Why Chris Schlarb?
Here is a quick example: if you want to approximate an orchestra of instruments with a single keyboard, I am probably not the right one for the job. My best work utilizes any number of unique, real world instruments including tabla, euphonium, mandolin, marimba and upright double bass. I thoroughly enjoy working with real instruments, in real spaces, with real musicians.
If your film, video game or album requires texture and atmospheric depth, unique or unusual live instrumentation, and thoughtful arrangement, I would love to hear from you. For the last decade I have explored the ambient, jazz, folk, electronic and modern classical genres as a member of both the American Composers Forum and ASCAP.
I specialize in taking small and medium sized budgets and turning them into expensive sounding recordings. I operate my own mobile recording studio and engineer most sessions, saving time and cost.
My work can be heard on this site and read about in the New York Times, All About Jazz, Time Out New York, Chicago Reader and Pitchfork.
Record Labels
Asthmatic Kitty
Sounds Are Active
bibliography
PRISM index
What if you could buy an entire art installation for $22 and keep it on your bookshelf? Well you can, it’s called PRISM index. A few years ago, I was asked to contribute four interviews with Twilight & Ghost Stories collaborators Mick Rossi, Bhob Rainey, Parker Paul and Ray Raposa. These interviews, discussing struggle, inspiration, [...]
Why Obama
My wife and I volunteered for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign today. We made some calls out to the people of North Carolina gave them information on where their local polling location was. It was an honor to volunteer with the good people gathered together in Carson, California. Carson is a semi-industrial neighborhood made up of [...]
Herbie Hancock + Joni Mitchell @ Fox Studios (3.20.08)
Were there wireless keytar solos, bass slaps, auto-wah drenched guitar scrapes and electronic sounds that harkened back to Burgertime-era arcade games? Yes, and it was worth every minute of it. A week ago I read about a special live performance for, get this: Nissan Live Sets on Yahoo! Music which was to be filmed at [...]
Bill Frisell + Joey Baron @ Jazz Bakery (1.13.08)
Bill Frisell is a unique voice in American jazz guitar, and for that reason alone he deserves to be listened to. His rhythmic counterpart and longtime collaborator Joey Baron is a musician of startling facility, equally capable tossing out be-bop fills or smashing in eardrums by playing blast beats, as he did with Frisell in [...]
Omid- Beneath The Surface
The last iPod I had was possessed by Beneath the Surface. The opening flute lines of the title track would creep out of the miniature jukebox even when turned off. Phoenix Orion’s voice would then bleed out from the speakers with an announcement of the genius/genus to follow.
By 1998 I had already ingested some of [...]
Max Tundra- Mastered By Guy at the Exchange (2004)
The analog to most contemporary music can be found in the music of the not-so-distant past. If looked for with enough vigor it’s not hard to hear Selling England By The Pound-era Genesis in Blonde Redhead’s Melody Of Certain Damaged Lemons or Jaco Pastorious’ liquid bass articulation in Tom Jenkinson’s writing throughout Hard Normal Daddy. [...]
Joni Mitchell- The Hissing of Summer Lawns (2003)
Post-Court and Spark Joni Mitchell isn’t easy. While some say she peaked with the emotionally gut wrenching Blue, others say that the former album was her commercial and artistic apex. While both albums hold in them some of Mitchell’s most personal lyrics (especially the fragile songs on Blue, which chronicle her divorce, decision to put [...]
Anthony Shadduck Quartet @ Finger Prints (03.19.07)
In the last ten years I’ve either played at or attended thousands of shows. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy about a performance in which I didn’t actually perform. In that same decade I’ve been shopping at Fingerprints in Long Beach: I bought my first Squarepusher and Steve Reich records there and with [...]