Beyond the Box with Wayne Hankin & Friends

A live demonstration of unique musical instruments that can take your music beyond virtuals and plug-ins, this seminar featuring Wayne Hankin took place at Professional Musicians Hall (Local 47), Hollywood, CA. Additional expertise was provided by Dave Porter, John Rodd, Mike Rubino, Ronan Chris Murphy, and Curtis McKonly.

A composer must not only please directors and producers, but anyone else who has pitched in their two cents. Once all that is met, a question arises: how does a composer remain unique? Most composers rely more on similar sound banks and libraries, and rely less on musicians, which limits a different set of sound possibilities. If one truly knows how to utilize skillful, versatile musicians, the opposite is true as it opens up a unique palette of sounds and playing styles no box can equal. Wayne Hankin performs a live instrumental demonstration on how to get the most out of instruments familiar and unfamiliar, ranging from Grosserbock, raushpfeiffes, bagpipes, hornpipes, bone flutes, and trumps, as well as show some different approaches to the recording process, plus excerpts from films and recordings.

WAYNE HANKIN is one of the most versatile musicians in the world today. Winner of countless grants and awards (20 from ASCAP alone), Wayne has played over 400 instruments in film (Safe), television (Breaking Bad), recordings (Jewel), Broadway theater, apps, video games, and Cirque du Soleil. Of his many reviews in the NY Times, one acclaimed: “The most directly communicative playing came from Wayne Hankin, who played bagpipes with the soulful abandon of a medieval John Coltrane.”

DAVE PORTER studied classical and electronic music composition at Sarah Lawrence College, and started his professional career at Philip Glass’ studio in New York City. Dave is the series composer for the Emmy-acclaimed drama Breaking Bad on AMC.

JOHN RODD is a freelance music recording, mixing & mastering engineer. He has worked on hundreds of projects including The Lincoln Lawyer (Cliff Martinez), Breaking Bad (Dave Porter), Call of Duty: Black Ops II (Jack Wall), World of Warcraft, and the upcoming Neill Blomkamp film Elysium (Ryan Amon).

MIKE RUBINO is a Los Angeles-based composer whose music has been heard by millions, whether in film trailers for movies such as Oz the Great and Powerful, Frankenweenie, and Epic; television shows like Survivor and Days of Our Lives; or video games such as Sports Champions for the Playstation Move.

RONAN CHRIS MURPHY has produced, mixed, engineered and recorded for King Crimson, Steve Morse, Terry Bozzio, Joan LaBarbara, and many others.

CURTIS McKONLY has composed music for numerous New York television themes and commercials, including WCBS News, Shame on You, and the NYC Marathon. He arranged the First Noel for Vanessa Williams’ Christmas CD Star Bright. He has orchestrated for Jennifer Hudson for the Boston Pops for the July 4th broadcast on CBS. As a pianist he recently has toured with Mannheim Steamroller and has played for singers Leslie Uggams and Diahann Carroll, in addition to the Broadway shows Wicked, Les Miserables, Cats, Tommy, Titanic and others.