Neil “Nail” Alexander is premiering his Piano Transformations at The William and Helen Richards Theatre in Orange Hall at 7:30 pm on Saturday, October 26, 2024.

Piano Transformations is a live performance project created by Alexander and presented as a solo piano concert. However, through modern technology, the sound of the piano is captured, digitized, and subsequently, enhanced. Thus, the digitized sound becomes transformed.

The project produced eight new compositions, each of which utilizes a different processing technique coupled with a specific musical style. Alexander will feature these works at the concert. The music and processing are created simultaneously and then, the piano and processing interact in different ways, creating ambient or rhythmic sounds and aural textures that enhance or contrast the original piano sound. The result is an electronic variation of “prepared piano,” where the sound of the piano is altered by external means.

The prepared piano concept in which the sound is altered by placing physical objects such as screws, felts, small plastic objects, and bits of rubber was first introduced by composer John Cage around 1940. For the most part these variations have been purely acoustic in nature. Meanwhile, advancements in electric and electronic music have moved forward exponentially.

“My goal with Piano Transformations is to explore new musical directions by bringing the traditional acoustic piano into the world of electronic signal processing,” Neil Alexander explains.

“All music is crossover”, says Neil Alexander, a self-styled Jazz synthesist and composer from Newburgh, NY who has played thousands of gigs in about every style in 40+ years of making music, including rock, jazz, blues, funk, electronica, ambient, minimalism, classical, composing for modern dance and avant garde theatre as well as teaching master classes in music technology. Alexander breaks rules and brings many different styles and worlds together. Through jazz, the original melting pot of music, Alexander ties these worlds together. He states, “Jazz borrows from everything it co-exists with, and spawns new styles constantly.”

Tickets will be available at the box office starting at 6:15pm the evening of the performance or online anytime at https://www.tix.com/ticket-sales/tix/2852/event/1401889

Admission: $5 general admission. $1 added, if ticket bought online. All students are free but must pick up tickets at the box office.

The venue of the concert, is located in Orange Hall at SUNY Orange. GPS 24 Grandview Ave, Middletown, NY where free parking is available in lot #1. Questions may be directed to cultural@sunyorange.edu

This project is made possible with funds from the Statewide Community Regrants Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature and administered by Arts Mid-Hudson.