Likes: Ramen, La Croix Coconut, and Anchorman
Dislikes: The way I feel after ramen, LaCroix Pamplemousse and Anchorman 2
Favorite Food: …
Favorite Quote: Darkness is to space what silence is to sound, i.e., the interval.
– McLuhan
I was classically trained as a pianist from age 5 and competitively performed between 8 and 15. My first professional commission came because of composing…not from pushing buttons like a monkey on a weird black and white keyboard. I studied composition at SFSU under Josh Levine who introduced me to Complexist music and his mentor, Brian Ferneyhough. From there, I moved to das Deutschland and completed my undergraduate degree at the Hochschule für Musik in Trossingen. I realized however, that I was ‘Merican and that the Euro Avant Garde wasn’t for me. So, I came back to the states and studied with the ‘cool’ know-it-all music nerds at CalArts; James Tenney and Morton Subotnick. Although they were nerds after my own heart, it became increasingly important to me to conceptualize my music beyond the intricacies of advanced music theory and that’s when I wrote my first film score. The score for “The Shadow Effect” won a Bronze Medal at Park City Music Festival and since then I’ve scored multiple features and documentaries, music for Emmy Award winning TV shows like How I Met Your Mother and Henry Ford’s Innovation Nation (if you’ve got kids, you’ve seen this!), numbers of ads (Nintendo, Nike, Garnier, EA Sports, Gillette etc.), and artsy stuff which I’ve performed or has shown around the world at places like ICA, ZKM, LACMA, MOCA, REDCAT, OCMA and the Hammer Museum.