Author Archives: natetrier

Many thanks to yeahiknowitsucks for this review of my album, nevernaught. In short: “an impressive album of experimental ambient curiosities!” Contrary to the name of the blog, they affirmed that the album does not, in fact, suck. In fact, the review is a quirky and delightful review that, broadly speaking, compares my music to theContinue reading

This week’s assignment was to make something as unlike yourself as you can. After some rumination (“Is music I don’t like necessarily unlike me?”) I decided to make the kind of electronic music I generally turn off as fast as I can – the kind that has one good-sounding loop that is played OVER andContinue reading “The Music Most Unlike Me”

Well, the internet is neat. I posted my weekly Disquiet Junto composition challenge on Twitter, mentioning the accordion, and Bruce Trigg’s accordion-centric radio show out of Vancouver found my tweet and broadcast my piece! You can listen to this episode of Accordion Noir here: http://www.coopradio.org/station/archives/58 Or you can listen to just my thing on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/triermusic/record-one-dronecore

Music for 3 AM Insomnia This week’s Disquiet Junto assignment was to write music for 3 AM during a bout of insomnia. I wake up at 3 AM several nights a week – before electric lights, it was actually common to go to sleep shortly after sundown, wake up in the wee small hours ofContinue reading “The Space in Between Sleeps”

I made a drumset out of clangs and bangs on a tuba – you can download it here. (there’s a wav file with all the samples, an Ableton pack, and an Ableton project). And you can listen to it here! This week’s Disquiet Junto assignment was to make your own drum machine sounds, do somethingContinue reading “A Sketch for Tuba and Tuba-Percussion”

Marc Weidenbaum, of Disquiet.com and the Disquiet Junto, recently posted this lovely piece of self-perpetuating ambient music that he came across on the Weekly Beats website. Weidenbaum posted this under the title “The Invisible Hand of Music.” This reminded me of other ways invisible hands can make music, including the hands that write music afterContinue reading “Invisible Hands of Music”

I (and some other sonicnauts) contributed 3 minutes of noise and 12 minutes of silence to vol. 5 of the Simultaneous Aural Detriments compilation – the kicker is that each contributor arranged their 3 minutes of noise differently among own 15 minute track. The organizer layered them all together and let the sounds and structureContinue reading “Simultaneous Aural Detriments v.5”

“Looking Glass Looking” is a chilled-out musical palindrome. I call it a “crab hocket” – meaning the keyboard plays the melody forwards and the piano plays the same melody backwards, and each part leaves room for the other. This was developed during a class on canons at the Walden Creative Musicians Retreat. Piano and recordingContinue reading “Palindrome music: Looking Glass Looking”

Hooray!  I just got back from The Walden School’s Creative Musicians Retreat, where my new art song, a setting of Thomas Hardy’s piece “The Selfsame Song,” was debuted (expertly!) by Renée Favand-See and Steven Beck. Recording coming soon.  It was a whirlwind of classes, rehearsals, lessons, and performances.  I was really knocked out by howContinue reading “The Selfsame Song”

I played “Jingle Bells, Jingle All the Way” on my upright and then processed it ways 50 ways from Sunday to make a track for this “Christmas Noise” compilation: https://angellistaliuu.bandcamp.com/track/nate-trier-silent-bells (I’ll bet you didn’t know “Christmas Noise” was a genre, did you???)