Watch Episode 5: Use Technology You Already Have to Make Music with Graham Reynolds

WATCH EPISODE

Lesson Description:
Learn about free and very inexpensive ways to make music at home with the devices you already have, along with basic recording techniques.

Materials Needed:
Any personal device that you already have at home, like a smart phone, laptop, iPad, or personal computer.

Presenter Biography:
Called “the quintessential modern composer” by the London Independent, Austin-based composer-bandleader-improviser Graham Reynolds creates, performs, and records music for film, theater, dance, rock clubs, and concert halls with collaborators across a multitude of disciplines.

Heard throughout the world in films, TV, stage, and radio, he recently scored Richard Linklater’s Where’d You Go, Bernadette with Cate Blanchett, Kristen Wiig, and Laurence Fishburne for Annapurna Pictures, Happy Jail for Netflix, the Rude Mechs’ Stop Hitting Yourself for Lincoln Center Theater, Ballet Austin’s Grimm Tales, and a multi-year commission from Ballroom Marfa, The Marfa Triptych.  He has performed on an array of legendary stages, from the Kennedy Center to the Green Mill Tavern to the Conan O’Brien Show. His Creative Capital Award winning project, Pancho Villa from a Safe Distance, a bilingual cross-border opera created with librettists Lagartijas Tiradas al Sol (Mexico City) and director Shawn Sides (Rude Mechs), has been staged in over a dozen cities in North America.

As Artistic Director of the non-profit Golden Hornet, he leads efforts which draw on the collaborative spirit of rock bands and the composer-led nature of classical music, with a focus on commissioning new music, fostering young and emerging composers, and presenting adventurous works in non-traditional settings. Alongside Kronos Quartet's longtime cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, he curated The Sound of Science, an interdisciplinary, multimedia performance that is touring internationally.

Reynolds leads the jazz-based but far reaching Golden Arm Trio.  He is a company member with the internationally acclaimed Rude Mechs theater collective and resident composer with Salvage Vanguard Theater and Forklift Danceworks. His accolades include a Creative Capital Award, an Independent Music Award, two Frederick R. Loewe Music Theatre Awards, ten Austin Critics Table Awards, the John Bustin Award, multiple Austin Chronicle Best Composer wins, and a B. Iden Payne Award.  Graham released a twelve album set on Innova Recordings in early 2017 and his newest studio effort, MARFA: A Country & Western Big Band Suite was released in late 2019.

Visit their page for more information: https://www.grahamreynolds.com/

TEKS ALIGNMENT

Grades 3-5 | Technology Applications. Creativity and innovation: Create original products using a variety of resources. Communication and collaboration: Perform basic software application functions, including opening applications and creating, modifying, printing, and saving files. Research and information fluency: Collect and organize information from a variety of formats, including text, audio, video, and graphics.

Middle School 1, 2, 3 | Technology Applications. Creativity and innovation: Identify, create, and use files in various formats such as text, raster and vector graphics, video, and audio files; create original works as a means of personal or group expression.

Middle School 1, 2, 3 | Music. Music literacy: Experience and explore exemplary musical examples using technology and available live performances; describe tonal and rhythmic musical elements using standard terminology such as instrumentation, voicing, intervals, solfège, absolute note names, rhythmic values, and counting systems. Critical evaluation and response: Demonstrate appropriate cognitive and kinesthetic responses to music and musical performance. Technology operations and concepts: Understand and use software applications, including selecting and using software for a defined task.

High School 1, 2, 3, 4 | Music. Historical and cultural relevance: Identify music-related vocations and avocations.