. Haven't seen or heard anything like it from any one else—except yours truly—certainly not from your generation. It falls somewhere between Strauss and Mahler. Especially like how you are able to slip in and out from the tonal to the atonal—or near atonal...”—GEORGE ROCHBERG, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “...court jester to the classical establishment...”—PAYTON MACDONALD, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...florid and juicy...” —RICHARD BUELL, THE BOSTON GLOBE, “...an incredible aural web ... a great ostinato of American kitsch. Sul pont never sounded so good.”—RUSSELL STEINBERG, composer, conductor of the LOS ANGELES YOUTH ORCHESTRA, “...I am bowled over by the expertise of your music: you use certain elements from the 19th century and from jazz, etc., and just at the moment when I am about to say, OK, what else is new?, you do a number of things, such as speeding up, becoming wildly dissonant, modulating to a distant continent, stopping completely and throwing some kind of total surprise ... you seem to know exactly when to do what and how much. I don’t know anybody else who can do it!” —ANDREW IMBRIE, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “... remarkable stuff...”
—MAX MORATH, American ragtime pianist, composer, actor & author, “...a loony composer from Oregon...” —MAX SHEA, WMUA 91.1FM, Amherst, MA, “Gary Noland is one of those 21st Century composers seeking to forge a new aesthetic based on older models that do not traffic in serialism or minimalism ... Zany waltzes, ragtime riffs, chorales, toccatas, and much else romp and tear through these depictions of superheroes and villains from his ‘chamber novels’; other pieces spoof serial music ... to grand operas ... and Jewish guilt.” —JACK SULLIVAN, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...Paranoid Ravel...”—ALEX DUNN, KZSU FM90.3, Stanford, CA, “...It’s a romantic romp, rhythmically robust yet melodically flirting with the nostalgia of cabaret, minus the sleazy diminution of spilled drinks and smelly ashtrays. Its elegance recalls Elgar, and the serious sides, a synthesis of those strange bedfellows Schubert and Ives. Composers hate it when their music reminds you of someone else’s, but writing within a tradition, Noland has incorporated divergent styles that, woven together, work. Cosmopolitan without snobbery, it’s intelligent, pleasurable and convincing.” —ROCKY LEPLIN, THE BERKELEY VOICE

Record label run by Lukas & Jonathan Nixdorff
holla@kommerz.fyi

// OUT NOW
*INDOME - Permission To Feel (Album)
https://idol-io.ffm.to/permissiontofeel

*Calida Ray - Breathing Underwater
https://idol-io.ffm.to/breathingunderwater

*LOUSELV & Mundy - It's Enough For Me, Anyway (EP)
https://idol-io.ffm.to/itsenoughformeanyway

*Calida Ray - Between Me And Myself
https://idol-io.ffm.to/betweenmeandmyself

*Dim Fumes - Liminal Clouds
https://idol-io.ffm.to/liminalclouds_

*Noa Erni & Nardo Says - BEAMS, SCREENS & THE SOUND OF LOVE
https://idol-io.ffm.to/beamsscreensthesoundoflove

writer, musician, folk, klezmer, country, pop, rock

Anthony Joseph Lanman is an active and passionate musician that divides his time between composing, performing, teaching and advocacy for new classical music.

As a composer, Anthony creates music that reaches general audiences as well as new music connoisseurs. Embracing influences that range from progressive rock and metal, to medieval and renaissance music, to jazz, to new classical, Anthony strives to create a sound that is his own. He has written for ensembles and soloists around the world.

Recent commissions include – E.G.S./A.J.L. for guitarist Matthew Cochran, Hear Us! for children’s choir and string ensemble commissioned by Otter Creek Middle School, Automaton – a concerto for 8-string electric guitar and percussion for Clocks In Motion, The Rag and Bone Shop – a song cycle for baritone and piano trio for Brian Lewis and David Small commissioned by the University of Texas Butler School of Music, Rush – a quartet commissioned by the Music Teacher’s National Association and the Indiana Music Teacher’s Association, Hommages for Piano, Book 2, for Holly Roadfeldt, and Damselfly – a duo for 8-string electric guitar and percussion for Kyle Lutes.

Anthony’s performing career began in high school while singing and playing electric guitar with his touring progressive band Canvas. His principle instrument changed to classical guitar during his undergraduate years at University of Texas at Austin where he studied with Adam Holzman. Through his graduate study at Indiana University he added renaissance lute and theorbo to his instrumental arsenal, studying with Nigel North. He has performed with the University of Texas New Music Ensemble, the University of Texas Early Music Ensemble, the Indiana University New Music Ensemble, the Indiana State University Wind Ensemble, and Clocks in Motion. He has also performed many concerts of solo and chamber music.

Anthony’s advocacy is life-long. In the nineties, he hosted a contemporary classical music radio show on KVRX in Austin, Texas. In the 21st century, he promoted fellow Indiana University composers through a web presence on Mp3.com (now defunct); created Guitar Heroes, a weekly presentation series in Second Life; and produced more than 100 episodes of his ongoing music-centric podcasts All the Cool Parts and the 1,000 Recordings Podcast. He has appeared as a guest on Soundnotion, Composer Quest, Classical Guitar Insider, Goes 2 Eleven, and The Portfolio Composer.  His new podcast 1 Track focuses on the music of the contemporary classical world.  In addition, he has exposed thousands of new listeners to contemporary classical composers by sharing this music to his more than 400,000 followers on Soundcloud.

Anthony has held several positions at multiple universities and colleges, as well as K-12 public schools. In 2016, he held an adjunct position at Butler University in addition to teaching choir and music at West Vigo Middle School. He holds a BM in composition from the University of Texas, and an MM and DM in composition from Indiana University.

Anthony currently resides in Bloomington, IN with his wife Jenna and their cats Silas and Bod.

New tracks tagged #virtuosic