Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jinty McTavish. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Jinty, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?
I like to think every one of our ATLYS projects is meaningful to us. However, this year, we embarked on one of the most difficult, yet rewarding projects yet. One that required our first ever Kickstarter and enabled us to work with one of the top classical music producers in the industry, Adam Abeshouse.
The album is a recording of the Sonnenberg Suite, a 10 movement, Neo-Romantic piece written especially for us by Ari Fisher. It was originally commissioned by a man named Thomas Mees from Canandaigua.
Thomas had for over a decade, envisioned a piece of music inspired by the magic and mysticism of the enchanting and historical Sonnenberg Gardens and Mansion in Canandaigua with a movement dedicated to each of the themed sections of the garden (e.g. a Japanese Garden, a Rock Garden, an Old Fashioned Garden, etc.). He admitted that it wasn’t until seeing us perform a concert in his hometown thanks to the Geneva Music Festival: this music should be written for the intimate but powerful string quartet, rather than a larger ensemble, and he wanted that string quartet to be us! .
Two years later, we premiered Ari Fisher’s hour-long, 10-movement masterpiece for a sold-out audience inside the Sonnenberg grounds. It was our first performance following our long hiatus because of the pandemic, and it was magical.
But the project didn’t stop there! We knew we needed to record this amazing work. And that we wanted to do it with the best in the business.
This June we worked extremely hard to help gather the funds to work with our dream producer, Adam Abeshouse. Because ATLYS typically performs crossover, cinematic pop music, we knew it was necessary to invite someone with his expertise and finesse in recording the nuances of classical music that this music deserved and required.
And just a few weeks ago, we recorded it! It was an emotional thing watching the culmination of so much hard work on our part as well as the magnitude of support we received from our ATLYS community. Slated to release mid 2024, we can hardly contain our excitement over the beauty of this record!! Stay tuned!
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
ATLYS is a classical crossover, cinematic pop string quartet that seeks to perform music that is relatable and welcoming to audiences of all kinds. We have performed thousands of concerts around the world, featuring music from a plethora of genres…from head banging EDM (check out our album OPUS), to the cherished beauty of video game music (listen to Fair Winds and Following Seas–an ode to the Legend of Zelda universe), to pop favorites by Billie Eilish (“Everything I wanted”), Imagine Dragons (“Believer”), and even the Beatles (“A Day in the Life.”) And all of this in venues varying from Red Rocks and the Gorge Amphitheatres to smaller music clubs, wineries, and more conventional performance venues.
Our favorite thing is breaking out and performing music that people wouldn’t expect a string quartet to play. And by default, attracting people to our concerts who might have never seen a string quartet perform before!
But performing isn’t the only thing we do! Recording is another facet to the ATLYS universe. Our signature remote recording system enables us to record from anywhere–separate, but together. We receive copious amount of requests from composers and artists around the world to add our real, intricate, and full string quartet sound to their tracks…and have yet to have someone be able to tell the difference between our remote and in-room recordings. That’s not to say that we don’t do studio recordings as well! We always prefer recording together when requested and budget allows.
As women in the music industry, we’re super proud to have gotten as far as we have without help from a management team–though we wouldn’t say no if the right one came around! We’ve worked hard to hone our skills in recording engineering and production–parts of the industry that were traditionally male dominated. We love exchanging knowledge and continuing to learn more and more about these topics.
Education is another very important part of the ATLYS mission. We’ve been quartet in residence for organizations like the Elgin Youth Symphony, the Chicago Youth Symphony, North Central College (Naperville), the OAcademy (Orchestra of the Americas), and Purdue Convos. We’ve also got a passion for teaching about how to succeed in the ever-changing music business, and have been invited to give presentations at institutions including Ithaca College and Music Teachers National Associations (MTNA). In addition to working with music programs, we love visiting K-12 schools around the US and creating captivating educational programs that can inspire and impact students both before we’ve arrived and after we’ve left.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
We absolutely love getting to share the beauty of our traditional instruments with new audiences, many of whom may have never heard a string quartet play before. One of our favorite things is getting to meet audience members after the show and learn about them.
Another thing that we love is getting to play genres of music that we never dreamed we’d be playing when we were in music school. Learning how to translate the risers and power downs of EDM music to our acoustic instruments with enough grit to make it convincing. Experimenting with beats and looping to fill out our quartet sounds in creative ways. And doing it all with intention and precision to the highest of our abilities. We’ve all become so much better players because of this path, and continue to learn and push the boundaries as we go.
What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?
For us, Patreon has been a complete lifesaver. If you are passionate about an artist, if they’ve changed. your life or inspired you, consider looking to see if they have a Patreon where you can send them $5 a month (cheaper than a latte at Starbucks!) to help keep them going!
In addition to that, listening to music–putting your favorites on a playlist, saving it to your library, pre-saving upcoming singles, or just simply listening on repeat. All of these things really help boost the algorithm in this streaming world and get artists’ music seen and listened to by a wider audience. And you can of course purchase merch and albums too!
If you’re super dedicated, reach out to the artist. Maybe you’re good with marketing, maybe you have a space and budget to have them perform a private concert, maybe you’re really good at tech stuff. I can’t tell you how many people helped us and continue to reach out to offer their services. It is SO APPRECIATED! Because we aren’t good at everything!
And remember, just because an artist might be performing some cool concerts, be doing decently well on Spotify, doesn’t mean that they are able to work full time on their project! It’s a goal for all of us, but it takes a lot of work and support to get there!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.atlysmusic.com
- Instagram: @atlysmusic
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/atlysmusic
- Youtube: www.youtube.com/c/atlysmusic
- Tiktok: @atlysmusic