Brandon died February 21, 2024, nearly 3 years after this interview. He was a composer of experimental music, and a very good friend of mine. This interview touches on topics like: attention (inside & outside of concert settings), processing trauma through music, mental illness, drug usage, the psychology of repetition, the harmonic properties of m…

Interview originally recorded March, 2021. Eleven trips to the Mayan region and an investigation of some 35 years into Precolumbian thought have indelibly marked and changed the work of this U.S.-born composer. Haladyna’s Mayan Cycle now stretches to thirty-five highly distinctive pieces, including such titles as Zaquico’xol, El Llanto de Izamal, T…

Interview originally aired July 5, 2021. Joel Feigin is an internationally performed composer, whose operas, chamber, orchestra, and piano works have been widely praised for their “very strong impact, as logical in musical design as they are charged with emotion and drama.” (Opera Magazine). Feigin’s opera, Twelfth Night, based on Shakespeare’s com…

Peruvian immigrant Anaís Azul (they/them) is a California based singer-songwriter, composer, and teaching artist. Described as “stunningly honest and vulnerable,” their artistry engages with music as a tool for community building, cross-genre collaboration, and collective healing. Azul writes music that is in conversation with looped vocal harmonie…

Moths, Clownfisher, Dylan Marx, The Sandman, Oracle of Light, Purveyor of Goods, Great Overtaker, Stopping by for Soup, Standing on the Corner with a Glass of Water, Dumping it out on the Sidewalk, missed the plants, missed the plant, went back, wrote a postcard, postmarked it, forgot to address it, sitting in a big mail room waiting to be sorted, …

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Lionel Loueke, Helen Sung, Chick Corea, Jazzmeia Horn, Theo Croker, and more!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Dave Meder about his upcoming release, Unamuno Songs and Stories. They discuss some principles and philosophies behind Unamuno's writings and how Dave applied these thoughts to his music.By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Earl MacDonald about his upcoming release, Consecrated. They talk about Earl's approach to mixing hymns and jazz, his style of arranging, the meaning behind this project, and more!By Outside in Music

The Los Angeles Electroacoustic Ensemble (LAEE) was founded in 2018 by its core members Zaq Kenefick, Christina Lord, Marcus Carline, and Glen Grey. In this episode, the group discusses how they first came together, their aesthetic goals for the ensemble, their process for writing and developing new compositions, and their debut album LAEE, which r…

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Gerry Gibbs, John Coltrane, Kenny Garrett, Esperanza Spalding, and more!By Outside in Music

Nick and Alan talk continue their talks about releasing an album with some of the best practices! Including: Talking through the timeline of a release and why there is so much lead time, creating a story for your album, picking your packaging, and more!By Outside in Music

Nick and Alan talk through how to begin the process of releasing an album with a record label. Beginning with what information we like to see from potential artists and what we are listening for, how to begin thinking of your timeline, how to build your team, building your brand and more!By Outside in Music

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Kenny Garrett, Terence Blanchard, Steven Feifke, Ledisi, and more!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Molly Sender about her experience with Ravinia's Steans Music Institute and her career in the music industry. They discuss some of the changes she's noticed with audiences, what will be next after the pandemic, and her experience with Ravinia.By Outside in Music

Daniel Newman-Lessler is a composer, conductor, pianist, singer, educator, and dabbler in watercolor and pastels. His compositions have been performed by players and ensembles across the country, and impressively he has also found repeated success as a conductor and performer. We met at the California Institute of the Arts, where he is currently a …

Alan talks with Sam Blakeslee about his new album, The Long Middle. They talk about what it's like writing for a drummer-less band, his process with composing, and how this project came to fruition during the pandemic.By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Sam Pilnick about his new album, The Adler Suite. They talk about composing for nonet, the inspiration behind the suite, and the importance of knowing the individuals in your band.By Outside in Music

Andrew Kaluzynski is a composer, improviser, and multimedia artist living in Oakland, CA. Andrew's music endeavors to explore relationships between gesture and feedback, and the effects of aleatoric input on improvisations and compositions. Andrew often employs the use of obsolete and/or idiosyncratic technology as a means of restraint, inspiration…

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Kenny Garrett, Jalen Baker, Tomoko Omura, Bruce Harris and more!By Outside in Music

Alex Hawthorn is an Artist, Composer, and Technologist based in Los Angeles and Brooklyn. His work interrogates notions of archive and memory, bringing together aspects of traditional composition and experimental sound design with elements of photography, videography, and other forms of digital media. In his solo work, he combines elements of old a…

On this episode Alan talks with Austin Zhang and Michael Shapira of Brave New Sound Productions NYC as they start a digital venue to help let the world access the jazz scene of New York City.By Outside in Music

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Benito Gonzalez, Chris Potter, Willie Jones III, Julian Lage, and more!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Warren Wolf about his life and career as a musician, his approach to music education, his thoughts on the industry, and some of his ideas for new projects.By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Anthony Johnson about his life as a drummer, composing, and how he has kept going through the pandemic.By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Benny Benack III about his life as a musician and how it's been living in New York City as a jazz musicianBy Outside in Music

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Steven Feifke, Avishai Cohen, Joey Alexander, Dan Wilson, and more!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Lydia Liebman about life while working in publicity and marketing in the music industry, starting with how she got started in the industry and where she thinks trends are taking it.By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Alexa saxophone, her life in New York, and all of the various projects she's been starting throughout CoVidBy Outside in Music

Andrew Jamieson: composer, improviser, & bandleader of the Avant-Gospel Trouble Ensemble. We talk about dialogues in music and community, race relations in American music, cultural appropriation, and musical accountability. Andrew even does a live improvisation near the end of the interview! Music Featured, in order heard: Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Tu…

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Ulysses Owens Jr. Big Band, Vincent Herring, Harry Connick Jr., Gretchen Parlato, and more!By Outside in Music

On this episode Nick talks with Steven about his upcoming release “Kinetic” and his experience composing and arranging for big band, and more!By Outside in Music

On this episode Alan talks with David about his recent release, his approach to composing, and teaching during the pandemicBy Outside in Music

Scott Perry earned his PhD in music composition from UCSB in 2019. He holds a BA from UCSB (CCS), an MFA from California Institute of the Arts, and a MA from UC Davis. His teachers include Beverly Grigsby, Jeremy Haladyna, Kurt Rohde, Wolfgang von Schweinitz, Ulrich Krieger, Pablo Ortiz, Mika Pelo, David Rosenboom, Curtis Roads and Clarence Barlow.…

On this episode Alan talks with Hailey about her recent release, her introduction to music, and how she's stayed creative during the pandemicBy Outside in Music

On this episode Nick talks with Jorn about his upcoming release with his trio Malnoia, "Hello Future"By Outside in Music

Alan and Nick talk about the new additions to the This is Jazz Today playlist with new music from artists like: Vijay Iyer, Chris Pattishall, Jeremy Pelt, Dr. Lonnie Smith and more!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Anthony about trumpet, life as a musician, his recording projects, and moreBy Outside in Music

Jeremy Rosenstock is a composer, pianist, and installation artist in California. In this episode, originally aired 11/30/2020 on KCIA, we talk about his compositional outlook, Simone Weil, socialism, listening to sound on its own terms, a piano department, and many other things. You can also hear some selections of his great music! Pieces featured,…

Alan talks with Tony his recent release, the process of being an artist, and the different forms of art todayBy Outside in Music

On this episode Alan talks with Randal about his recent release "Dio C'è" and his views on music.By Outside in Music

Today's episode features Alison Niedbalski and the band she leads "qualia." Alison's music is tagged on bandcamp as: experimental, jazz, progressive death soul, torch gospel, great American songbook, and new wave old fashioned. Some of the things we talked about: covering Captain Beefheart songs, the legacy of Carla Bley & Annette Peacock, the effe…

Alan talks with Isaiah about his experience learning music, his debut album release, and humility as a musician.By Outside in Music

On this episode, Nick and Alan talk about the new additions to the playlist including: Shai Maestro, R+R=Now, Jeremy Pelt, Steven Feifke, Emmet Cohen, and others!By Outside in Music

Alan talks with Jalen Baker about life as a musician, the pandemic, and his thoughts on music as he puts the finishing touches on his debut release.By Outside in Music

Tim Rowe is a drummer, painter, video maker. His video series "How to Play the Drums by Tim Rowe" uses all those mediums and others to touch upon subjects from the silly to the historical to the philosophical to the purely musical. We talk about his careers as a drummer & painter, how he makes his videos, why he makes the artistic decisions he make…

We wanted to look back on 2020 with featuring some of the releases we did with introductions from the musicians themselves! You'll hear from Aubrey Johnson, Doug Stone, Chad McCullough, Kasperi Sarikoski, Tomoko Omura, Dean Tsur, John Lake, and Nick Finzer.By Outside in Music

Cheryl E. Leonard is a San Francisco-based composer, performer, field recordist, and instrument builder whose works investigate sounds, structures, and objects from the natural world. Her projects cultivate stones, wood, water, ice, sand, shells, feathers, and bones as musical instruments, and often feature one-of-a-kind sculptural instruments and …

Nathan Corder is an Oakland-based composer of works for electronics, objects, and arrays of people. Our chat covered topics like performer agency & control in composition, fixed media composition vs. composing for people and/or objects, and nontraditional ways of conceiving rhythm and musical time. Pieces featured, in order heard: Untitled (for str…

On this episode preview Outside in Music's Holiday Releases introduced by the composers and arrangers: Augie Haas, Seth Weaver, and Dan PugachBy Outside in Music

Christoffer Schunk is an artist based in Los Angeles. His portfolio vacillates between audio and theater, resulting in intricately staged productions, films, and sound art. His audio compositions incorporate almost everything: theatricality, humor, strange instrumentation (farts, hunting calls, dolls, to name a few), noise, and many other things. W…