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Jherek Bischoff is a songwriter, producer, performer and composer from the Pacific Northwest who has been called a "pop polymath" (The New York Times) and a "Seattle phenom" (The New Yorker). We're trying not to get too braggy over here, but we are proud to be releasing this music!
Composed is a meticulously arranged, multi-tracked orchestral pop album featuring a host of famous guests, many of whom appeared at the sold-out Ecstatic Music Festival performance in New York that launched the project earlier in 2012. David Byrne collaborates on "Eyes," a piece of meta-pop as great as anything he's produced in the past decade. Brazilian Tropicalismo legend Caetano Veloso guests on "The Secret Of The Machines" with an avant-percussion solo by Deerhoof's Greg Saunier. Parenthetical Girls' Zac Pennington and French singer/actor Soko duet on "Young & Lovely." Et. cetera. Despite the impressive cast of characters, Jherek manages to make the album his own, without ever falling into the trap of self-indulgence that often besets multi-vocalist projects. The album is a consistently rewarding and uplifting body of work -- a testament to his clarity of vision.
The project's creation was informed by Jherek?s history of playing in indie bands, a fervent desire to make great pop music and a love affair with the potential of the orchestra. Just as an example of "home" recording Composed is quite unique. DIY in the purest sense, Jherek first composed the album on a ukulele. Next he arranged, produced and engineered the backing tracks, achieving an orchestral sound without the orchestral cost by recording the music one instrument at a time using a single microphone and a laptop. Yet sonically, the final product is consistently rewarding, following the composer's quirky vision while showing a deep familiarity with a catalog of compositional ideas & technique.
"I recorded each individual musician of the 'orchestra' in their own living rooms," says Bischoff, "and then I layered each instrument -- sometimes one violinist playing one part twenty times - until it was the size of a huge orchestra. I spent the summer riding my bike from house to house recording each musician. I finished the album by taking a road trip to record all the singers in person, except for Caetano Veloso and David Byrne, who recorded their own parts at home."
This approach reflected Jherek's desire to shake up the business-as-usual routine of being an independent rock musician. As he notes: "I realized a few years ago that being in several serious touring bands at the same time could be really frustrating, because I tend to work on music at least eight hours a day at home, and on tour you only get to make music for an hour a day. I realized that by producing records, doing soundtracks and collaborating on music for dance, I could be creatively involved with a ton of exciting music, and let it have its own legs without having to always be on tour."
This approach reflected Jherek's desire to shake up the business-as-usual routine of being an independent rock musician. A veteran of several music scenes, he has performed in numerous musical configurations over his 30-odd years, collaborating with Parenthetical Girls, Xiu Xiu, The Degenerate Art Ensemble, The Dead Science, Amanda "F**king" Palmer and The Wordless Music Orchestra. We think you'll agree Composed is a startling solo debut.
Composed is a meticulously arranged, multi-tracked orchestral pop album featuring a host of famous guests, many of whom appeared at the sold-out Ecstatic Music Festival performance in New York that launched the project earlier in 2012. David Byrne collaborates on "Eyes," a piece of meta-pop as great as anything he's produced in the past decade. Brazilian Tropicalismo legend Caetano Veloso guests on "The Secret Of The Machines" with an avant-percussion solo by Deerhoof's Greg Saunier. Parenthetical Girls' Zac Pennington and French singer/actor Soko duet on "Young & Lovely." Et. cetera. Despite the impressive cast of characters, Jherek manages to make the album his own, without ever falling into the trap of self-indulgence that often besets multi-vocalist projects. The album is a consistently rewarding and uplifting body of work -- a testament to his clarity of vision.
The project's creation was informed by Jherek?s history of playing in indie bands, a fervent desire to make great pop music and a love affair with the potential of the orchestra. Just as an example of "home" recording Composed is quite unique. DIY in the purest sense, Jherek first composed the album on a ukulele. Next he arranged, produced and engineered the backing tracks, achieving an orchestral sound without the orchestral cost by recording the music one instrument at a time using a single microphone and a laptop. Yet sonically, the final product is consistently rewarding, following the composer's quirky vision while showing a deep familiarity with a catalog of compositional ideas & technique.
"I recorded each individual musician of the 'orchestra' in their own living rooms," says Bischoff, "and then I layered each instrument -- sometimes one violinist playing one part twenty times - until it was the size of a huge orchestra. I spent the summer riding my bike from house to house recording each musician. I finished the album by taking a road trip to record all the singers in person, except for Caetano Veloso and David Byrne, who recorded their own parts at home."
This approach reflected Jherek's desire to shake up the business-as-usual routine of being an independent rock musician. As he notes: "I realized a few years ago that being in several serious touring bands at the same time could be really frustrating, because I tend to work on music at least eight hours a day at home, and on tour you only get to make music for an hour a day. I realized that by producing records, doing soundtracks and collaborating on music for dance, I could be creatively involved with a ton of exciting music, and let it have its own legs without having to always be on tour."
This approach reflected Jherek's desire to shake up the business-as-usual routine of being an independent rock musician. A veteran of several music scenes, he has performed in numerous musical configurations over his 30-odd years, collaborating with Parenthetical Girls, Xiu Xiu, The Degenerate Art Ensemble, The Dead Science, Amanda "F**king" Palmer and The Wordless Music Orchestra. We think you'll agree Composed is a startling solo debut.
The Seattle composer and songwriter Jherek Bischoff had a dilemma: He wanted to make an orchestral pop record but, like most people, lacked an orchestra. Decidedly unlike most people, however, he remedied this by building one himself. Throwing some rudimentary recording equipment in his backpack, he visited a handful of musician friends in their homes, re-recording them as they played dozens of parts, and then mixed the painstakingly assembled piecemeal results into the majestic 70-piece outfit he could never afford during mixing. Listening to Composed with this task in mind is like imagining someone filling an Olympic-sized pool with an eye dropper: the mind balks, both at the enormity of the undertaking and at the disposition of the person behind it.
Composed had to get made. But you would have gathered this from the album's first six minutes without a shred of context anyway: Opening with a gorgeously sobbing piece of string writing reminiscent of Samuel Barber's "Adagio For Strings" as fanfare, the orchestra slides into a groove, tropical and breezy. And then who should wander into view but David Byrne, in loosened-tie, silver-fox mode, crooning a quizzical love song to the disparate parts of his beloved's face. Not bad for an opening number.
Composed is a succession of these head-turning walk-ons. No sooner has Byrne ambled offstage than Tropicália legend Caetano Veloso has sauntered on, for "The Secret of the Machines", stepping lightly with his reedy voice over an orchestral landscape that veers from Disney rainbows to a moat filled with snapping jaws. Greg Saunier of Deerhoof appears onComposed also, as do Nels Cline, Craig Wedren of Shudder to Think, and many others. It's an ensemble affair. Folk singer Dawn McCarthy drops by to sing a cheery number titled "Insomnia, Death and the Sea". Each artist contributed their own lyrics to Bischoff's compositions, lending the album the feel of a busy, semi-staged opera.
Bischoff arranges the songs around his guests like thick little jungles, symphonic interludes sprouting like overgrowth. On the surface, Composed feels like a successor to records like Grizzly Bear's Veckatimest and St. Vincent's Actor, chamber-pop records that drip with ornament. But it's to Van Dyke Parks, the granddaddy of unclassifiable, absurdly ambitious art-song cycles, that Composed owes the most. Like Parks, Bischoff's music swims around in a deep pool of references: a bassoon pops up, in "Secret of the Machines", quoting the opening of The Rite of Spring, and ragtime, bossa nova, and more flit airily through the arrangements. "Young and Lovely", featuring Zac Pennington of Bischoff's former band Parenthetical Girls, indulges in a broad, slurpy cabaret melody for its chorus that feels like Parks reincarnate.
If Composed doesn't resonate as deeply as it should, this debt might be part of the reason. Bischoff is a hugely talented composer, with sky-high ambitions. He is also still in the process of announcing his voice. Many of the big ideas on Composed still feel borrowed, from Parks and from others, but you can hear Bischoff busily whittling away at their edges so that he can eventually own them. The multiple guest vocalists, meanwhile, keep things lively while also preventing a through-line from developing. Composed is a good album. Someday Bischoff will likely make a great one. - Jayson Greene
May 7, 2013
First of all, “Composed” was chosen by Amazon US to be a part of the 100 for $5 program. So! For the next two weeks you can order “Composed” for only 5 one dollar bills! That’s like one double (vegan) mocha frappuccino with extra (vegan) whip cream for 9 songs with an entire orchestra and some of the best singers alive (in my opinion)!
Get it here.
In other news… I am currently writing a piece for Kronos Quartet!!! WHAT?!?! Yup. Lincoln Center commissioned me to write a new piece for Kronos Quartet to be played by them at Lincoln Center as part of their Out of Doors festival. The evening includes new music from Amon Tobin, Dan Deacon, Bryce Dessner and more. To top it all off, IT’S FREE! I am so insanely honored to be composing for Kronos. For a lil fella like myself, it is about as good as it gets. More details here.
For the next two weeks as this Amazon US sale is going, I am going to be posting 4 videos from my show at The Moore Theater on Dec. 1 of last year. So check back often and you can see what shenanigans we got up to.
Listen/Buy:
Brassland (US and rest of World)
The Leaf Label (UK and Europe)Amazon US / Amazon UKiTunes US / iTunes UK
2012 was rediculously amazing! I shared the stage with so many of my heroes and friends, traveled the world, met tons of absolutely wonderful folks. It was crazy. Check out my blog post below for a detailed look at everything I got up to in 2012, including videos and pictures!
It feels as though the foundation I have been working so hard to build my whole life is finally done and its time to start building! 2013 will certainly be that. There are tons of things I am so close to announcing, but not able to just yet. BIG STUFF. Still pinching myself kind of stuff. So check back often! One of my new years resolutions is to stay more current with this stuff!
Here are a few announcements!
New videos -
From my live broadcast on KEXP. This is super well documented and with some of the players from my record!
And another nice video from The Ecstatic Music Festival.
I was also just commissioned by The Liasons Project to write an arrangement for solo piano of a Stephen Sondheim tune!
Some Shows -
I have a handful of shows confirmed in the US at the end of February supporting the incredible Efterklang… check out my Live Page for more info
I am also performing at Adelaide Festival on March 6th. I am performing with an orchestra at this one playing music from Composed with some special guest singers. The show will also have a couple of my favorite bands on the bill, Deerhoof and Buke and Gase. It will be a real great one!
Finally, I just wanted to remind you all about my newest release called “Scores”, available on CD or digitally. It is instrumental versions of the songs from “Composed”. When I was recording “Composed”, I was at a point where all the music was done and no vocals had been added. I almost kept the record instrumental because I loved the space and feeling the music had and was scared to loose this. As soon as I heard the vocalists add their stuff, my concerns went away, but the instrumentals give you a chance to perhaps discover some details overlooked in “Composed”. “Scores” also comes with option of… YOU GUESSED IT! Scores for the entire record! All of the parts for all of the instruments for your own playing pleasure! I am excited about this because usually scores are hard to come by or expensive. These are neither of those things! Enjoy!
Alright! Happy New Year everyone and be sure to check out my ’2012 round up’ blog below.
XO
Jherek
January 23, 2013 I wanted to put together a little Year in Pictures and Video timeline of 2012 kind of thing… So here you go!
Feb 4th @ Ecstatic Music Festival NYC
The evening was pure magic. Shared the stage with David Byrne, Carla Bozulich, Craig Wedren, Mirah Zeitlyn, Zac Pennington, Sam Mickens, Charlie Looker, Steven Reker, Jen Goma, Greg Saunier and The Wordless Music Orchestra. Here is a new video of Blossom!
I then joined Amanda Palmer & The Grand Theft Orchestra and we headed of to Melbourne to record Theater is Evil. Here is a tune that I wrote and arranged for the group!
While in Oz we my pals in the GTO and I made some buddies and made this video for Young & Lovely!
We also shot this -
Then I won an award called the Amy Award from my hometown of Bainbridge Island. Really lovely and honored!
You guessed it.. Back to NY again! This time to celebrate Amanda Palmers Kickstarter! We celebrated pretty hard!
Then we headed off to Berlin, London to play and do press. We shot this video while there -
Straight from there to L.A. and S.F
More shows and press.
Boston & NY. More shows, more press.
We insanely got David Byrne to come hang and sing Burning Down The House with us as his backing band.. To collaborate with him was totally insane, but to play a song that I grew up listening to and hearing being right there next to him as he belted it, was totally overwhelming.
Then we went to Oklahoma City and filmed the Do It With A Rockstar video with Wayne Coyne -
That was fun!
Came back home and recorded a couple records including Parenthetical Girls, Led To Sea and Princess Siesmagraph.
AFP & GTO headed off to BARD College for a residency and rehearsed here…
Then we headed off for the loveliest and hardest and craziest tour I have ever been on! So fun. Such a great crew. I opened all the shows as did my good buds The Simple Pleasure. We had a string quartet in almost every city. Met a billion amazing and talented people. Did the U.S., E.U. and U.K.
The second night of tour was my birthday in NY. Epic.
Special shout out to Jessie England from The Simple Pleasure, who played viola with me every night on tour and really made things easier when things were hard and more fun when things were awesome.
Tour stuff -
A highlight was playing Time Warp with Richard O’Brien (Creator of Rocky Horror)
After 10 days at home after about 3 months of touring, I started rehearsals for my show at The Moore Theater. Rehearsals were held at Frye Art Museum in Seattle as part of their current exhibition Mw [Moment Magnitude]. I collaborated with Robb Kunz who is a fantastic instillation artist. He used some of my ambient music for a sound sculpture. The Frye then invited me to hold open to the public rehearsals inside the museum. It was great!
Also in preparation for the show, I brought some of my best buds into KEXP for a live broadcast.
My show at The Moore Theater on Dec. 1 was a truly wonderful evening. So many friends and collaborators coming together and kicking serious ass together. It got me all cryin and stuff… Beautiful. I had fantastic guests including Mirah, Nika Danilova (Zola Jesus), Soko, Tomo Nakayama, Zac Pennington and Jason Webley!
There will be some great documentation of this very soon!
10 days later, you guessed it, I was back in NYC. Lincoln Center commissioned me to write new music for a performance at Lincoln Center with yMusic, Greg Saunier and Jen Goma. It was such an honor to get to play with this ensemble again. They are truly astounding musicians and the coolest people on the planet.
Few days break for the holidays, then this happened…
Then this happened……
and then perhaps the most fun thing I did all year was trying to sing my favorite Prince song. I know, I know… I am not prince, but god it felt good. Actually it kind of hurt. But the good kind of hurt.
Happy New Year everyone! I am going to go to sleep now! What a year!
XO
Jherek
I want to start this by saying that I am super happy to be in a band that encourages its individual members to speak their minds and remain independent personalities. I have been a musician my whole life. And I have been a *struggling* musician my whole life. Living in my van, living in my friend’s closet, skipping meals, and refusing to work a 9-5 in hopes that I could reach a point in my life that I could make ends meet by doing what I love. This was a choice, and one I will never regret. Maybe for that reason, it warms my heart to see people standing up for musicians’ rights. I can’t recall musicians’ rights ever being such a major point of conversation and it has been extremely thought-provoking to see so many different views being expressed.
Moving along, eight months ago I first met with Amanda Palmer to talk about joining the Grand Theft Orchestra. I ended up doing some string arrangements for her record, and another member of her touring band, Chad Raines, did some horn arrangements. Before we recorded, before her Kickstarter, we had a long conversation about how the tour would work. I was excited to learn that Amanda also wanted to have strings and horns as part of her show. She also invited me to open her shows. Amanda was incredibly kind to invite me, in part because it’s rare to get a chance to open for someone with such an incredible fanbase, in part because my own music is orchestral.
For those who don’t know me or my work (which I imagine is the majority of you!), earlier this year, I released an album called Composed that was made after many years of painstaking work. This whole discussion has been very personal for me, because as a little-known composer, it is virtually impossible to have a traditional orchestral performance of your own music if you don’t have big bucks. As a result, I’ve had to constantly think of unconventional and innovative ways to make things happen. For my own record, I didn’t have the funds to hire an entire orchestra, so I had to improvise. Instead, I rode my bicycle around the Pacific Northwest, laptop in tow, and recorded a smaller number of classically-trained musician friends, layering their parts to literally orchestrate the sound of a large orchestra. Later, I was lucky to have some more well-known guests like David Byrne, Mirah Zeitlyn, Caetano Veloso, SoKo, Nels Cline and Greg Saunier contribute to the album. To this day I am amazed the record even exists!
You might imagine how difficult it would be to tour and bring an orchestral record to life, especially with no budget of my own. Your imagination is correct! However, I thought if I had access to a string quartet, it would at least make it possible for me to present a set of my own music. So Amanda presented the idea of reaching out to her fanbase, something she has done in various ways in the past to great success, in order to source local volunteer players for each night of her tour. We agreed that it would be my responsibility to organize them. I would get to present my music and she would get to use the quartet on a few songs.
This was all *before* the Kickstarter project and *before* making the record.
The volunteer arrangement had me worried from the beginning, because I have always done my absolute best to pay musicians in my own projects. I write grants, I have done a Kickstarter project, I save, and I often play gigs where all of the money goes to the players and I receive nothing. I do this happily, because as a composer, the opportunity to get the chance for my music to be played by awesome people is extremely fortunate! Sometimes I pay players a small amount of money and sometimes a larger amount, but the players know what to expect in advance.
Aside from the volunteer aspect, the logistics of organizing different string quartets for each city was really overwhelming. As someone who was not social media savvy, the whole prospect was completely mind-boggling and foreign to me, but the possibilities were also interesting. As an outsider, learning about Amanda’s history and success with crowdsourcing and her incredible connection with her fans, the volunteer musician scenario made some sense to me. It seemed yet another improvisational way to make performing orchestral music possible.
Boom, her Kickstarter happened, catapulting this whole project into the spotlight.
Part of the Kickstarter project included a promotional tour in which we played two shows in six different cities between June and August. I was happy to learn that there was a budget for string players on these shows. I was able to hire players, and I also did opening sets on all the gigs. It was really great and worked out well.
After the promotional tour ended, I was happy to learn that there would be a small budget available to me to hire some extra players. Uncertain I would be able to organize quartets in every city, I started by approaching musicians in cities in which I already had contacts and friends – namely larger cities which I had played in before, and some of the musicians who had played with us during the promotional tour. A major help to this effort was Classical Revolution, whom I had collaborated with a few times in the past for my own projects. For those of you who don’t know, Classical Revolution is an international organization of classical musicians looking to bring classical music to new audiences and venues (AWESOME! — and more about that at the end of this letter). In July, we worked with CR on the San Francisco stop of Amanda’s promo tour, and at that time the head of their SF chapter expressed interest in being involved during the fall tour that’s happening right now. We fantasized about creating AP/CR merch that could benefit CR and other ways to bring more attention to the organization. Unfortunately time was not on our side, so we couldn’t realize the merch ideas. When it was certain there would not be a budget to hire musicians in all cities during the fall tour, the head of CR SF decided he would no longer be able to help, a decision which I fully respect. However, he did say it would be okay for me to reach out personally to the heads of other CR groups.
Part of the reason there was such confusion surrounding crowdsourcing musicians is because it wasn’t happening in every city. From the beginning, Amanda and I were approaching assembling extra players in different ways. For her, it really *was* all about engaging her fanbase, and her belief that it would be an exciting and unique way to involve her fans, that would add yet another element of intimacy to each show. I, on the other hand, approached it like every other project I have done. Having to organize, rehearse and play with a completely new group every single night was a crazy amount of work and somewhat of a crap-shoot. The easiest way I saw to manage all of that work was to contact the very best players, hope I could lock in one or two ringers each night, and build the ensembles from there. So the first thing I did was reach out to friends, friends of friends, and to the CR network, some of whom were outside the AP fanbase, some of whom had been paid to play during the promo tour, all before the open call was even made. This is how some of the cities ended up having paid players, such as in New York.
When the plan to crowdsource volunteers for the rest of the shows was brought up again, we discussed the things we could offer the volunteers, settling on the now infamous “beer, hi-fives and hugs”, as well as guest list spots, merch and food. During the promo tour, we had also invited the guest musicians to sell their own merch at the shows, and some expressed interest in playing before the show, which was something we were very happy to try and accommodate. Since the string players would be playing for my opening set as well, it was important for me to have some way of making sure the selected players could actually play their instruments, hence the call for samples of their work. Not having any idea what the response would be, it was basically some sort of filter to help me sort through all of the possible submissions.
Finally, the open call was made, via AP’s website and through her twitter.
We were inundated with offers from all types of musicians from many different cities. We found players who are talented and extremely excited to be there to play music with us. (Some of them were even from CR, for instance we had an all-CR band in Washington D.C. Lovely folks!) In some cities we weren’t able to organize players, and that was okay too, for example in Atlanta where instead I opened for Amanda with a solo set.
It wasn’t until the tour actually started, some weeks after the open call was made, that the comments against the call began to mushroom on the internet. When the feedback started rolling in, you can bet everyone involved began reassessing the entire situation. Both Amanda and I definitely have some regrets. For one thing, I’m sorry it wasn’t clear that there was a budget for some cities, and that I had approached players on my own outside of AP’s fanbase before the open call was made. This, in particular, seemed a big contradiction to the original intent of crowdsourcing volunteer players from AP’s fanbase as a unique approach to touring. The whirlwind of activity and attention that surrounds an “overnight sensation” like Amanda’s Kickstarter can really mix up plans and intentions and execution in ways that are hard for the public to discern, especially when so many different people are involved. It certainly wasn’t anyone’s intention to take advantage of or exploit anyone. And for what it’s worth, once the feedback started rolling in at the start of tour, I was glad to forgo profits from the nightly sales of my own merch in order to compensate the volunteers. And of course, Amanda announced later that all of the volunteer musicians would be paid, retroactively as well, which I am very happy about.
Having spent a lot of time now with AP, I am continually inspired by her passion, innovation, and genuine support and love for her fanbase and everyone that works for and with her. She is a pioneer, navigating through an evolving music industry in which paradigms are shifting. There is definitely some trial-and-error along the way, but I absolutely know that her heart is in the right place.
** A quick postscript about bringing composed music and classical instruments to new audiences. I teased this point above — how important it is to reach new audiences — and I think it’s worth stating at length: Most folks in smaller towns (and by that I mean any city under a half million people) lack the chance to hear *any* classical music, much less the new, dynamic composed music happening in major cities like New York, London, and Los Angeles. One of my life goals, therefore, is to bring my own music to cities outside of normal classical music capitals. I’ve spent a long time building relationships with classical musicans/groups everywhere to help make this happen. And it’s always a pleasure to work with groups like Classical Revolution for this reason, as they have groups around the whole world. The Portland chapter just played some of my music a few nights ago at the Time-Based Arts Festival, and they also assembled an amazing chamber orchestra for me a couple years ago for a concert. In return, I am volunteering my services to play a big benefit for them in S.F. later this month. Point being, the world they and I are operating within is not one to which normal pop music economics always apply. It’s not ideal — but it is okay — and, more importantly, it’s a reality we need to deal with to keep this music alive. Maybe it doesn’t compete with EDM in the minds of the traditional music business promoters but, hey, if we keep breathing new life into it, maybe, just maybe, one day it will.
I have been working on this record since May of 2009 and it has been a wild journey! What started out as songs written on a ukulele and me humming gibberish has blossomed into a full orchestra and collaborations with pretty much all of my heroes! What started out as me as a very behind the scenes guy that was always afraid to ask people to participate in my own thing turned into quite the opposite.
This record is the culmination of so many things, it makes it a little hard to write about. Mostly, it has shown me that everything musically I have done in the past has been for a reason and all of the musical and non musical growing pains I have gone through have brought me to this insanely special place of working with so many wonderful musicians, singers, and the labels that have given this record a home. It has given me greater appreciation for my past, time with all of the bands that I have been in and worked with, which in turn gives me a real awareness of how exciting this time is. Many of these collaborators had never heard of me and had absolutely no obligation to be involved, but decided to collaborate because they believed in the music they heard. This gives me a lot of hope personally and for humanity!
I had a show in February at The Ecstatic Music Festival that brought everything to light. The concert was all of the tunes from “Composed“ and featured nearly all of the musicians that played on the record, most of the singers as well as a couple of my best friends. All of these people that had been put together one at a time on my little laptop and some headphones, were all now in the same room together. As I looked around the room and saw all of these amazing personalities and friends, even in the midst of all of the craziness, I made a conscious effort to take a minute every so often to really take in all of the love and support these people have given me and to remember this time where everyone is healthy, happy and freaking awesome. It was the most beautiful night of my life (so far!)!
This record to me is a celebration of my friends, family, collaborators, and to all of the musicians I have crossed paths with on the road and at home. I am taking this moment right now, before this record is released into the world and hopefully into your hands and hoping that my happiness and all of this love travels into your ears and spreads love bugs all over your brain.
This year I will be doing several tours with my friend Amanda Palmer. I will be playing bass in her band and also opening a lot of her shows. I also have some big shows later in the year planned in Seattle and NY. I hope to travel to your neck of the woods soon, so check my live page every once in a while and come see a show!
Sincerely
Jherek Bischoff
I am back so soon! I am here to remind you that you can get Composed over at Amazon US for $5 until the 15th of May. Go get it here.
Here is another tune from my show on December 1, 2012 at The Moore Theater in Seattle. This one features a beautiful tune by Soko. Arrangement by yours truly.I have some exciting news!
May 2, 2013First of all, “Composed” was chosen by Amazon US to be a part of the 100 for $5 program. So! For the next two weeks you can order “Composed” for only 5 one dollar bills! That’s like one double (vegan) mocha frappuccino with extra (vegan) whip cream for 9 songs with an entire orchestra and some of the best singers alive (in my opinion)!
Get it here.
In other news… I am currently writing a piece for Kronos Quartet!!! WHAT?!?! Yup. Lincoln Center commissioned me to write a new piece for Kronos Quartet to be played by them at Lincoln Center as part of their Out of Doors festival. The evening includes new music from Amon Tobin, Dan Deacon, Bryce Dessner and more. To top it all off, IT’S FREE! I am so insanely honored to be composing for Kronos. For a lil fella like myself, it is about as good as it gets. More details here.
For the next two weeks as this Amazon US sale is going, I am going to be posting 4 videos from my show at The Moore Theater on Dec. 1 of last year. So check back often and you can see what shenanigans we got up to.
Hello to listeners from NPR’s Fresh Air
April 9, 2013Listen/Buy:
Brassland (US and rest of World)
The Leaf Label (UK and Europe)Amazon US / Amazon UKiTunes US / iTunes UK
A few announcements
January 25, 20132012 was rediculously amazing! I shared the stage with so many of my heroes and friends, traveled the world, met tons of absolutely wonderful folks. It was crazy. Check out my blog post below for a detailed look at everything I got up to in 2012, including videos and pictures!
It feels as though the foundation I have been working so hard to build my whole life is finally done and its time to start building! 2013 will certainly be that. There are tons of things I am so close to announcing, but not able to just yet. BIG STUFF. Still pinching myself kind of stuff. So check back often! One of my new years resolutions is to stay more current with this stuff!
Here are a few announcements!
New videos -
From my live broadcast on KEXP. This is super well documented and with some of the players from my record!
And another nice video from The Ecstatic Music Festival.
I was also just commissioned by The Liasons Project to write an arrangement for solo piano of a Stephen Sondheim tune!
Some Shows -
I have a handful of shows confirmed in the US at the end of February supporting the incredible Efterklang… check out my Live Page for more info
I am also performing at Adelaide Festival on March 6th. I am performing with an orchestra at this one playing music from Composed with some special guest singers. The show will also have a couple of my favorite bands on the bill, Deerhoof and Buke and Gase. It will be a real great one!
Alright! Happy New Year everyone and be sure to check out my ’2012 round up’ blog below.
XO
Jherek
Feb 4th @ Ecstatic Music Festival NYC
The evening was pure magic. Shared the stage with David Byrne, Carla Bozulich, Craig Wedren, Mirah Zeitlyn, Zac Pennington, Sam Mickens, Charlie Looker, Steven Reker, Jen Goma, Greg Saunier and The Wordless Music Orchestra. Here is a new video of Blossom!
I then joined Amanda Palmer & The Grand Theft Orchestra and we headed of to Melbourne to record Theater is Evil. Here is a tune that I wrote and arranged for the group!
While in Oz we my pals in the GTO and I made some buddies and made this video for Young & Lovely!
We also shot this -
I then flew straight from OZ to New York and had the insane privilege to work with The Degenerate Art Ensemble on a re interpretation of Robert Wilson & Philip Glass’s Einstein On The Beach with Robert Wilson himself directing! The show was really great and was at Baryshnikov Theater.
Then my record came out!!
Went home briefly and then back off to NY for a show in th BAM opera house for the Crossing Brooklyn Ferry Festival curated by the Dessner brothers of The National. I performed with yMusic and Greg Saunier. I had some crazy guests once again, David Byrne, Amanda Palmer, Charlie Looker and Jen Goma.
Went home briefly and then back off to NY for a show in th BAM opera house for the Crossing Brooklyn Ferry Festival curated by the Dessner brothers of The National. I performed with yMusic and Greg Saunier. I had some crazy guests once again, David Byrne, Amanda Palmer, Charlie Looker and Jen Goma.
Then I won an award called the Amy Award from my hometown of Bainbridge Island. Really lovely and honored!
You guessed it.. Back to NY again! This time to celebrate Amanda Palmers Kickstarter! We celebrated pretty hard!
Straight from there to L.A. and S.F
More shows and press.
Boston & NY. More shows, more press.
We insanely got David Byrne to come hang and sing Burning Down The House with us as his backing band.. To collaborate with him was totally insane, but to play a song that I grew up listening to and hearing being right there next to him as he belted it, was totally overwhelming.
Then we went to Oklahoma City and filmed the Do It With A Rockstar video with Wayne Coyne -
That was fun!
Came back home and recorded a couple records including Parenthetical Girls, Led To Sea and Princess Siesmagraph.
AFP & GTO headed off to BARD College for a residency and rehearsed here…
Then we headed off for the loveliest and hardest and craziest tour I have ever been on! So fun. Such a great crew. I opened all the shows as did my good buds The Simple Pleasure. We had a string quartet in almost every city. Met a billion amazing and talented people. Did the U.S., E.U. and U.K.
The second night of tour was my birthday in NY. Epic.
Special shout out to Jessie England from The Simple Pleasure, who played viola with me every night on tour and really made things easier when things were hard and more fun when things were awesome.
Tour stuff -
A highlight was playing Time Warp with Richard O’Brien (Creator of Rocky Horror)
After 10 days at home after about 3 months of touring, I started rehearsals for my show at The Moore Theater. Rehearsals were held at Frye Art Museum in Seattle as part of their current exhibition Mw [Moment Magnitude]. I collaborated with Robb Kunz who is a fantastic instillation artist. He used some of my ambient music for a sound sculpture. The Frye then invited me to hold open to the public rehearsals inside the museum. It was great!
Also in preparation for the show, I brought some of my best buds into KEXP for a live broadcast.
My show at The Moore Theater on Dec. 1 was a truly wonderful evening. So many friends and collaborators coming together and kicking serious ass together. It got me all cryin and stuff… Beautiful. I had fantastic guests including Mirah, Nika Danilova (Zola Jesus), Soko, Tomo Nakayama, Zac Pennington and Jason Webley!
There will be some great documentation of this very soon!
10 days later, you guessed it, I was back in NYC. Lincoln Center commissioned me to write new music for a performance at Lincoln Center with yMusic, Greg Saunier and Jen Goma. It was such an honor to get to play with this ensemble again. They are truly astounding musicians and the coolest people on the planet.
Few days break for the holidays, then this happened…
Then this happened……
and then perhaps the most fun thing I did all year was trying to sing my favorite Prince song. I know, I know… I am not prince, but god it felt good. Actually it kind of hurt. But the good kind of hurt.
Happy New Year everyone! I am going to go to sleep now! What a year!
XO
Jherek
Amanda Palmer: The view from here
September 27, 2012I want to start this by saying that I am super happy to be in a band that encourages its individual members to speak their minds and remain independent personalities. I have been a musician my whole life. And I have been a *struggling* musician my whole life. Living in my van, living in my friend’s closet, skipping meals, and refusing to work a 9-5 in hopes that I could reach a point in my life that I could make ends meet by doing what I love. This was a choice, and one I will never regret. Maybe for that reason, it warms my heart to see people standing up for musicians’ rights. I can’t recall musicians’ rights ever being such a major point of conversation and it has been extremely thought-provoking to see so many different views being expressed.
Moving along, eight months ago I first met with Amanda Palmer to talk about joining the Grand Theft Orchestra. I ended up doing some string arrangements for her record, and another member of her touring band, Chad Raines, did some horn arrangements. Before we recorded, before her Kickstarter, we had a long conversation about how the tour would work. I was excited to learn that Amanda also wanted to have strings and horns as part of her show. She also invited me to open her shows. Amanda was incredibly kind to invite me, in part because it’s rare to get a chance to open for someone with such an incredible fanbase, in part because my own music is orchestral.
For those who don’t know me or my work (which I imagine is the majority of you!), earlier this year, I released an album called Composed that was made after many years of painstaking work. This whole discussion has been very personal for me, because as a little-known composer, it is virtually impossible to have a traditional orchestral performance of your own music if you don’t have big bucks. As a result, I’ve had to constantly think of unconventional and innovative ways to make things happen. For my own record, I didn’t have the funds to hire an entire orchestra, so I had to improvise. Instead, I rode my bicycle around the Pacific Northwest, laptop in tow, and recorded a smaller number of classically-trained musician friends, layering their parts to literally orchestrate the sound of a large orchestra. Later, I was lucky to have some more well-known guests like David Byrne, Mirah Zeitlyn, Caetano Veloso, SoKo, Nels Cline and Greg Saunier contribute to the album. To this day I am amazed the record even exists!
You might imagine how difficult it would be to tour and bring an orchestral record to life, especially with no budget of my own. Your imagination is correct! However, I thought if I had access to a string quartet, it would at least make it possible for me to present a set of my own music. So Amanda presented the idea of reaching out to her fanbase, something she has done in various ways in the past to great success, in order to source local volunteer players for each night of her tour. We agreed that it would be my responsibility to organize them. I would get to present my music and she would get to use the quartet on a few songs.
This was all *before* the Kickstarter project and *before* making the record.
The volunteer arrangement had me worried from the beginning, because I have always done my absolute best to pay musicians in my own projects. I write grants, I have done a Kickstarter project, I save, and I often play gigs where all of the money goes to the players and I receive nothing. I do this happily, because as a composer, the opportunity to get the chance for my music to be played by awesome people is extremely fortunate! Sometimes I pay players a small amount of money and sometimes a larger amount, but the players know what to expect in advance.
Aside from the volunteer aspect, the logistics of organizing different string quartets for each city was really overwhelming. As someone who was not social media savvy, the whole prospect was completely mind-boggling and foreign to me, but the possibilities were also interesting. As an outsider, learning about Amanda’s history and success with crowdsourcing and her incredible connection with her fans, the volunteer musician scenario made some sense to me. It seemed yet another improvisational way to make performing orchestral music possible.
Boom, her Kickstarter happened, catapulting this whole project into the spotlight.
Part of the Kickstarter project included a promotional tour in which we played two shows in six different cities between June and August. I was happy to learn that there was a budget for string players on these shows. I was able to hire players, and I also did opening sets on all the gigs. It was really great and worked out well.
After the promotional tour ended, I was happy to learn that there would be a small budget available to me to hire some extra players. Uncertain I would be able to organize quartets in every city, I started by approaching musicians in cities in which I already had contacts and friends – namely larger cities which I had played in before, and some of the musicians who had played with us during the promotional tour. A major help to this effort was Classical Revolution, whom I had collaborated with a few times in the past for my own projects. For those of you who don’t know, Classical Revolution is an international organization of classical musicians looking to bring classical music to new audiences and venues (AWESOME! — and more about that at the end of this letter). In July, we worked with CR on the San Francisco stop of Amanda’s promo tour, and at that time the head of their SF chapter expressed interest in being involved during the fall tour that’s happening right now. We fantasized about creating AP/CR merch that could benefit CR and other ways to bring more attention to the organization. Unfortunately time was not on our side, so we couldn’t realize the merch ideas. When it was certain there would not be a budget to hire musicians in all cities during the fall tour, the head of CR SF decided he would no longer be able to help, a decision which I fully respect. However, he did say it would be okay for me to reach out personally to the heads of other CR groups.
Part of the reason there was such confusion surrounding crowdsourcing musicians is because it wasn’t happening in every city. From the beginning, Amanda and I were approaching assembling extra players in different ways. For her, it really *was* all about engaging her fanbase, and her belief that it would be an exciting and unique way to involve her fans, that would add yet another element of intimacy to each show. I, on the other hand, approached it like every other project I have done. Having to organize, rehearse and play with a completely new group every single night was a crazy amount of work and somewhat of a crap-shoot. The easiest way I saw to manage all of that work was to contact the very best players, hope I could lock in one or two ringers each night, and build the ensembles from there. So the first thing I did was reach out to friends, friends of friends, and to the CR network, some of whom were outside the AP fanbase, some of whom had been paid to play during the promo tour, all before the open call was even made. This is how some of the cities ended up having paid players, such as in New York.
When the plan to crowdsource volunteers for the rest of the shows was brought up again, we discussed the things we could offer the volunteers, settling on the now infamous “beer, hi-fives and hugs”, as well as guest list spots, merch and food. During the promo tour, we had also invited the guest musicians to sell their own merch at the shows, and some expressed interest in playing before the show, which was something we were very happy to try and accommodate. Since the string players would be playing for my opening set as well, it was important for me to have some way of making sure the selected players could actually play their instruments, hence the call for samples of their work. Not having any idea what the response would be, it was basically some sort of filter to help me sort through all of the possible submissions.
Finally, the open call was made, via AP’s website and through her twitter.
We were inundated with offers from all types of musicians from many different cities. We found players who are talented and extremely excited to be there to play music with us. (Some of them were even from CR, for instance we had an all-CR band in Washington D.C. Lovely folks!) In some cities we weren’t able to organize players, and that was okay too, for example in Atlanta where instead I opened for Amanda with a solo set.
It wasn’t until the tour actually started, some weeks after the open call was made, that the comments against the call began to mushroom on the internet. When the feedback started rolling in, you can bet everyone involved began reassessing the entire situation. Both Amanda and I definitely have some regrets. For one thing, I’m sorry it wasn’t clear that there was a budget for some cities, and that I had approached players on my own outside of AP’s fanbase before the open call was made. This, in particular, seemed a big contradiction to the original intent of crowdsourcing volunteer players from AP’s fanbase as a unique approach to touring. The whirlwind of activity and attention that surrounds an “overnight sensation” like Amanda’s Kickstarter can really mix up plans and intentions and execution in ways that are hard for the public to discern, especially when so many different people are involved. It certainly wasn’t anyone’s intention to take advantage of or exploit anyone. And for what it’s worth, once the feedback started rolling in at the start of tour, I was glad to forgo profits from the nightly sales of my own merch in order to compensate the volunteers. And of course, Amanda announced later that all of the volunteer musicians would be paid, retroactively as well, which I am very happy about.
Having spent a lot of time now with AP, I am continually inspired by her passion, innovation, and genuine support and love for her fanbase and everyone that works for and with her. She is a pioneer, navigating through an evolving music industry in which paradigms are shifting. There is definitely some trial-and-error along the way, but I absolutely know that her heart is in the right place.
** A quick postscript about bringing composed music and classical instruments to new audiences. I teased this point above — how important it is to reach new audiences — and I think it’s worth stating at length: Most folks in smaller towns (and by that I mean any city under a half million people) lack the chance to hear *any* classical music, much less the new, dynamic composed music happening in major cities like New York, London, and Los Angeles. One of my life goals, therefore, is to bring my own music to cities outside of normal classical music capitals. I’ve spent a long time building relationships with classical musicans/groups everywhere to help make this happen. And it’s always a pleasure to work with groups like Classical Revolution for this reason, as they have groups around the whole world. The Portland chapter just played some of my music a few nights ago at the Time-Based Arts Festival, and they also assembled an amazing chamber orchestra for me a couple years ago for a concert. In return, I am volunteering my services to play a big benefit for them in S.F. later this month. Point being, the world they and I are operating within is not one to which normal pop music economics always apply. It’s not ideal — but it is okay — and, more importantly, it’s a reality we need to deal with to keep this music alive. Maybe it doesn’t compete with EDM in the minds of the traditional music business promoters but, hey, if we keep breathing new life into it, maybe, just maybe, one day it will.
NEW LIVE VIDEO
September 18, 2012HELLO
June 8, 2012I have been working on this record since May of 2009 and it has been a wild journey! What started out as songs written on a ukulele and me humming gibberish has blossomed into a full orchestra and collaborations with pretty much all of my heroes! What started out as me as a very behind the scenes guy that was always afraid to ask people to participate in my own thing turned into quite the opposite.This record is the culmination of so many things, it makes it a little hard to write about. Mostly, it has shown me that everything musically I have done in the past has been for a reason and all of the musical and non musical growing pains I have gone through have brought me to this insanely special place of working with so many wonderful musicians, singers, and the labels that have given this record a home. It has given me greater appreciation for my past, time with all of the bands that I have been in and worked with, which in turn gives me a real awareness of how exciting this time is. Many of these collaborators had never heard of me and had absolutely no obligation to be involved, but decided to collaborate because they believed in the music they heard. This gives me a lot of hope personally and for humanity!
I had a show in February at The Ecstatic Music Festival that brought everything to light. The concert was all of the tunes from “Composed“ and featured nearly all of the musicians that played on the record, most of the singers as well as a couple of my best friends. All of these people that had been put together one at a time on my little laptop and some headphones, were all now in the same room together. As I looked around the room and saw all of these amazing personalities and friends, even in the midst of all of the craziness, I made a conscious effort to take a minute every so often to really take in all of the love and support these people have given me and to remember this time where everyone is healthy, happy and freaking awesome. It was the most beautiful night of my life (so far!)!
This record to me is a celebration of my friends, family, collaborators, and to all of the musicians I have crossed paths with on the road and at home. I am taking this moment right now, before this record is released into the world and hopefully into your hands and hoping that my happiness and all of this love travels into your ears and spreads love bugs all over your brain.
This year I will be doing several tours with my friend Amanda Palmer. I will be playing bass in her band and also opening a lot of her shows. I also have some big shows later in the year planned in Seattle and NY. I hope to travel to your neck of the woods soon, so check my live page every once in a while and come see a show!
Sincerely
Jherek Bischoff
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