I had a meeting with my client composer Michael Gordon on Monday, and out of nowhere he said something like, “Yeah, and with the Rock Band thing…”
What “Rock Band thing”??
Turns out, the following pieces are now available to play on Rock Band!
David Lang – Cheating, Lying, Stealing
Michael Gordon – Yo Shakespeare
Evan Ziporyn – Shadowbang (Head)
Julia Wolfe’s Believing will also be available soon.
According to the folks at Bang on a Can’s label, Cantaloupe, Alex Rigopulos, founder of Harmonix and Rock Band creator, went to MIT with Bang on a Can All-Star Evan Ziporyn. [Update 6/18! Alex Rigopulos and Harmonix co-founder Eran Egozy were actually Evan Ziporyn’s students at MIT in the early and mid 90s – apologies for the mistake! Evan remains a faculty member at MIT today.] The “Rock Band Network” just launched, which allows artists to submit music to Rock Band for XBOX via the web, so the Bang on a Can All-Stars went into the studio and recorded 4 pieces!
I love that the crowd is going CRAZY for Yo, Shakespeare! Bras on the stage for contemporary classical music whoooooooooo!!! AYE YAY AYAYAY!
The powers-that-be also report that there’s going to be a live, playable demo of these songs at this year’s Bang on a Can Marathon on June 27th, so people can play Rock Band between sets. I am completely incapable of playing video games of any kind, so if you see me trying next weekend, do not, and I mean do not, record it for YouTube. I played Guitar Hero with Hilary once and she kicked my…well, you know. She played Black Magic Woman on Expert, got a perfect score, and asked after, “What – is that a hard song?”
Alex actually co-founded Harmonix with Eran Egozy, also an MIT alum. Eran is a gifted clarinetist and a member of Boston’s Radius Ensemble.
Yeah!! I have listened to their music and it has really stolen my heart. I liked it.