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Show Park City composer will headline Utah Symphony concert Saturday Park Record Thursday, May 21, 1992 Page A13 by SENA TAYLOR Record staff writer The Utah Symphony's "Breeze Concerts" will come to a finish for the year this Saturday, featuring the new age music of Park City composer David Arkenstone. Arkenstone moved to Utah from Los Angeles last fall with his wife and three sons. He has become well known with his contemporary music since the late 1980s, and has released five recordings, the most recent of which, "Spirit of Olympia," hit the record stores April 28. His last four recordings for the Narada label were top ten titles on Billboard's adult alternativenew age sale chart, and Arkenstone has high hopes for his most recent album, portions of which will be played with the Utah Symphony May 23 in Symphony Hall at 8 pjn. In an interview with Arkenstone at his Park City home, he talked about how he became interested in music and progressed to becoming notable in his field. Growing up in a family where music was an important element, he was a natural and had talents worth tapping. Arkenstone was born in Oak Park, 111., and at age 10 he and his family moved to Southern California. "My dad played guitar and was in bands, kind of like I was," said Arkenstone. "He also played accordion and clarinet-just in small combos-whatever they played in the '40s." Arkenstone's involvement with music began with piano lessons. "As much as my parents hammered me to take those lessons, I really appreciate that now." He and his friends liked making different sounds, and they developed a rudimentary drum set comprised of different sizes of coffee cans. "Then when the Beatles came out I had to have a guitar. That was really necessary. Who wouldn't want zillions of screaming girls at your feet?" Arkenstone was 12 at that time, and his mom helped him buy a cheap guitar. A year later he obtained a bass. "At 18 1 got a Hammond organ, and right about Park City Profile that time I was into Jethro Tull so I picked up the flute and later the recorder." Arkenstone said the most difficult instrument he taught himself to play was the cello, which involves learning the fingering, vibrato and bowing. "At least it was similar to the guitar," he recalled. "But I had a blast learning how to play it. It's probably my favorite instrument. It's really close to the human voice." Following high school, Arkenstone attended Cabrillo College in Northern California, and later U.C. Santa Cruz and Pierce Junior College in the Los Angeles area. "I took any music class I could get my hands on, I was hungry for it," he said. In the bands he was playing in at the time, he found that he was doing most of the writing. "So I tried to get ideas...I was trying to figure out where composers got their inspiration." The music he was playing at the time echoed the sounds of Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Yes, Deep Purple and classical. "We were playing real broad key board sounds, and as much synthesizer stuff as possible. Any band that had a prominent keyboard player influenced me." Arkenstone found that he was primarily interested in playing music that only he had written. "I wanted to compose my own music instead of just being in a band. You're responsible for your own happiness that way; you have more of a stake in your own destiny." Arkenstone believes his desire to write music is "partly a gift," but he adds that in order for it to be tapped, "you really need to cultivate it and go after it." A few years after leaving college, Arkenstone began making the transition to becoming a professional composer. "I was living and traveling and playing Top 40 in hotels and stuff, but it was fun. I got really good at playing the guitar then." "During that time he said he did "a lot of self exploration. I knew I had this thing and it wasn't going to go away. I wanted to play a lot of instruments because I wanted to have a nice palate to draw from." While he and his band were "doing Holiday Inns and bars in Montana," he kept writing songs and recording them on cassettes or in small studios he found along the way. At age 26 he got married, and that's when life on the road ended. "We moved to LA and I got a couple of gigs in some studios and stuff, but I didn't like that because I didn't like playing other people's music. So I and a drummer friend of mine started doing some serious recording-classical rock-and we were trying to get a record deal. Now when I hear that stuff I can't believe it, some of it is weird and sort of avant garde rock. We did that for a while and that got a little frustrating, so I started a new band and we played the LA area." The sound of his new band-called Arkenstone"was more like Foreigner meets Yes...and I concentrated on the craft of writing a good rock song. There's always room for a new kind of sound." Soon thereafter he began having problems working with the lead singer, and had to fire the person. "I just couldn't bring myself to get another lead. We lost him and it was like, 'I don't think I want to do this any more.' So we started composing instrumental music, and really exploring the synthesizer more." To get his initial contacts with recording companies, Arkenstone went to a Tower Records shop and leafed through the two small bins of new age albums to get names. He sent samples of his work to those companies and was surprised to receive positive responses. His first album, "Valley in the Clouds," was recorded in 1986 but wasn't released until the following year. "It was 'in the can' for nine months, which is common for albums to wait," recalls Arkenstone. But for a first album, he was anxious to see it become a - X I Y'AA BEST BUY IN SILVER SPRINGS My " i I Kathy Mears Offers You Her Best! LARGE FAMILY HOME Cul-de-sac, prestigious neighborhood, extras include hot tub, sauna, and large rec room with pool table. For more inf ormation, contact Kathy Mears or your local realtor. 649-9200, 649-0731 01 MLS. Register Now For "Summer Dance in the Mountains (June Through August ending our season with a children's musical review) The P.C. Performing Arts Academy will open June 1st (Under the direction of Deborah Wing and Assistant Director Leslie Butler) Two Beautiful new studios offering classes in Ballet o Jazz o Tap Modern Country Swing o Clogging Ballroom Acting o Vocal Training ALL AGES- Beginning through Advanced, now accepting pre-registration Call for information 649 4651 or 645 8544 Located in the 1910 Building West Entrance "basement" The P.C. Performing Arts Academy 1 ) " 'A ' ' , r t t . ft 'V: t ' --It'' 2? reality. During that nine months he began working on a second album, Island, which was released in 1989. When "Valley in the Clouds" finally came out, Arkenstone was practically beside himself. "It was really gratifying first of all to find it in the store. I went back to the same bin in Tower to find it, and I felt like taking a picture. By then of course the new age section was four or five bins deep. The next gratifying thing was to hear it played on the radio. I was driving the car in the mountains and the reception wasn't very good so I had to pull the car over to listen to it." Arkenstone said his kids, who were in the car with him. first heard it coming across the airwaves. Having heard the same song played at home for the previous two years, Arkenstone said they didn't think it was such a big deal to hear it again on the radio. Arkenstone's third and fourth recordings ("Citizen of Time," 1990 and "In the Wake of the Wind, 1991") both reached number one, and "In the Wake of the Wind" held the top chart position for more than three months. It also earned a 1991 Grammy nomination as a Best New Age Album. His first two albums have had Top 10 entries on the chart. His most recent album, "The Spirit of Olympia," celebrates the beauty, energy and human drama ol the Olympic Games. Arkenstone has collaborated in his music for the past few years David Arkenstone with Kostia, a Russian-born, classically trained keyboardist who had also signed with the Narada label. Arkenstone invited Kostia to join him during the recording of "In the Wake of the Wind," and Kostia played keyboards and arranged many of the album's orchestral selections. In the most recent album, "The Spirit of Olympia," the two celebrate their international friendship. "Both of us have experienced a lot of growth from working together, and we've had a lot of fun, too," said Arkenstone. "We help each other fill in the gaps in our musical backgrounds, and that has helped me broaden my outlook on composing." Arkenstone said his "next nut to crack" is composing the background music for film scores. He has dabbled in that area, and says, "You have to change your focus to share another guy's idea about what's important and accentuate that. You have the luxury of not having to come up with the visual image, which is sometimes hard to get, but in this case you sort of have that on the screen for you." He's geared up for his debut with the Utah Symphony this weekend, but says the experience so far has been "harrowing." He and his band of four others will have just one rehearsal with the symphony. The first time Arkenstone's music was interpreted by an orchestra was in 1989 when his title selection from "Valley in the Clouds" was used in a special dance production to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. Performing with a symphony is a tremendous experience for him. "We have done a lot of orchestration in my music that has been on my records. Giving parts that may have been done on the synthesizer to its counterpart-the orchestra-is really incredible." Arkenstone pointed out that it's generally cost-prohibitive to record with an orchestra, but he hopes to have about 20 such engagements each year all over the world. "It's a very fulfilling sort of thing." He has another symphony performance in Milwaukee in July. He may play at Deer Valley also in July, but without the symphony. "The thing that separates my music apart from other guys in contemporary music is a real sense of imagination and adventure. I try to put a lot in my music that a listener can grab a hold of. It's a sense of adventure. I think in another life I would like to be somebody like Indiana Jones," speculates Arkenstone. "However that translates now, I'm comfortable with that. Not as a guide, but as a backdrop for the imagination." Tickets to Arkenstone's performance with the Utah Symphony can be obtained at the Symphony Hall box office or charge-by-phone by calling 533-NOTE. VMM Friday, May ZZnd - Monday, May Z5th C 3 COED mm Oft pel) USED fifclflluP ( m (3S? J mm EC3 7Fm I S0fe 1 V J mm 'n n hml hi 1) I m ) 1600 Park Avenue 649-4949 |