Jarome Matthew

Author: jarome

  • Chinese folk meets electronic music, latest production

    Despite my lack of updates, I’ve actually been quite busy here since living in Beijing China.
    I’ve been working on some cool projects, one of the most interesting being Mikey Dee and Miss Melody’s fusion of western downtempo electronic with poetic traditional Chinese folk music.
    The two shouldn’t work well together, yet under the moniker ‘Mobidextrous’ they’ve somehow create something very cool and unique and are breaking new ground here in Beijing and worldwide.
    The first track I produced, mixed, and did a lot of the sound design for is called ‘Huan’ which is a poetic account of being lost in the big city, where ‘even the wine glasses are drunk with excess’
    They’ve also done a video for it below which has some great footage of Beijing:

    You can find more about Huan and their other tracks on the Mobidextrous Soundcloud page, including 2 other songs I’ve produced, Wang Ming Yue, which features the latest and most groundbreaking effects I have used yet, and Woo Yan.

    More tracks and videos coming soon, so keep an eye out.

  • Fire throws our lives into chaos

    I haven’t written a blog for some time as our lives were thrown into chaos early December when an electrical fire forced us out of our home. Then numerous hacker attacks crippled my website making it hard to post much.

    Things have been rough for us in China since we decided to come here. But dealing with an electrical fire like this because of the lousy quality of workmanship here would normally be too much to bear.
    Luckily I didn’t lose any of my work, and a lot of the studio equipment was ok, and so was little Evan & all of us, so that made it possible to rebuild our lives.

    My Macbook Pro didn't survive
    My Macbook Pro computer didn't survive…

    But what really gave us the will to go on and feel any interest in being in China was the kindness and assistance of the Chinese people. They are quite different than the more individualistic people in the west. And the Baha’is here really went out of their way to assist us try and rebuild our lives. It was one of the most touching things we’ve experienced.
    Thanks so much to all of you, to my mom, who sent Evan a sleeper that arrived the day of the fire so he had something to sleep in, and most of all to the Mahony family, without whom we would be truly destitute.

    We are now in the process of getting a new place to live and setting up and building a new studio.

    I could  share a lot more, but this experience and everything else that has gone on here has made me weary, and for legal reasons,  I will say no more except that things could have been worse.

  • baby Evan’s first birthday!

    We’ve been having such an amazing time raising dear Evan, he is such a precious, smart, friendly and happy boy!
    We sure are lucky. So his first birthday was a great cause for celebration!
    On November 30th, we celebrated 12 months old, 6 months since he joined our family.
    Here are some photos from the party and special day we spent with him:

    .
    Missing from these photos – His first taste of ice cream! Blueberry Soy flavor.

  • Our work featured in Dawn Breakers film festival

    The music video I shot and produced for Elika Mahony’s song ‘Where There Is Love’ was chosen as official selection for the Dawn Breakers International film festival happening this weekend in San Diego California.

    You can read more about the video and song I produced and mixed on Elika’s blog.

    You can watch it on Youtube here, or on Youku.com in China below:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN6dal3mwK8

    For viewers in China:

  • Chinese potato chip flavors

    I’ve haven’t been able to blog much lately, even though I’ve never actually had so much to blog about…
    That’s because even the simplest things seem to take so long in China and eat up a lot of your time.

    Every day here in Beijing I see something that would blow your mind and often I take photos.
    Wish I could share it all with you…

    All I can leave you with for now is this – Lay’s certainly know how to market their products to a different culture!
    One of many very bizarre potato chip flavors in Beijing, China:

    Lays 'Intense and Stimulating' hot and sour fish soup potato chips

  • Crazy Chinese Signs

    I’ve seen a lot of crazy stuff in China, but this is the best one so far:

    Beijing Meat Patty Explode sign, Beijing China

    Would you eat at this restaurant?

  • open house for new music production and sound studio in Beijing

    I’ve been living in Beijing for over a month now, trying to figure out how to blog about all that has happened here and what a dramatic shift it’s been living in China. There is simply too much to write about and not enough time!

    So I’ll simply share that we’ve moved into our new home, and the new studio is now ready, looking great and sounding fantastic! It’s the best quality studio I’ve had in my 20 years as a music producer and sound engineer.

    I’ll blog more about the studio soon. If your in Beijing, come by the open house:
    Sunday, September 26th, 2pm to 5pm

    Please contact me to rsvp to let me know your coming.

    Happy Mid Autumn / Moon festival!

    Pro Soul Studio Beijing, China

  • One week until Beijing!

    Today marks one more week before our big move to Beijing China. I’ve never felt ‘prepared’ and I still don’t.
    I can still hardly believe we’re actually doing this to be honest, even though I know it’s the right thing to do for us.

    I’ve been appreciating the luxuries and conveniences that we’ve had in Vancouver because we won’t have those things in China, but I’m looking forward to the adventure that awaits us there, and other things that will potentially improve our quality of life.

    First thing I will be doing when we arrive is setting up the new sound studio with some equipment and cables that I had custom made in Vancouver that I’ll be bringing to make it functional so I can get back to work finishing projects that have started for my waiting clients. We also have to get some appliances to make our place livable, but our things won’t be there for months, so that should make life interesting.

    I’ll miss our friends and family that we’ve enjoyed visiting with the last few weeks, but the calling for China’s strong, and I need to get back to work in the new studio.

    I’ll be back to North America at least once a year or possibly every 10 months or so depending on how things go.
    To get in touch when I’m outside the country, you can leave  a message on my normal mobile number, or use the new Pro Soul number: (213) 908-1284.
    Email is best though, and you can message me for my new number in Beijing.

    And remember, if you want to work on a project or visit, we have a guest room.

    Very excited and curious about embarking on this adventure living in a totally new culture and environment.

    Jarome China summer palace

  • Development of our adopted baby

    We adopted Evan Binh Minh from Bac Ninh, Vietnam on June 17th, 2010 at the age of 6 months. Like most orphans, he was listless and quiet. But within only a month with 2 parents, his development was rapid, and he changed dramatically. Just look:

    Here’s a link to the video if you want to share it:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W04FnjG5TZA

    This is a great example of the importance of children having a proper family care for them.

    Over a relentless 5 year process trying to adopt an infant, I’ve learned that politicians, institutions, and even non profit organizations like Unicef around the world feel that it’s best children stay left abandoned in orphanages or foster care in their own countries rather than be adopted internationally.
    That is no kind of life, and I think children deserve better!

    But the diseased world we live in has much higher priorities right now than children… things like the stock market, military, and politics.

  • Music for Infants

    As you may know if you’ve read my blog before, I recently adopted a baby boy from Vietnam.
    Of course as a music producer, the first music he heard had to be something I had composed, and appropriately I had some music created just for infants for a video project I was involved in that never got released.
    So I thought I should share a sample of it I call ‘Wonder Funtime’:
    [audio:Wonder_Funtime_01.mp3]
    .
    I am no expert when it comes to music and children, especially infants, but I did some research and used my instincts to come up with some music that I hoped was appropriate for young ears and delicate minds.
    I’ll let you be the judge if I succeeded in that effort. Not sure what I’ll do with this music as I still own the rights, perhaps I should put out an album or license it for something…
    Of course Evan loved it and was quite mesmerized.
    He loves sound of all kinds, so the bells and vocal like horns seemed to appeal to him.
    Next I think I’ll introduce him to some jazz.
    Evan Binh Minh 7 months