Anna’s Ghost
Visiting Ensemble, MFA in Music Composition
Profile
The ensemble’s name, Anna’s Ghost, refers to the legend of Anna, the resident ghost of Vermont College of Fine Arts, whose story you can read about here.
Dan Cantrell (piano, accordion)
Devon Taylor (horns)
Mathias Kunzli (drums)
Miles Jay (bass)
Sylvain Carton (guitar, woodwinds)
Profile
Dan Cantrell
Dan Cantrell is an Emmy award winning composer known for his innovative and evocative film and theatre scoring approach, as well as his virtuosic playing abilities on the accordion, piano and musical saw. He holds a BFA degree from CalArts where he majored in Composition and Piano performance. Dan is a self taught master of the accordion, excelling at Balkan, Romani, Eastern European, and Klezmer styles. In recent years, Dan has performed and recorded with Tom Waits, Joanna Newsom, Beats Antique, Bono, Danny Elfman, members of the Klezmatics and Fishbone.
Devon Taylor
Devon Taylor is a multi-instrumentalist studio musician for commercials, TV, movies, and music. In New Orleans, Devon made a name for himself playing with Preservation Hall and many top New Orleans bands. Devon was given the name “TubaRed” by the musicians of New Orleans.
Devon was featured playing alongside Dr. Dre, Snoop Dog, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, Anderson.Paak and 50 Cent under the direction of Musical Director Adam Blackstone in The Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show.
Devon has played on BLACK ADAM (Movie), Dungeons & Dragons (Movie), Transformers Rise of The Beasts (Movie), Little (Movie), The Underdoggs (Movie), 1Bdr (Movie), Friday Night At Freddy’s (Movie), Ellen Degeneres Show (TV), Conan O’Brian (TV), Picard (TV), Bobs Burgers (TV), Hacks (TV), Brain Games (TV), THE VOICE (TV), Blackish (TV), Queens (TV), All American (TV), Disney Movies, Disney Theme Park RECORDINGS, Nickelodeon TV/Movies and others.
Devon has performed and or recorded with Dr. Dre, Eminem, Usher, John Legend, Muse, Snoop Dog, Lalah Hathaway, Morrissey, Raphael Saadiq, ODESZA, Ciara, Anderson Paak, Preservation Hall, Fitz and the Tantrums, Solange Knowles, Vampire Weekend, Bono, Frank Ocean, 50 Cent, YG, Yves Tumor, Mary J Blige, D Smoke, Metro Boomin, TRAVIS, Ron Artis II, T-Pain, Youngblood Brass Band, Postmodern Jukebox and others.
Devon performs styles of music from Pop to Jazz, Electronic, Rock, Hip Hop, R&B, Latin, Orchestral and more on the Tuba, Sousaphone, Bass Guitar, Upright Bass, Trombone, Bass Trombone, Cimbasso, Saxophones, Trumpet, French Horn and various other instruments with artists around the globe.
Mathias Kunzli
Hailing from Switzerland, multi-disciplined drummer/percussionist and composer Mathias Kunzli has become ubiquitous in the New York City and Los Angeles music scenes. He currently resides in Pasadena, CA.
As a teenager he became the drummer for the Swiss Youth Jazz Orchestra, received two scholarships from Boston’s prestigious Berklee College of Music and moved to the United States.
Kunzli’s desire and ability to adapt to a wide range of musical styles have enabled him to tour extensively in six continents and he has appeared in some of the world’s most prestigious concert halls, arenas, and festivals including Carnegie Hall, Royal Albert Hall, Sydney Opera House, Royal Festival Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Boston Symphony Hall, Outside Lands Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival, Montreux Jazz Festival, Monterey Jazz Festival, and many more.
National TV appearances in the US include:
Late Show with David Letterman, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The Colbert Report, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, and Good Morning America, Late Late Show with James Corden, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Late Night with Seth Meyers.
Besides having recorded on over One hundred and Fifty albums and countless film scores, Mathias released “Playground” and “A Lyrebird’s Wish” under his own name.
Kunzli’s original compositions have been licensed to multiple TV shows. As a drummer and percussionist he has had the chance to collaborate with artists as varied as Regina Spektor, Moby, Lauryn Hill, Yo-Yo Ma, John Zorn, Kimbra, Rihannon Giddens, Vieux Farka Toure, Hal Crook, Jamey Haddad, Yanka Roupkina, Theodosii Spassov, Bakithi Kumalo, Savina Yannatou, The Paul Winter Consort, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Matt Dariau, Frank London, Gina Gershon, Keyhan Kalhor, Mary Wilson, Steve Gorn, Howard Johnson, Brooklyn Rider, Steff La Cheffe, Erika Stucky etc.
Miles Jay
Miles Jay’s multifaceted music career has taken him around the world as an upright Bassist, film composer, producer, musical director and instrument maker.
Miles’ compositions and playing are featured across all of season 6 of the hit BBC/Netflix series Peaky Blinders, as well as the Academy Award nominated Caphernaum, and he is the bassist of the acclaimed Gypsy punk jazz group Axon Orkestra. Originally from Los Angeles CA, Miles spent a decade based in Egypt, Lebanon, Greece, and Syria, playing with some of the most beloved artists of the regions, including Youssou N’dour, Mashrou’ Leyla, Ziad Rahbani, Nasseer Shama, Dina el Wedidi, Ross Daly and Zeid Hamdan. This experience lead Miles to become the Music Director of the critically acclaimed Nile Project, a 17-member collective of musicians from the Nile River Basin which toured and recorded extensively across the world. Through all these travels Miles devoted himself to learning numerous regional instruments, all of which combine to form his unique palate of sounds for his original film scores and compositions. And at the helm of his sound is his JayBass; a one of a kind bass instrument he personally designed and built by hand to solve his need for a more travel friendly full scale upright bass. Miles currently resides in Altadena, CA.
Sylvain Carton
Originally from France, Sylvain Carton is a multi-instrumentalist (woodwinds, guitars) and composer currently residing in Los Angeles. An accomplished musician, Sylvain has recorded and performed for many groups including Aly and Aj, Beats Antique, John Vanderslice, Lord Huron, Tenacious D, Eddie Mitchell, Donovan, Phi-Psonics, Varietopia with Paul F. Tompkins, The Japonize Elephants, We Are The West, Jessica Fichot, Yves Tumor, and The Mitch Marcus Quintet.
As a composer/producer, Sylvain composes/produces music for feature-length films, shorts, commercials, documentaries, TV, radio spots, dance, and many of the groups he performs with. His compositions for big band won a “Subito” grant from the American Composer’s Forum.
Sylvain Carton holds a BM in Jazz Performance from the Indiana University School of Music at Bloomington, where he studied with David Baker, Eugene Rousseau, Tom Walsh, and Shirley Diamond, as well as an M.A. in music composition from UC Santa Cruz, where he co-directed the Latin American Music Ensemble. In addition to performing and composing, Sylvain is a Vandoren Performing Artist and Artistic Advisor.