Alloy Orchestra

The Alloy Orchestra was a musical ensemble based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, that performed its own accompaniments to silent films of the classic movie era. Performing on an unusual collection of found objects (horseshoes, plumbing pipes, and a bedpan comprising their so-called "rack of junk"), homemade instruments, accordion, clarinet, musical saw, and a sampling synthesizer, the group scored and performed with 40 feature length silent films or collections of shorts. The group is often credited with having helped revitalize the art of silent film accompaniment. Percussionist Ken Winokur and keyboardist Caleb Sampson founded the group on June 12, 1985 to accompany a theatrical production of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Marilyn Monroe vs. the Vampires. In 1991 Coolidge Corner Theatre director David Kleiler invited Sampson and Winokur to write a new score for Fritz Lang's science fiction film Metropolis. The pair composed many of the themes for the film, including the title theme "Metropolis" and the dance club scene, "Yoshiwara" and then brought percussionist Terry Donahue into the group before the first performance. After Sampson's death in 1998, the band was joined by keyboardist Roger Miller, guitarist of post-punk band Mission of Burma. They have composed music for approximately 40 full length silent films or collections of shorts. They composed scores for 19 feature length silent film DVDs and BluRays that have been commercially released. They toured extensively (performing an estimated 1000 shows world-wide) in 13 countries in North America, Europe and New Zealand.

Please enable Javascript to view this page competely.