Josh Whelchel

Your Name

“Your Name” is a piece I wrote with my Poolside partner in crime Melinda Hershey nearly a year ago. It transformed over the year more than a handful of times before becoming what you hear now. The piece has a LOT of sentimental value to me on many different layers, and I’m extremely proud of it.

Please, if you enjoy the music, consider purchasing it as all the proceeds go to the American Cancer Society. If you’re not comfortable making the purchase, clicking that “share” value does a lot more good than most people realize, too.

Thanks!

Songs for the Cure ‘10 has been released.

I’d like to thank the following people for their hardwork and dedication to making this a possibility:

Matt Johnson for doing all the artwork that’s on the album and for the “Your Name” promotional video.
Tara Morrow, Martha Mingle, Danny Clay, Dan Sato, and Matt again for sitting through a grueling five hour recording session for a few of the pieces on the album.
TIGSource.com, originalsoundversion.com, Zen Albatross, gamemusic4all.com, destructoid.com, and all of the aggregate news feeds that posted about this years album ahead of time.
Alec and Eileen Holowka and Blinkworks Media who together made an AWESOME promotional and informative film about the drive that pushed a lot of donations our way.
All of the musicians and hardworkers involved in making this possible. Without them there really would be no cancer drive. In particular a big thanks to Martha Mingle, Danny Clay, and T.R. Beery for being some of the VIPs of my outbox lately.
Huge, HUGE thanks to Melinda Hershey for really helping me perfect “Your Name” over to past year and providing much of the inspiration for everything in it.

There are probably too many more names to mention, so just hurry up and listen already! http://music.cancerdrive.org

CDs, Concerts, Cancer, and Rehearsals?!

I just put in an order for 500 CDs (technically 1,000). The tentative plan is that we’re gonna throw them at people with cancer until their cancer goes away. We’re aiming specifically for malignant tumors…

I jest. We’re actually giving the money we make from the CDs to the American Cancer Society to beat Cancer on the head. You should be a part of this. Make a donation today at http://www.cancerdrive.org/#donate

For said CD I was directly involved with the production of four tracks with a few artists. First, I worked with Martha Mingle (piano) and Tara Morrow (soprano) to create a wonderful live rendition of “Your Name,” which we recorded and are making a music video out of. Hopefully we’ll see that soon. Whilst this live version is not included on the CD, there is a studio version of it performed in two renditions. Once, by Tara, and again by Melinda Hershey (Poolside). They are very different expressions of a deep feeling. The third piece is called “Sing Gloria” and features Rich Brilli, Melinda Hershey, and Tara Morrow - this is sort of a crazy fare in my usual cinematic/videogame style that I’m very pleased with. The fourth piece is an electronic piece featuring entirely acoustic segments performed by Martha Mingle on piano.

My other big project this quarter has been orchestrating “Your Name” and creating an art piece out of it which properly reflects my feelings and the complicated emotions that are associated with recent tragic events in my life. We’re rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing next week for a performance on MARCH 10, 2010. That’ll be at Cohen Family Studio Theatre at the COLLEGE CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC at 8PM. Free admission and all that jazz. (Also something about Qdoba? hmmmmm) Be there.

GunGirl 2: Original Soundtrack, featuring Rich Brilli

- This is coming, and it’s coming fast. And it looks beautiful thanks to Amanda Appiarius!

Make your donation today at http://www.cancerdrive.org

This Wednesday, January 20th, the Sonic Explorations concert (at CCM, Cohen Studio Theatre at 8pm) will be premiering exciting new installations and tape pieces by our department, one of which is “GulpGulp!,” an interactive installation developed by yours truly.

At it’s core, GulpGulp! is a procedural audio generator which ‘feeds’ on two-dimensional image data. Based on brightness contrasts found in the image and other various programmable methods, GulpGulp! creates an audio signal comprised of various wave forms, not limited to pure sine waves, squares, triangles, saws, and noise. GulpGulp! further varies the process by assigning special waveforms to various colors and contours, making each and every input a completely different aural experience. Of course, all of this assignment is programmable to the end-user so that a single image has an infinite set of possibilities.

At the recital, I will be taking photographs of various patrons and using those images as the input data to create a truly unique experience. To further increase the experience for the guests, GulpGulp! creates a realtime visual experience which maps to the audio data and detected-contours to help the audience identify the source-material, creating a thought-provoking and entertaining listening and viewing experience.

Here I have a short video sampling three different images that were created using an older version of the algorithm. To save time, these images were only set to be twenty seconds in length, but a more dynamic and richer experience is found with longer durations and higher resolution images.

December 2009 Update

HAPPY HOLIDAYS from me to you! I hope you are enjoying this joyful time with your friends and family staying warm over eggnog and cider, but hopefully you’re not spending TOO much time under the mistletoe! A good way to start celebrating would be to grab the SONGS FOR THE CURE 2009 ALBUM for FREE (only until Dec. 26) here: http://music.cancerdrive.org - also, consider donating for the 2010 album which is going to be amazing.

I’ve been spending my time away from school working on about a thousand things at once, including my first film score! (Click here to see a photo) That’s proven to be a challenging but ultimately very rewarding process.

I’ve also been finishing up the GunGirl 2 soundtrack with my friend/guitarist Rich Brilli. You can watch a video of our recent jam session right here on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=693336855435 When all is said and done the soundtrack will be released for free along with the game which should be a lot of fun. You can also check out the completed track “Vehemence” from the soundtrack on thesixtyone right here.

I’m also headed up to MAGFest from the 31st to the 4th of January to give a panel on the “Being, Business, and Evolution of an Indie Game Composer” where I will give some inside tips to how the business works, how to find jobs, and how to tackle jobs. I’ll also go over some of that stuff that nobody really talks about - NDAs, Invoices, and all that stuff. No worries, there will also be a video on how to tackle a track from beginning to end! Besides all the work, that should be a BLAST.

Happy Holidays everyone! 2010 is going to be an AMAZING YEAR of music, fun, and celebration!

Yours,
Josh Whelchel

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Josh-Whelchel/14493454471
http://blog.jwmusic.org

7 Days of GunGirl 2: Day 2

Go listen (and give hearts!).

“Vehemence” from GunGirl 2.

Ladies and gentlemen, Rich Brilli on guitar.

We did this improvisation for the GunGirl 2 soundtrack, and we did it in our sweatpants. Sort of like Alec Holowka (Infinite Ammo) and his Pajama Jam.

Blog of Josh Whelchel

Your Name

CDs, Concerts, Cancer, and Rehearsals?!

December 2009 Update

7 Days of GunGirl 2: Day 2