Author: Michael Tiemann

Open source pioneer. Red Hat Executive. UNCSA Trustee. Ninja.

One for the Ages

When I was 12 years old, I discovered the music of Emerson Lake and Palmer, and with it, new powers of imagination, beauty, and creativity.  ELP became both my refuge and my strength as I battled my way through the awkwardness, confusion, and loneliness of adolescence.  So you can only imagine my surprise when I was contacted earlier this year by Carl Palmer’s tour manager asking whether we might host his final North American Tour performance.  On November 21st, yet another dream became reality as Carl Palmer performed and recorded in front of a live studio audience.

This week we got permission to post the first of several videos we will be releasing over the coming months from that event: Welcome Back My Friends (Karn Evil #9 for the nerds).

Continue reading “One for the Ages”

Mary Lattimore brings Moogfest to The Miraverse

Earlier this year Moogfest, which was born in Asheville, made its debut in Durham.  The event was a world-wide sensation, bringing 10,000 people a day, for four days, into the funnest, funkiest, most fabulous venues in Durham to share and experience electronic music innovations and inventions.  It created an estimated 1.3 billion media impressions and earned a very encouraging New York Times review.

But the heartbeat of Moogfest doesn’t stop after four days of performances and partying.  It simply goes underground and travels around in the form of dial-tones events.  These events bring Moog leaders together in cities around the world, connecting performers with educators, entrepreneurs with artists, community leaders with community creators.

Normally, Dial-Tones events are held in large cities, but the Moogfest team was so impressed with our space that they decided to host an event close to home.  It was a great success!  Here’s a little mosaic of images showing the events of the day, from the get-together before Mary Lattimore‘s performance, some words from the Moogfest team, a wonderful performance, and a chance for people to talk with Mary after the performance.

We are so proud to have co-hosted this event, and look forward to more exciting collaborations with the Moogfest community!

Covers and the Transformative Power of Art

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Today it was announced that Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize in literature.  Last weekend, Taylor Mac performed A 24-Decade History of Popular Music, in which he sang his version of Dylan’s A Hard Rain A-Gonna Fall, a response to the Stonewall Riots and their place in American history and culture.  Next week, Wayne Krantz will be performing his own covers of iconic songs at The Miraverse, hybridizing their pop-culture DNA with his own angular, progressive jazz.

In my book, the greatness of Dylan’s genius is not that it stands alone, but that it supports the work of other geniuses, such as Taylor Mac and Wayne Krantz.  Their ability to take the familiar and make us experience it completely new ways gives us insights, hopes, and confidence that we, too, can take our familiar selves and change the goddamn world.  That’s not only an exciting message, but it’s an empowering and transformative experience!

If you live anywhere in the RTP area, you can see what this all means for yourself by purchasing tickets for the event we are recording Oct 19th at 7pm at the studio from this eventbrite tickets link for the Wayne Krantz Undercover Pop Tour.  AbstractLogix (Wayne’s label) is running a special for their customers, so hit them up if you want their very special discount.

You can’t touch this… Continue reading “Covers and the Transformative Power of Art”

Carl Palmer’s ELP Legacy Tour 2016

Once upon a time, there existed a very special kind of music that cast a magic spell upon its listeners.  Beyond sheer beauty and raw excitement, this music bestowed powers of creativity beyond imagination, revealing a transcendent possible beyond any conventional reality.  I first encountered such music when I was 12 years old, in the form of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer’s Tarkus.  I had grown up in a music family and had listened to a wide range of music all my life, but this album challenged and inspired me like nothing I had ever experienced before.  It was magic for me. Continue reading “Carl Palmer’s ELP Legacy Tour 2016”

Wayne Krantz returns to The Miraverse

Wayne Krantz first visited The Miraverse February 15th, 2015 after receiving the All Clear from Jimmy Herring and others.  That night we recorded Wayne playing with long-time collaborator Keith Carlock on drums and Grammy-winning legend Anthony Jackson on bass.  And we have the video to prove it:

It was an incredible evening, listening to a mix of older songs as well as several new selections from his just-released album Good Piranha / Bad Piranha.  These new songs were an exploration of what might happen if Wayne used some well-known hooks as the kindling for his virtuoso pyrotechnics.  Songs like MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This” and Ice Cube’s “Check Yo Self” never sounded so progressive!

So here’s the exciting news about Wayne’s return to The Miraverse on October 19, 2016:

Continue reading “Wayne Krantz returns to The Miraverse”

Recording a Chamber Orchestra

As told last month, Richard Weiss received a commission to create a full-length ballet based on Shakespeare’s Macbeth, and composer J Mark Scearce was commissioned to write the score.  Both the ballet (produced and performed by Carolina Ballet) and the music (performed by the Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle) were enthusiastically received and reviewed both at Memorial Hall in Raleigh and at DPAC in Durham earlier this month.  While the text may have been a tragedy, the performances were an absolute triumph!

In between the Raleigh and the Durham shows, Manifold Recording became the venue for a very special recording session.  Here is a video that gives a glimpse into that recording session:

Continue reading “Recording a Chamber Orchestra”

Macbeth at 400 leaps off the page

It took 400 years after the death of the Bard for the stars to align, but Carolina Ballet has realized the impossible–a telling of the story of Macbeth without words.  The world premiere performance at the Duke Energy Center in Raleigh demonstrated without a doubt that this production will be a favorite in the repertoire for a long time to come.  And Manifold Recording has a role to play in realizing that.

As Robert Weiss, Artistic Director and CEO of Carolina Ballet, explains in the performance program:

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I have thought about a ballet to this great tragedy for a long time but was never able to find music which I felt really did justice to the story in the way I wanted to tell it.  Therefore, I asked composer J. Mark Scearce if he would be interested in creating a score for the ballet.  […]  We worked together in New York City for six weeks this past summer (on a fellowship from NYU) and in an amazing burst of creative energy, Mark completed the full piano score for the ballet–two hours of music that tells the story in a fluid, dramatic, musical language just waiting to be set to dance.

Mark Scearce fulfilled not only his promise to Robert Weiss, but a promise he made to us as well…
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Continue reading “Macbeth at 400 leaps off the page”

Sam Pollard selects Manifold Recording for NC location shot

Sam Pollard is a legend in both the documentary film world and the world of narrative film editing.  Last week he came to North Carolina, both to participate in the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival and to do an interview for an upcoming documentary project that is scheduled to air in this fall on PBS.

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Continue reading “Sam Pollard selects Manifold Recording for NC location shot”

Autumn Nicholas Tracking Sessions

W007_C002_0208Z1.0001498 Autumn Nicholas, an award-winning singer-song writer from Fayetteville North Carolina, is recording her first studio album at Manifold Recording!

We spent the first week of February recording scratch tracks.  Each week thereafter we added layers, recording drums and percussion, bass, piano, organ, guitars, and finally lead vocals.  We will mix and master the final product in March.  We are also excited to be working on some video productions stemming from these sessions.

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Continue reading “Autumn Nicholas Tracking Sessions”

My Three Sons release at AbstractLogix.com

my3sons_whoswe Just in time for the holiday gift-giving season, AbstractLogix is now selling the latest release from the rock/funk fusion group My 3 Sons.  Titled Who’s We?, the album was recorded and mixed at Manifold Recording this summer by Ian Schreier.  Recorded live with minimal overdubs to capture the dynamics and tone of a high-energy My 3 Sons performance, it exemplifies the magic that can happen when a great band comes together in a great space to play great music.

There are some other new releases coming out around the corner, but this one’s available now.  Check it out!