Classical music (Bach, Debussy, Satie, Rachmanioff, Medtner, Scarlatti, Rameau, Handel, Stravinsky, Partch, Glass, Vaughn Williams, Ginestera, Milhaud, Hovahness, Poulenc, Arvo Part, William Bolcom, -- and Stockhausen, Cage, Xenakis not always for their music but for their ideas). It's hard to list rock influences because there's sometimes something I don't like about certain artists, especially when you very varied tastes, but here goes: Progressive Rock (Yes, Kevin Ayers, Henry Cow, 5uu's, ELP, Magma, Eskaton (obscure French band), Early Genesis, Gong, Novalis (German band), Hoelderlin, King Crimson, Rick Wakeman, etc.), Stereolab, Field Recording. lowercase sound. John Coltrane. Sun Ra. Joni Mitchell. Marc Bolan. Colin Newman circa 1980's, Great fusion like Mahavishnu, Weather Report, Return to Forever. Polyartists or thinkers who work in different areas like Herbert Bayer, David Byrne, Laurie Anderson, da Vinci, Goethe, Diderot, Benjamin Franklin, Brian Eno. Surrealists (Max Ernst, Yves Tanguy, Dali, Cornell, Matta, Harold Hitchcock). Conceptual art. Dada. Poetry (Tristan Tzara, ee cummings, Novalis, Billy Lamont, Andre Breton, Shelly, Keats, Edward Taylor, Wordsworth) literary authors (Olaf Stapledon, Mark Twain, Emerson), philosophers (Kierkegaard, Wittgenstein, Novalis again, Idealists, Romanticists, Post-Modernists, of course, Virtuists). Spiritual figures (Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Thoreau, St. Francis, Florence Nightingale (who also wrote a book of philosophy), Jesus, Solomon, the writers of the Philokalia, some Eastern philosophy). Antiquarian books. Great psychological works such as "The Obsessive Personality" by Leo Salzman and "The Anatomy of Hallucinations" by Fred Johnson. I believe in eco-psychology, which states by getting closer to nature and animals we become more whole, and if more people got involved in environmentalism, helping endangered species (by local zoo support), it would probably help things like depression, obesity and other problems. When people take interest in sustainable energy technology, animals and the environment, they may be surprised how well they are rewarded.
I like to compose music that follows the classical tradition. I like to compose a music that is original sounding and gives the listening an exotic experience. I also try to create either a pleasant physiological response without simplification, as in some
New Age music. Sometimes I look at some of my music as a musical Surrealism, as Surrealism visually and in poetry historically was not usually abrasive or scatological. I sometimes do generative music, which is something that Brian Eno does also. Mine is different, and developed in 1983 when I stumbled upon a keyboard called the Casio 1000P. On the 1000P was a very special "sequencer" which really wasn’t iust a sequencer at all. It enables one to play on the left hand intervalled sequences that you programmed, from 1-9 and 0’s for rests. The music then will change with the playing you do on the first two octaves. You can only estimate what it will do, a bit like the Surrealist’s frottage, or even Pollock’s drips. So, I tell everyone this just to prove that what I’m playing is really live music, even on recordings before there really was a lot of computer technology It’s me directing a pulsing numeric sequence. All my recordings except a very small fraction are live one tape events. I play in the Keith Emerson/Rick Wakeman style of multiple keyboards at once, usually two or three. I had classical keyboard lessons and was a early fan of prog rock as a child, eventually getting into Tangerine Dream, Tomita, Carlos and Synergy, and then the New Wave/Punk thing and a passing exposure to the depths of Industrial music starting in 1983 (it wasn’t my cup of tea for long but, like many others, helped in my development to manhood). I’ve had an interesting musical history here in Seattle, being a part of the first two or three years of the formal grunge movement. I never formally played in a grunge band, just in an experimental band that was a precursor to one of the widely acknowledged first grunge bands named Feast. That early experimental band did have a belated release a work on Al Margolis’ (If Bwana) label in 1987. My music shows this wide history, channelled in a modern classical way that at this time is only realized electronically. I hope that to change in the future and I’m working towards it. I have over three hours of mp3s at my site at www.rspearson.com
Record Label
I have released music privately/looking for labels
I am a composer/poet/author influenced by art movements such as the Romanticists, Transcendentalists, Dadaists, Surrealists, Bauhaus and an interest in psychology, spirituality and science. My music sounds sometimes like modern classical and sometimes like surreal electronic. I am the creator of ParaMind Brainstorming Software (www.paramind.net) and the Virtuism aesthetic theory. ParaMind is an word processor-like program with its own database that "exhausts the interactions of words coming up with every idea possible" in any given area. It's a fourteen year old company and we have versions in Windows, Mac and Linux. Virtuism started in 1984 as a type of trickster response to the negative and/or nihilistic art movements. It states that acts of virtue give the aesthetic experience, something which film depicts very well. I have published a book on it recently called "Philosophy and the Aesthetics of Virtue." I have authored two books on a fusion of psychology, philosophy and theology called "The Experience of Hallucinations in Religious Practice," and "Hyperreligiosity: Identifying and Overcoming Patterns of Religious Dysfunction." (both available on Amazon.com -- I go by R.S. Pearson). I see that mental illness often goes hand in hand with some spiritual beliefs, and if some types of religious people learned to lean on themselves more, better results would be obtained for all (except if that person is a criminal as is sometimes the case). Jesus said love God with your heart, soul and MIND -- the anti-intellectualism of Evangelicalism or other forms of Fundamentalism can hurt us by making people vulnerable to the most crass elements in society. White/black thinking gets nowhere -- people should not be afraid to embrace both perspectives of spirituality and positivism. No one is a pure liberal or pure conservative. The truth is usually in the middle. I do believe the Spirit guides us intimately and we become complete when it is in our lives. I'm anti-drug so any use of the word "hallucination" must be understood in that context. I see helping clear people from pitfalls along the religious path to be a major aim of my life, equal to my composing music and writing poetry. My website is at www.rspearson.com.
Hi, I just wanted to let you know that my new album Afrikan Machinery is out now on Tzadik Records. Check out some of the tracks on my profile! You can buy the CD here, here, or here. It's also available on iTunes.
Best Wishes, Lukas Ligeti
We have a new track called 'In Auberterre' inspired by an old woman opening her door and closing it in a french village last summer! Hope you enjoy it....Peace to you and all your friends!
Would you think a guy who dressed like this can hold a real job?
Well the truth is, I haven't been able to yet. It always things like dress codes and being on time that cost me gainful employment. So by popular demand I will not reenter the world work if I can avoid it.
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