Thor's 88 Q&A

 Thanx everyone for such a kind reception to this musical journey!

I have been getting a lot of questions via email and such, and thought maybe others had some of the same thoughts, so it seemed natural to share these with you.

I narrowed them down to the 8 most asked questions and will start in that order

1 - Q - Where did you get the idea to do this?

1 - A - I was going through some old recordings I had made, and I came across "Grand Hammer Orchestra" a piano improv I had done way back in 2011.  I heard some nice themes that could be worked into something great, and the title reflected on me Grand Hammer . . . . boom, lightning struck and I immediately knew I wanted to do a musical composition based on Thor God of Thunder and use the 88 piano forte hammers as a conduit to tell that story.   I did research on Thor's real hammer and found the markings on them told a story, I saw Midgard in the middle (duh) and a pendulum swinging between two Universes, one on the far left and the other on the far right, represented by the infinity symbol.  Being an artist I have been a student of symbology for a long time and I knew there was something to the fact that in almost every case of being shown in the real world Thor's hammer was predominately shown upside down, at first this never made sense to me as a hammer is meant to be used right side up.  But the engraving in the hammer itself made it all very clear, it represents a pendulum and in ancient times this was esoteric knowledge and highly guarded because it was the beginnings of mechanized clocks for better time telling and the pendulum was the source of that knowledge.  So, that's how it all came together, I created nothing the project created itself out of what was already there right in front of me.  

2 - Q -Why 88?

2 - A - It started with the 88 keys of the Piano Forte of course, each key uses a Hammer to
strike a string making a sound thereby making it a percussion instrument like a drum,
and then when I saw the symbology on the actual Thor's hammer I knew I was onto
something really meaningful 

3 - Q - What "Type" or "Style" of Music is this?

3 - A - (hesitates) . . . ya, not really sure it can be classified under any current genre, like I said thinking of the piano as Hammers was a foundation for the over all sound, it had to sound like drums, . . . very Tribal, very . . . rhythmic, heavy, very heavy, that was something I wanted to do from the beginning put the "Forte" back in Piano Forte.   Nowadays the piano is mostly used for fluff and I wanted to change that, I wanted the Piano Forte to be heard . . . . differently . . .

4 - Q - Is this Composition based on any existing Sagas?

4 - A - No, I really had not read much on the subject and unfortunately what I did know based on things I have seen or read over my life corrupted some of the details, so I am still occasionally fixing those items in the story line.  One of the things that I had wrong, which was a huge error, was I had Thor and Odin meeting on Mt Olympus, this story connection was based off of the song God of Thunder by the band KISS, I had listened to that song for so long, that's what the connection became, it's not that I didn't know about Asgard, I did, I just assumed Olympus was right up there in the Mythos with it, boy I was wrong, so that was fixed asap, but as far as the music goes, it's more conceptual and even though some of my details needed slight adjustment the overall story and theme remain the same.  The premise being that if it was happening now, how would it play out, what if all the stories we have ever heard of are not in the past, but are in the future, or maybe they are in the now . . .

5 - Q - Are all the "Traditional" canonized Characters in Thor's 88

5 - A - No, not mentioned directly, the Music centers around a themed story line that leaves the actual story to the imagination, . . . or another telling, so this one is painted with a broad brush and anyone familiar with Norse canon will see who needs to be included in the scenes and who does not, . . . mentally speaking of course.

6 - Q - In today's Tech Age, why would you release a Piano only Composition, why not fully orchestrated, or use a full Rock Band like TSO (Trans Siberian Orchestra)?

6 - A - So, a lot of thought actually went into that, and I was there for the early days of TSO, actually prior to so I saw first hand how that progression stratosphered them into the global music scene, but ultimately this truly was about the 88 hammers, and I did not want anything to distract from that, to add any other instrument would be to degrade the project itself, all of a sudden it would just become every other rock band.


7 - Q - Do you have any music out currently I can listen to?

7 - A - Yes, you can most of it on this site, but keep in mind, I have never done anything musically like this before, so those styles and genres do not reflect the music or sound of this project.

8 - Q - When and Where can I get a copy of these 8 New Musical Sagas?

​8 - A - I am Releasing the Music on 8/8/18, but you are able to Reserve a copy now, it will be available on all the standard platforms.  I am currently working on videos now as well as post production on the music, so I may release it as a simple download, but also offer some sort of box set with the story and original art included, we could include video as well, it really just all depends on the interest from you awesome people, thank all of you so much, if youve read this far, I must of peaked an interest, and that means something to me, so thanx from the heart.

O.K., so those were some of the questions, if you have any other questions please send them in, even if I do not post them I will respond to each and every one personally.