About
Hey, my name is Sam Russell and I'm a composer based in West London, UK.
This site is a record of my composing and thoughts around my composing.
From Rock Guitar to String Quartets
My musical journey started with learning guitar, where I quickly developed an interest in rock and heavy metal. At university I studied astrophysics while playing in a heavy metal band, which was a ton of fun.
After university I started studying guitar more seriously, and arranged and recorded Bach's first two cello suites on electric guitar, before writing, recording and releasing a heavy metal album.
After releasing the album, I was interested in learning how to compose music and moved my studying from developing my electric guitar playing to studying composition, originally as a way to compose music to play on guitar.
Over the years I've studied various textbooks and studied with a few teachers, to develop my understanding of how music works.
While I still enjoy composing and learning my own compositions on guitar, I quickly found that my brain could work faster than my fingers and started composing for more traditional ensembles such as string quartets as a way to (1) develop my composition skills and (2) create something beautiful.
Personally, I love the challenge of composing tonal music: It feels like I'm playing chess against myself.
Recent Compositions
Supporting My Work
If you are interested in supporting my work and helping the recording and release of new pieces, then any of the following would be helpful:
- Subscribe for free to my newsletter I'll let you know about new releases
- Consider buying a recording from Bandcamp or iTunes
- Help bring new recordings to life with the Kickstarter projects
- Purchase a score
- Leave a tip
- Consider becoming a paid supporter, which helps bring new projects to life and free up time to work on new projects. Paid supporters get access to my recordings archive, can post comments and receive thanks in the credits of videos for new recordings.