Studio B
Tom Belknap
Musician, composer, and builder of creative systems.
I write, perform, and shape music — and I build the systems that help creative work actually live and breathe. Studio B is where those two worlds meet.
This site is part portfolio, part lab, and part ongoing conversation about process, structure, and the work behind the work.
I was born on September 6th, in the year 1974, at 6:36 in the morning. I don't remember much. But those in attendance tell me it was "pretty cool."
Subsequently...
From these humble beginnings, music has always been a through-line in my life. Along the way, I've been machinist to developer in my professional life; I've been a teenage band nerd and father in my private life. And across all of it, my creative life has always been musical. I produced my first indie album at 24, toured with a tribute to RUSH, backed up belly dancers and performed at weddings and even jumped off my tour bus to sneak into Woodstock '94.
I am a disciple of the prog rock legend Neil Peart, a student of the rudimental genius of Bill Bruford and a fellow traveler in the lush soundscapes of Stephen Perkins. I am a navigator of deep musical waters, traveling from familiar climes of Paul Simon to the far-flung sounds of Angélique Kidjo and Ismaël Lô. And every day, I have searched farther and wider for still more musical influences.
Currently, I have an amateur’s studio of recording equipment and musical instruments of all varieties which I'm always eager to share with my fellow musicians. I record live performances, write electronic synth work and compose orchestration.
I prefer to think of my creative output in a way Frank Zappa might recognize: "the work." It's not simply a single song or album or performance. It's a conceptual continuum which expresses and reinvents itself over and over again. This space is where I allow that continuum to speak in a single voice.