My father used to play “Waltzing Matilda” for us on his mandolin. We were living in a farmhouse in Ohio at the time, but the family had recently relocated from New Zealand, leaving cousins spread all over the globe from England to Australia to Canada.

But generations before, most of my ancestors hailed from Cornwall and took the ships around Good Hope to New Zealand, forever leaving the old life for the rough country of the South Island.

This album traces that journey.

“Waltzing Mathilda”, from Folk Piano:

Waltzing Mathilda

Click here for more samples on Amazon.com.

This one was a lot of fun.

I had worked with the EON trio (Peter, Jack & Bill) at Sesame Street, designing and programming new educational computer games. But what we were really doing was playing all their marvelous boardgames: Cosmic, Borderlands, Runes, Dune, and all the rest. At one point they adapted Borderlands for the Apple II and I wrote the “score”, which consisted of tinny little jingles, squawks and blurps on that primitive speaker. There was also a new game for the Commodore 64 called “The Argos Expedition” for which I created a theme worthy of Ben Hur, or perhaps a Ben Hur scaled for inclusion in a happy meal.

When they decided to take their cult classic Cosmic Encounter to the web, I jumped at the chance to dream up sounds and themes for all the aliens. I then compiled them into this fantasia of old scifi effects and creepy noises… all with a solid rock beat, of course.

Click here to listen to samples on Amazon.com

Book and Lyrics by Michael Smith
Music by Mark Sutton-Smith

Margaret has disguised herself as a boy in order to go to sea. However, once embarked, war is declared with England, and she finds herself in a much more precarious situation than anticipated.

1812 is a love story sprinkled with ribald humor and set in the strange world of a 19th century warship.

Click here for the official 1812 website

“At Sea”, featuring Carey Brown:

At Sea

Post-Rock meets Pop in this cinematic mix of dance beats, pop hooks and synth interludes.

A new compilation of instrumental rock songs inspired by the progressive rock scene of the 60′s and 70′s.

Liner Notes

Most artists don’t like labels, but they have their uses. My compositional motto is “follow me”, that is, let me try to hold your interest by taking you on a journey of unfolding surprises, transitions, found objects.

But we have to have a starting point. If I want to take you someplace new, I have to first meet you where you are now. A label helps us find that mutual starting place. The diner on the corner of Broadway and 112th. The chess tables in Washington Square Park.

Post-Rock is a fluid category. There isn’t much of a market for it and consequently it hasn’t settled into anything too rigid. But if post-rock uses “…rock instrumentation for non-rock purposes…”, I’ve chosen a more specific interpretation, something that might be called “Post-Pop”.

Pop is like a multicolored sequence of baubles, hooks, timbral contrasts, and simple repeating chord progressions that are not generally found in either traditional art music or jazz. So the question becomes, how can I string together a piece of music of extended length using only these means, without any narrative content (no lyrics), and without using the traditional AABA song structure?

This album is an attempt to solve that puzzle, a composer’s etude.

Click here to listen to the tracks.

Free Download

Download 3-Song Sampler Here.

Credits

All compositions by Mark Sutton-Smith
Keyboards/Synths, Mark Sutton-Smith
Guitar, Michael Gliedman
Mastered by Pete Doell, Universal Music Group

The album cover image is a photograph by Russian chemist and photographer, Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii, using a very early form of color photography that required 3 cameras mounted side by side. This image was taken sometime between 1909 and 1912 and shows Russia on the eve of World War I and the coming of the revolution. The original is in the U.S. Library of Congress.

Stand by the River dramatizes the life of William Still, Philadelphia’s most active conductor on the Underground Railroad. Set in Philadelphia in the 1850′s, the musical focuses on two episodes in William’s life: his reunion with his long-lost brother, and the court case of Jane Johnson, an enslaved woman who claimed her freedom in Philadelphia.

Book and Lyrics by Mark & Joanne Sutton-Smith
Music by Mark Sutton-Smith
Stephen Amato, Director
Francesca Harper, Choreographer

The musical has been presented in workshop form to Philadelphia audiences at Swarthmore College and the Hedgerow Theater, in New York City at the Theatre at St Clements and at Theatre Building Chicago’s “Stages” festival. It was also featured in the ASCAP NYC Workshop, as well as the Village Originals Festival in Seattle.

To date, over 3000 people have attended and responded to various versions of the musical, which has been presented in colleges, libraries, and historical societies. All performances have been completely sold out.

The production has been covered in over 20 publications and media outlets, including National Public Radio, and the op-ed section of the Philadelphia Inquirer. The work was also chosen as a finalist in the 2002 Richard Rodgers Awards, presented by the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Click here for the official “Stand By The River” website

Title song, featuring Jim Gwathney:
Stand by the River

This is an EP album of Tara Novie singing original pop songs that I produced with Griffin Novie. I started with the songs and basic tracks, mostly synth, piano, and drums. Tara would record her parts and then Griffin would add guitar tracks. In the case of “You Belong”, he completely replaced all the guitar and drum tracks with his own versions.

I have been interested for some time in the overlap between radio pop music and theater songs. 60 years ago, they were the same thing. The question is, how can one draw on the excitement and contemporary relevance of the pop sound, but still serve the needs of a dramatic setting? This project was an attempt to both sharpen my skills at production of contemporary pop music, and also to research that middle ground between pop and theater.

“Make Your Move”
Make Your Move

“You Belong (In Hell)”
You Belong

“Fading”
Fading

Tara on Facebook

Album Credits:

• Tara Novie, Vocals
• Songs by Mark Sutton-Smith
• Griffin Novie, Guitar, Bass, Keyboards, Drum Programming, Guitar Arrangements
• Michael Gliedman, Guitar
• Mark Sutton-Smith, Keyboards, Arrangements
• Recorded at Uptime Studios
• Recording Engineer, MP Kuo
• Master by Ellen Fitton, Universal Mastering Studios
• Album cover designed by Rita Ivenitsky

Credits

Book & Lyrics by Alan Gordon
Music by Mark Sutton-Smith

Click here for the official Girl Detective website.

Synopsis

Casey Ames, a teenager transplanted from New York City to a small town in Pennsylvania, is obsessed with becoming a detective. But her initial efforts to ferret out evil antagonize most of the student body, and what is worse, she soon finds that she has made an enemy of the powerful owner of the local munitions plant. When her best friend’s father offers to help he out, she arrives only to find that he has been murdered, and she has become the chief suspect.

The problem is, Casey has secrets of her own, and her attempts to reveal the truth about the murder may ultimately reveal the truth about herself. And the murderer may have something to say about this as well.

Selected for the Stages 2009 Festival at Theatre Building Chicago.
Winner of the Special Merit Prize in the ANMT 2009 “Search For New Musicals.”

Samples

Girl Detective, Opening Number, featuring Tara Novie:
Opening Number

Demo Album

Tara Novie (Casey)
David Perlman (Derek)
Peter Samuel (The Chief)
Gil Brady (Tarner)
Lauren Blackman (Olivia)
Natalie Weiss (Maddie)
Cathy Taylor (Terry)
Nick Cearley (Charlie)
Jay Aubrey Jones (Oliver)
Theresa Finamore (Kelly)

Guitar Solos by Dan Schloss (Back in the Day) and Michael Gliedman (My Father’s Child)
Recorded at Uptime Studios, New York City, Engineered by M.P. Kuo