Last year we got to experience the creative genius of Modern Robot’s Ben Singer up close and personal during the Orlando Fringe, so we were very excited to see him again at the 2017 Orlando Fringe. To say that Ben is a raw undiscovered talent in the UK would be an understatement of the greatest kind.
We adored his live scoring of F.W. Murnua’s 1926 film Faust so much, and we were delighted to hear that his next project was tackling one of our favourite horror films of all time…and that he wanted to work with Civil Disobedience to deliver its European premiere.
We got to see ALIVE: Music for Night of the Living Dead in Orlando this May, and it did not disappoint. Ben’s edited version of the film — where some of the more poorly acted and less pivotal scenes have been cut — paired with his sometimes other-worldly, sometimes harrowing live music score, makes for an intense and deliciously ghoulish experience.
About ALIVE: Music for Night of the Living Dead
In 1968, George Romero’s black & white film Night of the Living Dead shocked audiences, redefined horror, and launched the zombie genre.
In his Modern Robot take on it, Ben Singer brings together the tradition of silent film, the aesthetic of film scoring, and sounds of contemporary instruments to create a mesmerising score to an edited version of Romero’s cult horror classic. Under its flesh and gore, Romero’s film is stark, personal, and still resonates politically today; with Modern Robot, it’s definitely an experience that gets under your skin.
What’s next for Alive?
ALIVE: Music for Night of the Living Dead is export ready, and following a great run at the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2017, Ben’s now open to booking the show into arts and film festivals in the USA, Canada, and internationally.
A bit more about Ben and Modern Robot
Over five years, Modern Robot has performed accompaniments to dozens of films: odd instructional and industrial films, campy B-movies, flight and space footage, and a wide range of more traditional silent films. What started out as an loose improvisational group has become a project that takes each movie as its own creative concept. For each show, Ben Singer assembles performers and creates musical outline that both complements the film and creates something new out of the combination.
Ben combines the formal training in jazz and classical music he received at Eastman School of Music with the roots music of his British folk-singing, bluegrass-playing parents and with the technology of being a computer programmer.
He regularly performs original music as a singer/songwriter and as Modern Robot.-and we’re sure that within an hour of knowing him, like us, you’ll be hooked.
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