David Beardsley, microtonal guitar, composer/performer

News

There's some of my music at myspace. Someday there will be more.

The September memorial for Rod Poole was beautiful. A dedicated group of listeners assembled at Downtown Music Gallery, NYC to hear Sasha Bogdanowitsch, John Cummins and I perform a section of The Voice of the Bowed Guitar by Rod. Kraig Grady asked me in June to organise this performance. Sasha (vocals, tambura) and I (acoustic guitar) also performed an improvisation dedicated to Rod.

Last week I heard an amazing performance of the Michael Harrison composition Revelation for solo piano in Just Intonation by the composerat the Chelsea Art Museum.

I've been thinking about that next string quartet, I still have to score it. I'm also looking forward to performing my microtonal guitar music in 2008.

All OgreOgress titles including For Feldman are now available for download via Naxos' Classics Online... http://www.classicsonline.com/search/searchresults.aspx?label=OGR

For Feldman DVDs are available and can be ordered directly from OgreOgress fby visiting http://cdbaby.com/cd/forfeldman.

It's nice to see reviews of the string quartet still showing up after more than a year after the release of For Feldman. Here's one by Bruce Gallanter of Downtown Music Gallery.

MORTON FELDMAN/DAVID BEARDSLEY/DAVID KOTLOWY/JOHN PROKOP/DAVID TOUB - For Feldman [DVD Audio] (OgreOgress; USA) Second in a series featuring previously unreleased works by emerging composers, this 96-minute 96kHz/24bit Audio DVD contains 4 world premiere recordings and the only available digital recording of 3 works [Three Pieces for String Quartet (1956)] by Morton Feldman.

David Beardsley is a good friend of mine who used to maintain the DMG website. We often hang out and talk about La Monte Young, Rod Poole, John Abercrombie and Morton Feldman. This is his first recorded piece and it is both mesmerizing and slightly disturbing. It is titled, "As Beautiful as a Crescent of a New Moon on a Cloudless Spring Evening". It was inspired by Morton Feldman and "tuned to the system known as Just Intonation". It is 30-minutes long and it is filled with long, slowly see-sawing drones that make me feel as if I am aboard a ship slowly floating on the waves. Since this piece changes slowly, it is more environmental in sound. Just let it flow and take you along with it. I love the way the notes shimmer and float like feathers on the air. You can actually observe the texture of each sound as it slowly evolves. Although I did enjoy the other pieces here by Morton Feldman and the other lesser-known composers, I felt the Beardsley piece was the most fascinating of the bunch. - BLG

David Beardsley
10/22/2007

Microtonal guitarist Rod Poole died last Sunday night, a senseless killing. I played various festivals with Rod over the years...2001 World Out of Tune Festival in NYC, the 2003 World Out of Tune Festival in Hollywood and the 2003 Southern California Microfest in Venice, Ca.. I'm pretty shocked, I was just talking to him recently about setting up some performances here on the East Coast this Fall.

http://www.biink.com/poole

A tribute page for Rod, since he never had a web page and the LA Times doesn't archive their articles.

David Beardsley
5/15/2007

Download my string quartet as beautiful as a crescent of a new moon on a cloudless spring evening and the rest of the For Feldman album as performed by Christina Fong and the Rangzen Quartet from itunes. just enter my last name -> beardsley

dB
4/7/2007

new blog, & myspace fun.

dB
3/25/2007

For Feldman DVDs are available and can be ordered directly from OgreOgress for $18.50 by visiting http://cdbaby.com/cd/forfeldman.

"a tough, intense work" - Brian Olewnick, bagatellen. see the whole review here

"Christina Fong's interpretation of this piece tuned to just intonation is exquisite" - Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes. see the whole review here

8/3/2006, reviews added 9/2/2006

The radio premiere of David Beardsley's (http://biink.com/db/index.htm) 30-minute 2004 string quartet "as beautiful as a crescent of a new moon on a cloudless spring evening" as performed by Christina Fong (http://christinafong.com) can be heard at 11pm PST Friday July 7th on KALW 91.7 FM's "Music from Other Minds" in San Francisco and also via the internet at http://rchrd.com/mfom. David's piece was submitted for a project initiated on the "Why Patterns?" discussion list. "For Feldman" (http://cdbaby.com/cd/forfeldman) is second in a series featuring previously unreleased works by emerging composers. This 96kHz|24bit Audio DVD (plays in any DVD player) contains 4 world premiere recordings and the only available release of 3 works by Morton Feldman.

7/2/2006

Last week I spent quite a bit of time checking out the mastering of my string quartet "as beautiful as a crescent of a new moon on a cloudless spring evening". It's the first I've heard of the string quartet version, I used a synthesizer when I wrote it. And it sounds amazing, I understand that the DVD is on it's way to the plant.

dB
6/27/2006

There's a solo guitar improvisation Dry Water on the forthcoming comp Out: 17 Modern Guitarists Salute Derek Bailey. Wild distorted guitar, not what I'm normally known for.

db
4/8/2006

I now have a page at http://www.myspace.com/davidbeardsley I'll be looking into posting some audio files there soon.

db
3/26/2006

I have a composition on a 96khz/24bit Audio DVD to be released soon:

For Feldman

(with Beardsley|Kotlowy|Prokop|Toub) / Rangzen Quartet
by OgreOgress productions

September 11, 2004

For Feldman (with Beardsley|Kotlowy|Prokop|Toub) / Christina Fong, Rangzen Quartet

Second in a series featuring previously unreleased works by emerging composers, this 96kHz|24bit Audio DVD (plays in any DVD player) contains 4 world premiere recordings and the only available release of 3 works by Morton Feldman.

1. David Toub: mf (1997/2004) [13:30]
2. Morton Feldman: Two Pieces for String Quartet (1954) I [4:41]
3. Morton Feldman: Two Pieces for String Quartet (1954) II [3:14]
4. David Kotlowy: of Shade to Light (2001) [14:20]
5. Morton Feldman: For String Quartet (1956) [3:07]
6. John Prokop: New England, Late Summer (2003) [15:45]
7. Morton Feldman: Three Pieces for String Quartet (1956) I [3:14]
8. Morton Feldman: Three Pieces for String Quartet (1956) II [4:41]
9. Morton Feldman: Three Pieces for String Quartet (1956) III [3:07]
10. David Beardsley: as beautiful as a crescent of a new moon on a cloudless spring evening (2004) [30 minutes]