Butter Composer Son Lux to Light up Ecstatic Music Festival with yMusic, Arcade Fire’s Parry

The Ecstatic Music Festival returns for an encore next week, and Butter composer Ryan Lott, aka Son Lux, will star alongside sextet yMusic, Arcade Fire's Richard Reed Parry, as well as guests Scott and Bryan Devendorf of The National, at New York's Merkin Concert Hall.

Lott will perform new arrangements from We Are Rising, his latest album, while yMusic will offer some of Son Lux's compositions from their debut work, Beautiful Mechanical. Parry will perform upright bass and a synth that will trigger virtual instruments Son Lux designed from Parry's recent orchestral pieces. Lott will also get loose on the piano for a unique set in which the musicians will gear up in stethoscopes and keep time to their own breathing and heartbeats.

Lott proposed a collaboration for the festival to Ecstatic curator Judd Greenstein following last year's event, and the exact set has been evolving ever since. The on-stage collaboration between Lott and yMusic will be an extension of a partnership that has been quietly evolving for several years - the band commissioned Son Lux and a few others to generate their initial repertoire.

"yMusic are great friends of mine, whom I've collaborated with for several years now," noted Lott. "They were essentially the core of my 'band,' as I wrote We Are Rising, which sprang from a challenge posed by NPR, in which they documented Ryan's effort to write and record an album in one month. yMusic came into the studio to track a lot of rough ideas I had. Through a process more akin to hip-hop production, I assembled the audio into collages and textures."

Lott, known for his versatility and energy, joined Butter after visiting the studio with senior composer Judson Crane in 2006 and blowing the staff away with rough mixes of what would become his acclaimed At War with Walls and Mazes album.

"At that time we were looking for another talent to complement the skills of our already seasoned composers Andrew Sherman and Judson Crane," stated Butter EP Ian Jeffreys. "Ryan brought a darker, edgier sound that our clients were hungry for. In addition to his musical acumen, Ryan is also connected to a wide network of musicians from the indie/underground scene, which has helped us stay ahead of the latest trends and expand our roster of collaborators and contributors. He is a real asset for both Butter and our sister company FLUID."

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About Butter:

Butter is a creative sonic collective committed to maximizing the impact and effectiveness of music and sound design for moving pictures and environments. Working within a collaborative environment featuring four in-house composers, access to myriad others throughout the sound world, and a core creative team, the studio emphasizes a friendly, inviting atmosphere.

Clients include Smart Car, Kayak, Keystone beer, Clinique and Lysol, via high-profile agencies, including Merkley + Partners, Saatchi & Saatchi and Euro RSCG. Butter also scored a stirring film portraying the construction of the new buildings at the World Trade Center site in New York. The studio has had work shortlisted at Cannes.