ProStudioMasters.com

Composer Doug Bielmeier’s fourth full length album places contemporary chamber music in a wider stylistic context that includes ambient and dance electronica. Drawing on his extensive activity as a recording engineer and producer, Music for Billionaires features chamber works performed by Hypercube and Unheard-of//Ensemble, two active New York based contemporary music groups, alongside five experimental electronic pieces. The diversity of styles puts each medium in relief against the other — the timbral vitality and individuated expressive world of mixed ensemble works versus the controlled sculpting that the electronic realm affords creators. Moreover, Music for Billionaires has an underlying meta-concept embedded within its program. Bielmeier engages with the question of access and equity that surrounds the esoteric world of contemporary composition. By combining two “new music ensemble” works with music that points to a more commercial arena, Bielmeier prompts questions about presenting modern music, context, and access to the avant-garde world for the general public. Through transformation of source files, deft manipulation of studio techniques, a penchant for anthemic musical materials, and an openness to juxtaposing divergent stylistic approaches, Music for Billionaires is an intriguing hybrid that provokes questions about aesthetic and genre boundaries.