Wine, Women and Westminster

Obviously I'm completely failing to update this regularly.. seems I'm either not at all busy and there's nothing much to write about, or I'm horribly horribly busy and I've got no time at all to write anything.

I'm glad to say that it's been a case of the latter recently, as I've been working hard on the next series of ITV's Primeval. I've got more of that work coming up soon, but right now I'm doing the music copying for a new Marple film. Add to that gigs here and there and it's a pretty busy time at the moment.

Anyway, just wanted to give a quick plug for my Dad's new book, Wine, Women and Westminster. It's a collection of funny stories from my Dad's 40 year career as a political journalist in Westminster, and travelling the globe with Thatcher and Major. He's going to be on Loose Ends with Clive Anderson on Radio 4 tomorrow evening at 6:15 talking about it.

MaxMSP Course

Had a bit of a gloomy time recently as I cracked an arm and a rib playing footie and had to lay off playing for a while :( - however, I'm pretty much back to normal again now.

Last week I went on the Introduction to MaxMSP course at Goldsmiths College. Max is a graphical programming environment for music, audio and other media. I actually bought this software ages ago, worked through a few of the tutorials, but never really got any further than that.

The course was taught by Tim Ward. We spent two days looking at some of the real basics of Max: cabling objects together, getting audio in and out, getting midi in and out, etc. Then the following two days were spent looking at some more advanced ready-made patches and trying to figure out how they worked. There was also plenty of time for exploring and messing around with Max and building whatever we liked.

Tim also talked about ways to send/recieve audio and midi to and from other applications, such as Logic, Live etc, and quite a lot about creative ways that people have interfaced Max with the outside world. I particularly liked this scary piano soundboard thing.

Not exactly sure what I'm going to do with this knowledge... There are some really good free patches available online (e.g. www.maxobjects.com) so perhaps one or two of those will be useful to me. Hopefully I'll also find time to get better at programming Max myself and be able to create my own stuff..

Thing's Ain't What They Used to Be

Ahhh... Clark Terry, one of my absolute favourite trumpet players! I love this clip - absolutely fantastic plunger technique, and so much joy in his playing and his singing.

Forthcoming gigs, E17 Jazz etc.

A couple of interesting E17 Jazz events coming up: tomorrow evening Adam Bishop is playing with his quartet at the Rose and Crown, 55 Hoe Street, starts 8pm.

Then on Saturday evening, there's a Silent Film Night at the Victoria (186 Hoe Street, E17), where there will be live improvised music to a couple of films from the 1920s. Starts 8:30pm and is free entry.

Finally, on Sunday - though not under the E17 Jazz banner - I'll be MDing the John Ongom Big Band at the White Hart, 1 Mile End Road. Featuring Gabrielle Ghray and Barry Vegas on vocals. Free entry, starts 7:45.

Hello Dolly!

I'll be playing in the pit for Hello Dolly! this week, put on by Geoids.

Performances at 7:30 from Wednesday to Saturday, plus 2:30 matinee on Sat, at the London Oratory Theatre, Seagrave Road, SW6 1RX. £13/£10 concs/£6 children.

New sampler

At long last I've got some new music up on my website: a sampler of some of the music I've done in the last.. well, since the previous sampler, really. It includes some stuff I wrote for various film trailers, plus from some short films I scored. Anyway, here it is:



[edit: Player doesn't appear above? Click here instead.]

E17 Jazz - Rachel Musson

This Thursday's E17 Jazz gig is Rachel Musson with her new band - a quintet with a two tenor front line, and features all original material. It's at the Rose and Crown pub on Hoe Street, starts 8:30, £4.

Unfortunately, I'm working that night so probably won't make it :( Sorry, Rachey.