I bought East West/Quantum Leap’s RA some time ago, a sample library including a wide range of instruments from around the globe, from Australian Didgeridoo licks to Sitar to Highland Bagpipes. I have been so happy with it over the years that I jumped at the opportunity to buy another East West ethnic library, SILK.

While SILK offers a smaller spread of ethnic instruments than RA, featuring only Chinese, Indian, and Persian sounds, SILK focuses on making the instruments from those regions extra special… the sampling process was much more in-depth and the instruments are more playable in a greater number of articulations and styles–there are also more instruments per each region than in RA. For Navigating History: Egypt, I primarily pulled from SILK’s Persian palette, which offers a range of bowed, plucked, wind, and percussive instruments from the middle east–ideal for this project. Every SILK instrument also comes with great-sounding and mix-friendly phrases and articulations that were recorded by expert musicians at East West Studios and Capitol Studios.

The Indian instruments sounded good too, which I was expecting… but the Chinese winds and strings blew me away. I mean, they’re really great. Buying SILK has led me to half-hope that the next destination of the Navigating History team will be China, if for no other reason than having an excuse to splurge on arrangements saturated with these expressive and evocative sounds.

While we’re speaking about EW/QL, I should mention that there is a Valentine’s Day sale running currently offering 3 instruments for 60% off… there’s good stuff here and it ships on a 1TB HDD. This is a pretty good deal, but don’t cry if you miss it–soundsonline.com (the site that carries EW/QL instruments) has similar deals every couple months. Unless forced by a pressing project, never buy any of their instruments (newer libraries excluded) for less than 40-50% off. Waiting is usually worth it.

Back to the review… In sum, Silk is awesome. All the ethnic instruments you hear in the above demos that are bowed, plucked, or blown came from SILK. You can also hear some electronic sounds from KOMPLETE 7, a dash of ProjectSAM’s Symphobia, and a healthy helping of my favorite EW/QL library, Hollywood Strings.

And in keeping with the law of this site (EVERY POST MUST MENTION AUDRI BOTKIN AT LEAST ONCE), I’m including a little medley of cello music Audri recorded for me.

Here’s how this sort of thing goes:

BEN: “Hey Audri, Can you play this for me?” (*plays little melody on keyboard)

AUDRI: (*plays little melody on cello) “Want me to add some grace notes?”

BEN: “YES… lemme get the recorder. Play around with that idea for a minute until I find it.”

Can you blame me? It’s Valentine’s Day! <3

Adventure. Exploration. Discovery. Pyramids. Pharaohs. History. Danger. Wonder. Are these words that spark your imagination and kindle the fires of intrigue within you? If so, then the Navigating History: Online Video Tour is for you.

My brother Isaac is on the ground in Egypt at this very moment with a team he has assembled for the purpose of cataloging the history and assessing the culture of the oldest civilization in the world… from a decidedly and self-consciously Christian worldview. I thought it was an interesting idea when I first heard the concept brought up a few months ago, but since then I’ve become way more invested and fascinated in the series and the subject matter than I ever thought I would.

In summary, you need to sign up. Now. Go to www.navigatinghistory.com and do so before the hyperbole of this post wears off. Or, if you are not totally sure you can afford to meet the paltry $49.99 sign-up fee, enter the Navigating History Subscription Challenge. For every 5 friends you get to sign-up for the show, you will be given a free subscription yourself, or a $35 Western Conservatory gift card–whichever you prefer. I would totally do this myself, except that I already have all the video they can crank out because I’m writing the music for the series.

On that note (har har), here is a teaser medley of some of the music I have written thus far. I also wrote the music in the video above… visuals courtesy of the guys at The Effects Forge.

At about 0.35 in this track you can hear my wife, Audri, playing harmonics on the cello. I only had about an hour to write that cue (0.13-0.45), so I played a series of notes for Audri and told her to improvise on them for a few minutes while I loaded a template in Cubase 4 to start the project. By the time my template had fully loaded and started up, I had some quality ethnic cello phrases to slide of our H1 handheld recorder into Cubase, ready for reverb and processing. I love my wife.

Look out for an upcoming post on the instruments and tools behind the production of the score, but for now, Here is a question for all of my dedicated readers (Audri and Mom, please rise):

How many of you would you be interested in purchasing some of the music from the show when it is completed as an mp3 album download?

I am in the process of writing the score for the up-and-coming feature film, “Ace Wonder: Message From a Dead Man.” Below you can hear a short teaser of a cue I’m working on. In the scene I am writing this for, Ace Wonder, professional half-pint shamus, begins his investigation into the type of case that only a hard-boiled 4′11” detective could solve.

Here is the second teaser trailer:

More posts on the score to follow.

A couple months ago I received a phone call out of the blue offering me a position to help out on the musical score for The Vision Forum and Erwin brothers studio’s latest film, The Mysterious Islands. The film is about a group of extraordinary men who travel to the Galapagos Islands to refute the evolutionist theories of Charles Darwin 150 years after his historic visit to the islands.

Needless to say, I was already looking forward to the film’s release with much anticipation, so being asked to be part of the music team was a real honor. I was joining the film’s primary composer, Paul Mills, a professional based out of Franklin TN, and Audri Vernier, a San Antonio-based cellist (and interviewee in Homeschool Dropouts, I might add) who recorded multiple Bach cello solos for the film.

Above is a short scene from the film where the adventurers go beneath the surface of the water for the first time. Underwater music has a rich and glorious heritage; From Saint Saens to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea to John Williams, there is a lot of great music here to draw inspiration from (and be judged by), so writing in the style can be an exhilarating and daunting experience. Nevertheless, I had a blast. You can hear the music I composed for the scene and judge for yourselves how well it works.

Over the next couple weeks I will be posting an assortment of different clips and teasers of the score, so be sure to check back regularly. Also, be sure to check out Paul Mills’s myspace page to hear some of his music!

Media used with permission from Vision Forum 2009