The cover art for Peter Gabriel's new album, Scratch My Back
This past February, Peter Gabriel released his eighth studio album, Scratch My Back, which is a striking collection of 12 songs made famous by a diverse range of artists – including Lou Reed, Elbow, Radiohead, and David Bowie – arranged for full orchestra. Peter Gabriel collaborated with pianist Jason Rebello, orchestrator and arranger John Metcalfe, and producer Bob Ezrin on the album, which he has described as “a swap shop of songs.” It’s quite a remarkable album, with a unique sound: Gabriel’s vocals over sparse piano and lush strings.
I caught up with John Metcalfe, who did all of the orchestral arrangements for the album, to ask him about the project. More after the jump.
I was delighted to receive a letter here at Sibelius HQ from a young composer called Julian Pombo, who has won the Strictly Composing competition, which was organised as part of the UK government’s Tune In – Year of Music initiative. The Year of Music is designed to get children and young people across the UK more involved in musical activities in the 2009/10 school year. There are all sorts of things going on, including the Sing Up! campaign to get singing into primary schools, school visits by pop musicians including Pixie Lott and the Jonas Brothers, workshops with ensembles like the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, local festivals, and a great deal else besides.
Julian Pombo
The Strictly Composing competition invited students aged 19 or under to compose a tango lasting no longer than five minutes, for any ensemble provided it includes violin and piano. Entries closed at the end of 2009, and the jury was chaired by Antony Hopkins CBE. The winning piece is set to be professionally recorded and performed in London by violinist Sian Phillips later this year.
Julian Pombo’s tango, Amor Joven, was judged to be the winner, and the 15-year-old composer, who has been studying flute at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama for the past three years, used Sibelius Student to write his winning piece. “Sibelius Student has helped me a lot in my composition classes, as well as giving me hours of enjoyment,” he said.
Julian hopes to move up to working in the full Sibelius 6 product soon: “Having won this competition, I would like to enter other competitions that will require writing for orchestra, and for that I’m going to need the full version of Sibelius!”
It’s always great to see our products helping students realise their creativity and playing a role in their development and success. Congratulations, Julian!
Check out this fantastic video taking you behind the scenes on the scoring and sound design of James Cameron’s Oscar-winning blockbuster, Avatar, which became the highest-grossing movie in history in an astonishing 20 days. And if you are one of the millions of people around the world who has seen the film, you will have been immersed not only in the astounding 3D visuals, but also in the extraordinary music and sound design.
It will surely come as no surprise to learn that Avid’s broad range of products played a vital role in Avatar’s production, and the video above shows you how Sibelius and Pro Tools were used to create the ethnic-fused score and alien sound world of the planet Pandora.
Composer James Horner says:
To keep track of what I’m doing now transparently, instead of using just pen and paper, I’m using Sibelius, writing in ways that are not conventional ways of writing: I mean, without it, we’d be lost. And Pro Tools is just such a wonderful enabler: it’s like a library, a writer, a recorder, an everything tool.
Watch the complete video above, or in glorious HD.
This Sunday sees the US broadcast on HBO of the first episode of a major new ten-part miniseries called The Pacific.
The Pacific is perhaps the spiritual successor to Band of Brothers, itself a ten-part adaptation of the book of the same name by American historian Stephen E. Ambrose. While Band of Brothers told the story of the part played in the victory in Europe of the 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment of the US Army, otherwise known as Easy Company, towards the end of World War II, The Pacific tells the story of the US Marine Corps’s participation in the Pacific theatre of war.
The series is based on memoirs by two US Marines, With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge and Helmet for My Pillow by Robert Leckie, and tells the story of the war against Japan through the eyes of these two men, and a third Marine, John Basilone.
The same production team that worked on Band of Brothers – including Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks – are behind The Pacific, so it is appropriate that the people behind the music have some links to the earlier series. The composer on Band of Brothers was Michael Kamen, who sadly passed away in 2003, but his orchestrator on that series, Blake Neely – himself now an acclaimed composer, arranger and producer – has collaborated with Hans Zimmer and Geoff Zanelli on The Pacific, and the results are sure to be epic.
Blake was kind enough to make time to talk to me about his work on The Pacific, his collaboration with his co-composers, and how Sibelius plays a part in his work. More after the jump.
Last night’s Academy Awards ceremony honoured composer Michael Giacchino with the award for Best Original Score for his score for Disney/Pixar’s Up.
The conductor’s score and parts were all prepared using Sibelius by the expert team of copyists led by Booker White in the music office at Disney Studios in Burbank, California, and Michael himself also [...]
Time is running out to take advantage of our special offer on switching to Sibelius from Finale, Encore, Mosaic or Notion. Until March 19, you can save a further 35% off the special crossgrade price, meaning that you will pay just $129 in the US or £129 in the UK to get a copy of [...]
One of the top online destinations for news, The Huffington Post, has started a new column by Ken Gruberman, a Los Angeles-based technology writer and professional arranger and music copyist, who calls himself The Tech Daddy!
I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Ken on a couple of occasions, including a very convivial lunch in Anaheim, California [...]
If your school, university or other educational institution has a site license for Sibelius and you’re thinking about upgrading to Sibelius 6 (you certainly should be!), then now just might be the best time to get on board.
Until March 26, educational institutions in the UK who upgrade their existing site licenses to Sibelius 6 will [...]
Martin Thomson of LoNote Music, an experienced Sibelius demonstrator, will be running a training session at the Showroom in Sheffield here in the UK this coming Sunday, 7 March 2010 from 12pm to 4pm (with a coffee break in the middle!). Organised by the Northern England branch of the Musicians’ Union, this is an excellent [...]
Cuban-born composer and Sibelius user Yalil Guerra has arranged, orchestrated and co-produced the theme music that will accompany the coverage of this summer’s football World Cup on America’s primary Spanish-language television network, Univision, and I got in touch with him to find out more about this project.
Yalil Guerra first trained as a classical guitarist, but [...]
