My name is Colin R MacRae. I record my own music in my own apartment using my Yamaha CP300 keyboard and some fairly primitive recoding gear, doing no more than 2 tracks, ie playing live over a track that I have played and saved in my keyboard. I listen to all kinds of music and can play many different genres. Oddly it seems my best songs do not resemble anything that I have heard before, so in that sense it is original. My second CD, not yet released, is called Beautiful Ghosts. I have written a couple of film scores, as I seem to have an uncanny ability of coming up with what the director wants - the mood or setting, going on only the directions from the director.
See above.
I do play live. When I was young I toured around in bands. Now I fly solo. Currently I play at a place called Atlantic News on Queen Street, in Halifax, Nova Scotia. I use the same keyboard that I compose and record on, and I am encouraged by the owner and the staff to play all original music. So for hours I will invent music and play songs that I have recorded. My first CD, Pilgrim's Cloak is promoted and sold there. I love playing live, interacting and chatting with the people as they come and go.
I listen to all kinds of music, and can play live many different genres. Oddly, it seems my best songs don't resemble anything I have heard before, so in that sense, I guess they are quite original. I have been inspired by the artist Vangelis because all of his music is instrumental and keyboard related.
I use a CP300 Yamaha Stage Piano. It is a big keyboard - too large for a traditional keyboard stand, 88 weighted keys - incredible piano sound as well as other features, such as jazz organ, strings, vibes, etc. But it is not a synthesizer. I find that it has just enough sounds to be creative with, and a far superior quality of sound, both recorded and live, than most synthesizers.
As I continue to learn more about the recording progress, I would like to use synths to augment my music and create a bigger and more versatile sound. I am currently working with an amateur film group doing "The Black Cat" - an Edger Alan Poe story. Prior to this, I did a soundtrack for a very dark, but profound, documentary "Requiem for a Drug" for an extremely talented film maker, Nicholai Efimov. Nicholai is a graduate of cinematography from Ryerson University in Toronto, and it was Nicholai who recorded me live in Toronto. During the recording of my first CD "Pilgrim's Cloak", I did a soundtrack for an animated alien movie, for multimedia artist Ryan Neilly from Halifax, Nova Scotia, where I now live and work.