Monday, April 19, 2010

European Radio and Net Label Features

"False Memory" from Daughters of Industry has been selected for the upcoming release:
Bezdna Radio Essentials 016, from the Silent Flow Netlabel, Chisinau, Moldova.
http://silent.com.md/label/


"Tough Times", also from Daughters of Industry, was featured on the radioshow
"Vrije Radicalen", Netherlands.
http://www.concertzender.nl/programmagids.php?date=2010-04-22&month=0&detail=41122


Saturday, April 10, 2010

Nice review via AmbientBlog.net

http://www.vancooten.com/blog/?e=292

After exploring various diversions of his musical art-form, Left Cincinnati feels like a 'return to form' of the sounds Joe Frawley presented on his 2008 album The Hypnotist.

The desolate piano sounds from the opening track "Plain Yellow Dress" immediately bring you to deserted playgrounds of your mind, with cutup fragments and almost ungraspable vocal samples.

"Short stories for processed found sounds and piano, exploring the dreams and
memories of an identity-shifting female protagonist"

I guess that's an appropriate enough description for this album. The collected sounds on this album are closely related: they all share the strange, alienated impressions of memories of distant past, of travelling on and of leaving home.

The soundscapes can sometimes also be quite unnerving, especially in the overtly sexual references of some fragments. I sometimes find these samples uncomfortable, almost embarrassing, to listen to, as if they present sound fragments I was not intended to hear.

Since his first release (Wilhelmina's Dream, 2006) Joe Frawley definitely has developed an immediately recognisable, personal - and different - style - which I suggest you check out!

The physical release of Left Cincinnati is limited to 100.
But it can also be downloaded from Bandcamp (along with his other releases).

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Just Not Normal

The wonderful Just Not Normal net-label has been kind enough to release the Angel Boxes mini CD through it's channels. Check it out along with the rest of their fine offerings: http://justnotnormal.wordpress.com/2010/04/07/jnn086-joe-frawley-angel-boxes/

Sunday, March 28, 2010

New Releases, Spring 2010



Some news.

News 1. Left Cincinnati, a new 35 minute release, is available now as compact disc or download. This is a collection of sound and piano collages, exploring the dreams and memories of an identity-shifting female protagonist. Details on how to get it here: http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/left-cincinnati


News 2. A new *free* release is available to download via Bandcamp.
Angel Boxes is a short collection of voice collages and musical experiments done with my friend Rachel. Check it out here: http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/angel-boxes

News 3. Two re-releases on Bandcamp. Emperor of Daffodils and The Hypnotist, previously CD only, are now available as downloads. Here are the links:

http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/emperor-of-daffodils

http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/the-hypnotist

(Bandcamp is great. MP3s are better quality than iTunes, and they have a really easy user interface. $$ is handled through PayPal.)

Thanks again for listening and supporting. Fan me on FaceBook if you haven't already http://www.facebook.com/pages/Joe-Frawley/39333519893.
-JF

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Angel Boxes

New vocal experiments with Rachel. I am planning to co-release this as a miniCD, along with the "Left Cincinnati" EP later this spring. Meanwhile it can be downloaded for free here: http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/angel-boxes

<a href="http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/angel-boxes">Angel Box One by Joe Frawley</a>

Thursday, January 21, 2010

January update

Two mini-announcements:

1. Emperor of Daffodils, formerly a CD only release, is now available as a digital download from Bandcamp
LINK: http://joefrawley.bandcamp.com/album/emperor-of-daffodils

2. The forthcoming Left Cincinnati (JFM-CD09) is on schedule for a spring 2010 release. The audio has been completed and design work is underway for CD packaging. The track list and album credits will be as follows:

Left Cincinnati Duration 35:08

1. That Flower 3:40
2. Left Cincinnati 4:35
3. Plain Yellow Dress 5:26
4. The Line 5:07
5. A Secret Story 2:59
6. The Girl on the Quay 4:06
7. Cumulus 8:09
8. Vanishing Point 1:03

Credits and Appropriations
Joe Frawley: piano & electric keyboards, found sounds, synthesized sounds, MIDI programming, electronic processing and arrangement. All original music composed and performed by Joe Frawley. "Ohio 6" dialect sample used by special permission of the International Dialects of English Archive, Paul Meier, founder & director. Amplifier feedback and distortion by Greg Conte. Chemistry textbook read by Amy Kennedy. Sample pack "Amy G", provided by Corsica_S, via The Freesound Project. Other musical samples include: Sample pack "Katy" served by The Freesound Project and produced by Digifish Music; "Fox Lemons" and "Sunday" from the Mememolly YouTube channel, performed by Molly Windman; brief a cappella vocal improvisation from the VHS recording In Concert: Live From Royal Festival Hall London, performed by Bernadette Peters; and "Toads" written and performed by Mia Mastrangelo. Additional vocals by Rachel Rambach. Copyright 2010, all rights reserved.

Thank you again for your continued support,
JF

Friday, January 1, 2010

Joe Frawley Music 2010

It's 2010, as good a time as any to announce that a new CD will be released, with luck, in the spring. The working title is Left Cincinnati. Also felt like a good time to revise my bio and artist's statement. Here are the new versions, which are more in line with my current intentions.

Bio
Joe Frawley (b. July 4, 1971) is an experimental composer and pianist working out of Norwich, Connecticut whose works blur the boundary between music and sound art. By layering and juxtaposing original music with processed found sounds, field recordings, and recontextualized speech fragments, the composer creates challenging yet accessible sound assemblages bearing a hypnotic dreamlike quality. His works have been widely broadcast internationally and appear on several prominent experimental music compilations, including Vibrö No. 4: Music No Music, published by Double Entendre, Paris.

Artist's statement
I am a pianist, composer, and sound collage artist whose work falls between the cracks of several musical genres. My approach is to combine original music with found sound samples, which I process and arrange electronically to simulate subconscious states, such as dreams, trances, auditory hallucinations, involuntary memories, etc. The found sounds could be voices, sound effects, or musical samples appropriated from a variety of prerecorded media, as well as original field recordings. I particularly enjoy recontextualizing speech samples (a favorite source being public radio interviews) and combining them with other sounds to create new meanings. At the same time, I aim to place the spoken word on equal footing with music, thereby calling attention to the musical qualities of speech. As I continue to work, I find myself drawing increasingly from the female voice: I believe it is the most beautiful instrument in the world. I am fascinated and moved by the tone of female speech, singing, pre-vocal aspiration, sighs, laughter, and the wide variety of wordless vocal expressions for which there are no names. Due to the prevalence of spoken word samples, the resulting work tends to suggest a narrative, however I try not to impose a particular story upon the listener, preferring instead the individual and subjective interpretations of imaginative minds.


-JF

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Joe Frawley Ensemble Makes Italian Top Ten

In Italian newspaper Il Manifesto, music critic and composer Girolamo De Simone rates “Emperor of Daffodils” number 8 of his Top Ten CDs for 2009.
http://www.konsequenz.it/desiartic135.jpg
Grazie!

Sunday, December 6, 2009

JFE in MungBeing 29

The music of Joe Frawley Ensemble is currently featured in the twenty ninth issue of MungBeing, a webzine dedicated to outsider art, literature and music.
www.mungbeing.com

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Sunday, November 15, 2009

New review

JOE FRAWLEY - EMPEROR OF DAFFODILS (Autoproduzione in Limited edition) GUSTOSO Promettente il nuovo lavoro di Joe Frawley, pianista/compositore del Connecticut, nonché artista del sound collage. I suoi accostamenti a reazione poetica determinano una texture non convenzionale, in cui anche il pianoforte assume un colore «alterato», come nella imminente release Daughters of Industry, o addirittura fuorviante, come nel particolarissimo Narcisse. In nota Agostino De Rosa, segnala come Emperor of Daffodils sia un album dedicato al mito del doppio: lo sguardo voyeristico di Frawley si posa sul femminino allo specchio: la spezzatura del suono pianistico in Narciso sembra allora evocare le (insane?) fratture di Prevert. (Girolamo de Simone, Il Manifesto - Italia)

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Clinical Archives release

Daughters of Industy has been re-released on the Clinical Archives net label.
LINK: http://www.archive.org/details/ca330_jfe

About Me

My photo
Joe Frawley (b. July 4, 1971) is a composer, pianist and visual artist whose works blur the boundary between music and sound art. By layering and juxtaposing original piano music with processed found sounds, field recordings, and recontextualized speech fragments, the composer creates challenging yet accessible sound assemblages bearing a hypnotic dreamlike quality.

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