Schallwelle Awards 2011

Back home after a great time in Germany.

Stayed with Klaus Hoffmann-Hoock and wife Dagi at their lovely "Mill" near Sonsbech. Arrived Thursday and had a very chilled time - just what the doctor ordered!

Schallwelle on the Saturday was great, nominated three times, twice for Callisto in best international album and best international artist, and I was also nominated in best international artist category. However, no awards this time round, but nice to be "in the mix" and had a really good day chatting to fans and other musicians.

Great to catch up with Robert Schroeder, amongst other, whose music I've always admired. Due to a problem with the first act not arriving until late, I was asked to perform first, and I think the set went down well - I enjoyed it and the audience wanted more, so a good sign. Played 20 minutes space music from forthcoming new solo album plus a new version of Rysheara and short space music version of Walking with Ghosts as encore.

Many thanks to everyone involved in the awards, especially those behind the scenes.

David Wright and Bekki Williams collaboration

Bekki Williams and I have at last talked seriously about a space music collaboration! I'm often asked by fans why we haven't done this before, and it's only because we're both busy with other projects - not to mention "Life".

Not going to give a time frame yet, but it now looks very likely that there will be a David Wright and Bekki Williams instrumental music album at some point in the future.

Brian Wilson Concert

Just got 2 tickets for the Brian Wilson concert in London in September - can't wait!! Easily one of the greatest composers of our generation, his recent albums "Smile", "Lucky Old Sun" and "Gershwin Reimagined" are simply outstanding. Even though I compose instrumental music and space music, Brian's influence on my music has been quite profound, and his music has been a part of my life since I was just 12 years old. Rock on..................

David Wright nominated in Schallwelle Electronic Music Awards Best International category

Well I missed this when getting so excited about the Callisto nomination, which, by the way, is for NYX in the Best album category, but I've been nominated in the Best International Artist category - second time having won the award 2 years ago.......................

Trinity Project gets off the ground at last!!

After a lot of delays caused by outside distractions, Neil and I finally managed to spend a productive evening in the studio and compose 15 minutes of music for the "new age" project we're doing "Music for Angels", and the track, titled "Lazy Heaven" is a great start. Definitely has strong space music overtones with a great feel, so we're very pleased by the start we've made.

There was some gentle ribbing and amusement to begin with, (and several cups of strong coffee!) as I managed to totally mess up my studio midi settings - it's been over seven years since I last set up all the external synths for simultaneous multi-recording. But we were soon up and running and and by midnight we had a pretty nice track.

More news to follow as the album progresses.

Callisto nominated in Schallwelle electronic music awards

Well, here's a pleasant surprise, Callisto have been nominated in the Schallwelle Electronic Music awards, presumably for "Best International electronic music Album" or "Best International Artist". I'm going to be there anyway as one of the three artists performing. But I was also scheduled to be one of the presenter/orators, but obviously can't be now because I've been nominated. Shame, but it does give me more time to work on the space music for the event.

So anyway, well done also Dave Massey and not forgetting Neil (Geigertek) Fellowes because the last two Callisto concerts (and future Callisto concerts if he behaves) include Neil on stage for Dave Massey, who as we all know, "doesn't do live". Both those concerts were well received and I think it likely that the concerts may have featured in some peoples thinking when they voted.

So we'll see how we do, but however it turns out, it's nice to know that we've been nominated and people thought Callisto good enough to vote for.

So "Thanks from Callisto" to all who did vote!

Sci fi soundtrack for Matt Howarth story - update

I received the first draft of Matt Howarth's sci-fi story, and an enjoyable read it is too! Plenty of ideas for music and titles and I will be starting work on that soon. Maybe I will perform some of the ideas at the up and coming Schallwelle Music awards in March, we shall see. I'm not going to give away anything at the moment, aside from saying its about an earth colony on a far off world in the future, mans first colony in fact. That's all I'm gonna say for now and I'm looking forward to putting together an evocative and descriptive space music soundtrack to accompany the book, which will be on the CD as an e-book/pdf. More details to follow................