From the category archives:

Pushing Musical Boundaries

Detroit Symphony Violist’s Electrified Adventures with “The Symphony of Life”

January 11, 2012

I recently came across a story on the Calgary Herald about Detroit Symphony Orchestra principal violist Alexander Mishnaevski’s collaboration with keyboardist Stuart Zaltz as the rock duo Two Circles Music Co. Their newly released album, Symphony of Life, fuses Mishnaevski’s classical music background and love of jazz violin with Zaltz’s passion for 70s progressive rock [...]

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The Orchestral Space Pop of Miracles of Modern Science

December 11, 2011

While perusing the music news on the handy dandy NPR iPad app, I discovered an intriguing story from Weekend Edition Sunday about rock band Miracles of Modern Science (MOMS). The group has an unusual instrumental lineup – mandolin, upright bass, cello, violin, drums, and vocals. I always love finding musicians who use classical instruments in [...]

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The Re:Generation Music Project

October 19, 2011

Earlier today I randomly came across a video from the Re:Generation Music project. I can’t say I know much about it because so far only a few odd videos have been made available.  The video that caught my attention has DJ Premier learning a little bit about classical music.  Watch below: After visiting the project’s website, [...]

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Jordan Rudess does Beethoven’s Symphony 5

September 21, 2011

Dream Theater‘s Jordan Rudess is renowned for his wizardly keyboard chops. But did you know that he sings, too? Jordan shows off his vocal “skills” in his latest YouTube video, “Beethoven Revisited”, by singing the melody and accompaniment lines from the first movement of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony. He used VidRhythm on the iPhone to create [...]

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Classical Virtuosity Turns Metal in SHREDDING PAGANINI

August 25, 2011

Classical violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini was renowned for his technical prowess and pyrotechnic compositions. German Schauss, Yngwie Malmsteen and The Great Kat are just a few of the heavy metal guitarists who have proven their chops by adapting Paganini’s music to their instruments. Now, Schauss is releasing a new instructional book entitled Shredding Paganini – [...]

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Yeah Yeah Yeahs Guitarist Goes Classical with “41 Strings”

August 17, 2011

Spin.com featured an interview with Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner about his foray into classical composition. Loomstate clothing company commissioned the rocker to write a piece celebrating the 41st anniversary of Earth Day for a performance on May 11. Along with collaborators Hisham Akira Bharoocha and Ben Vida of Soft Circle, Zinner composed 41 [...]

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Baroque Violin Music Gets Hip-Hop Makeover by THE DUELING FIDDLERS

August 16, 2011

Violin duo The Dueling Fiddlers (Adam DeGraff and Russell Fallstad) has released a new hip-hop/classical mashup, “Yo Fo Leah”. This collaboration with DJ Everglow takes the guys out of their traditional acoustic zone into the realm of electric violin, with some synthesized keyboards thrown in for good measure. They’re currently holding a contest in which [...]

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Aerial Violinist Turns Classical Performance Upside Down

July 27, 2011

While browsing the web for interesting music news, I came across an astonishing video of aerial violinist Janice Martin. She demonstrates incredible physical strength by performing her violin while suspended from the ceiling on silks. The Juilliard graduate has performed with symphony orchestras all around the United States and has collaborated with several jazz artists. [...]

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DSharp’s Violin Stylings Fuse Pop, Rock, and Hip-Hop into One Unique Flavor

July 8, 2011

While Contrapuntist and I were being bums at home on a lazy summer night, I decided to peruse my Google reader for any rock violin news. I came across a CBS news video featuring pop violinist Derryk Gleaton‘s (a.k.a. DSharptheViolinist) cover of Katy Perry’s “Last Friday Night (TGIF)”. Even though I don’t like most of [...]

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Break of Reality Perform Metallica Cover

June 9, 2011

In the process of scouring the internet, I stumbled onto an amusing quartet, Break of Reality. The group has a similar sound to Apocalyptica, but instead of four cellos the group has three cellos with a percussionist.  The following video is of the group performing Metallica’s “The Day That Never Comes” from Death Magnetic. Break [...]

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