David Arkenstone
Encyclopedia
David Arkenstone is an American New Age music
ian. His music is primarily instrumental, with occasional vocalizations. He was born in Chicago
, Illinois
on July 1, 1952. He has three children—Quillon, Dashiell and Valinor—with his first wife, Julie. His second wife was Diane Arkenstone
, also a musician.
at the age of ten, he was involved in various high school bands playing guitars and keyboards, playing baseball in his spare time. He studied music in college and started a progressive rock band named after himself, but he soon discovered the music of Kitaro
and was heavily influenced by it. Arkenstone was influenced by writers such as J. R. R. Tolkien
and Ian Fleming
, and grew up listening to bands like Emerson, Lake & Palmer
, Deep Purple
and Yes
, as well as listening to classical music.
Arkenstone went solo and found his own sound in New Age music. Arkenstone says that has been greatly aided by technology: "Technology has produced some wonderful tools for making music. The computer allows me to fully orchestrate my pieces and really fine tune them." His music is primarily instrumental. His albums, often fantasy themed, often come packaged with literature and art. He worked with fantasy novel writer Mercedes Lackey
on a few of his albums. Arkenstone and his ex-wife, Diane, created their own record label called Neo Pacifica. In addition to releasing their own music on the label, they have included other bands such as Earth Trybe, Enaid, and the Marquis Ensemble.
He has also composed music for television; channels such as the History Channel, the Discovery Channel
and NBC Sports
include his music. He has also written music for trailers and some of his works were used as film soundtracks. His music also features on computer games such as World of Warcraft
, Lands of Lore
2 and 3, Blade Runner
, Earth and Beyond, and Emperor: Battle for Dune
; he also features on 20 Years of Narada Piano
. Additionally, he wrote the original score for the independent film PRISM.
Arkenstone earned three Grammy nominations for his work: In the Wake of the Wind in 1992, Citizen of the World in 2000, and Atlantis in 2004.
Arkenstone has learned to play a large variety of musical instruments including the bouzouki
, mandolin
, guitar
, bass guitar
, harp
, cello
, flute
, electronic keyboards
, piano
, Turkish saz
, pennywhistle, melodica
and pan pipes. He also plays drums and percussion and has performed some vocalizations on his albums.
Arkenstone is also involved in the band Troika; their sound is similar to his solo work. The band members like to remain anonymous, although the compositions are credited to Arkenstone.
His theme "The Journey Begins / Kyla's Ride" was used for the FIFA World Cup France '98 broadcastings intro by the Mexican television network TV Azteca
.
He recently signed with Domo Records
and re-released the album Echoes of Light and Shadow in 2010.
Arkenstone was a member of the composing team who developed the music for Blizzard Activision's World of Warcraft
videogame's Cataclysm expansion. Along with Arkenstone, the team consists of Derek Duke, Glenn Stafford, and Neal Acree
.
New Age music
New Age music is music of various styles intended to create artistic inspiration, relaxation, and optimism. It is used by listeners for yoga, massage, meditation, and reading as a method of stress management or to create a peaceful atmosphere in their home or other environments, and is often...
ian. His music is primarily instrumental, with occasional vocalizations. He was born in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
on July 1, 1952. He has three children—Quillon, Dashiell and Valinor—with his first wife, Julie. His second wife was Diane Arkenstone
Diane Arkenstone
- Career :Arkenstone wrote her first song at the age of three and started playing guitar at the age of seven. She is trained as an opera singer. In her early career she co-formed with a friend named Melanie the duo Enaid & Einalem....
, also a musician.
Biography
After moving from Chicago to CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
at the age of ten, he was involved in various high school bands playing guitars and keyboards, playing baseball in his spare time. He studied music in college and started a progressive rock band named after himself, but he soon discovered the music of Kitaro
Kitaro
, better known as , is an award winning Japanese musician, composer and multi-instrumentalist who is regarded as one of the pioneers of new age music.-Early life:...
and was heavily influenced by it. Arkenstone was influenced by writers such as J. R. R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
and Ian Fleming
Ian Fleming
Ian Lancaster Fleming was a British author, journalist and Naval Intelligence Officer.Fleming is best known for creating the fictional British spy James Bond and for a series of twelve novels and nine short stories about the character, one of the biggest-selling series of fictional books of...
, and grew up listening to bands like Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Emerson, Lake & Palmer, also known as ELP, are an English progressive rock supergroup. They found success in the 1970s and sold over forty million albums and headlined large stadium concerts. The band consists of Keith Emerson , Greg Lake and Carl Palmer...
, Deep Purple
Deep Purple
Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in Hertford in 1968. Along with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, they are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal and modern hard rock, although some band members believe that their music cannot be categorised as belonging to any one genre...
and Yes
Yes (band)
Yes are an English rock band who achieved worldwide success with their progressive, art, and symphonic style of rock music. Regarded as one of the pioneers of the progressive genre, Yes are known for their lengthy songs, mystical lyrics, elaborate album art, and live stage sets...
, as well as listening to classical music.
Arkenstone went solo and found his own sound in New Age music. Arkenstone says that has been greatly aided by technology: "Technology has produced some wonderful tools for making music. The computer allows me to fully orchestrate my pieces and really fine tune them." His music is primarily instrumental. His albums, often fantasy themed, often come packaged with literature and art. He worked with fantasy novel writer Mercedes Lackey
Mercedes Lackey
Mercedes "Misty" Lackey is a best-selling American author of fantasy novels. Many of her novels and trilogies are interlinked and set in the world of Velgarth, mostly in and around the country of Valdemar...
on a few of his albums. Arkenstone and his ex-wife, Diane, created their own record label called Neo Pacifica. In addition to releasing their own music on the label, they have included other bands such as Earth Trybe, Enaid, and the Marquis Ensemble.
He has also composed music for television; channels such as the History Channel, the Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel is an American satellite and cable specialty channel , founded by John Hendricks and distributed by Discovery Communications. It is a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav...
and NBC Sports
NBC Sports
NBC Sports is the sports division of the NBC television network. Formerly "a service of NBC News," it broadcasts a diverse array of programs, including the Olympic Games, the NFL, the NHL, MLS, Notre Dame football, the PGA Tour, the Triple Crown, and the French Open, among others...
include his music. He has also written music for trailers and some of his works were used as film soundtracks. His music also features on computer games such as World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994...
, Lands of Lore
Lands of Lore
Lands of Lore or LoL is a computer role-playing game series by Westwood Studios and published by Virgin Interactive. Lands of Lore follows the tradition of Dungeon Master, but introduced a linear scenario-based storyline, rather than characters and feats.-Development:Westwood Studios made role...
2 and 3, Blade Runner
Blade Runner (video game)
Blade Runner is a point-and-click adventure game, developed by Westwood Studios for the PC. Rather than re-tell the 1982 Blade Runner film, the developers created a different story set in the same universe, serving as a side story...
, Earth and Beyond, and Emperor: Battle for Dune
Emperor: Battle for Dune
Emperor: Battle for Dune is a Dune video game, released by Westwood Studios on June 12, 2001. It is based in Frank Herbert's science fiction Dune universe....
; he also features on 20 Years of Narada Piano
20 Years of Narada Piano
20 Years of Narada Piano is a 2001 compilation release by Narada. It peaked at #12 on Billboard's Top New Age album charts in the same year.-Track listing:*1.1 "Endings" – Michael Jones – 5:33*1.2 "Sunrise" – Kostia – 5:02...
. Additionally, he wrote the original score for the independent film PRISM.
Arkenstone earned three Grammy nominations for his work: In the Wake of the Wind in 1992, Citizen of the World in 2000, and Atlantis in 2004.
Arkenstone has learned to play a large variety of musical instruments including the bouzouki
Bouzouki
The bouzouki , is a musical instrument with Greek origin in the lute family. A mainstay of modern Greek music, the front of the body is flat and is usually heavily inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The instrument is played with a plectrum and has a sharp metallic sound, reminiscent of a mandolin but...
, mandolin
Mandolin
A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...
, guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
, bass guitar
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
, harp
Harp
The harp is a multi-stringed instrument which has the plane of its strings positioned perpendicularly to the soundboard. Organologically, it is in the general category of chordophones and has its own sub category . All harps have a neck, resonator and strings...
, cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
, flute
Flute
The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
, electronic keyboards
Electric piano
An electric piano is an electric musical instrument.Electric pianos produce sounds mechanically and the sounds are turned into electrical signals by pickups. Unlike a synthesizer, the electric piano is not an electronic instrument, but electro-mechanical. The earliest electric pianos were invented...
, piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
, Turkish saz
Baglama
thumb|180px|Cura and bağlamaThe bağlama is a stringed musical instrument shared by various cultures in the Eastern Mediterranean, Near East, and Central Asia....
, pennywhistle, melodica
Melodica
The melodica, also known as the "blow-organ" or "key-flute", is a free-reed instrument similar to the melodeon and harmonica. It has a musical keyboard on top, and is played by blowing air through a mouthpiece that fits into a hole in the side of the instrument. Pressing a key opens a hole,...
and pan pipes. He also plays drums and percussion and has performed some vocalizations on his albums.
Arkenstone is also involved in the band Troika; their sound is similar to his solo work. The band members like to remain anonymous, although the compositions are credited to Arkenstone.
His theme "The Journey Begins / Kyla's Ride" was used for the FIFA World Cup France '98 broadcastings intro by the Mexican television network TV Azteca
TV Azteca
Azteca, is the second largest Mexican television entertainment. It was established in 1983 as the state-owned Instituto Mexicano de la Televisión , a holding of the national TV networks channel 13 and 7 and was privatized under its current name in 1993 and now is part of Grupo Salinas...
.
He recently signed with Domo Records
Domo Records
Domo Records is an independent record label in Los Angeles, California. Domo Records was established in 1993 by Ei'ichi Naito, a record producer and engineer...
and re-released the album Echoes of Light and Shadow in 2010.
Arkenstone was a member of the composing team who developed the music for Blizzard Activision's World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994...
videogame's Cataclysm expansion. Along with Arkenstone, the team consists of Derek Duke, Glenn Stafford, and Neal Acree
Neal Acree
Neal Acree is a composer of film, television, and video game music. He has scored 22 feature films, contributed music to the popular Blizzard Entertainment video games World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade and Starcraft II:...
.