Advent profile picture

Advent

About Me

The above two video clips are from our recent gig at the North Star Bar in Philadelphia, PA on February 22nd, 2009. Many thanks to our good friend Franklin Holmes for providing the video footage. ADVENT continues to gig, all the while working out new material for our upcoming release...so stay tuned. We have also recently composed and recorded some music for the Colossus project, Inferno. From their website:The Finnish Progressive Music Association COLOSSUS together with Musea will release a concept album based on the first cantica of the Italian Epic Poem “The Divine Comedy”. The 34 “cantos” of THE INFERNO will be assigned to 34 bands. Each band participating in the project has chosen one “canto” and will use this as inspiration for their original compositions. The maximum length of the songs is 7 minutes and the songs can be either instrumental or with vocals. All keyboards used on the songs will be original '70s instruments (Hammond, Mellotron, Minimoog, Clavinet, Fender Rhodes etc.) or be emulated with the best technology of today (no drum machines or programming is allowed!) and an early '70s atmosphere is preferred (Genesis, Yes, ELP, VdGG, etc.). The bands participating in the project hail from areas such as Europe, South America, U.S.A., Canada and Japan).We've composed original music specifically for this project. Our offering is entitled "Canto XXVI (The Evil Counselors)," and we've posted a roughly two minute clip that you can check out in the music player above. For more info on this delightfully ambitious release, please visit www.colossus.fi .Thanks for stopping by the site and checking out what we're about and what we're up to. When you have a minute, please check out the NJ Proghouse website (by clicking on the picture below) to see what performances they've got going on for the upcoming season. It's a great venue in the northeast to hear some terrific progressive rock music. You won't be sorry! Formed in 1989, Advent began as collaboration between Alan Benjamin and Henry Ptak, with Henry's brother Mark joining very shortly thereafter. Leveraging diverse-yet-harmonious backgrounds and a common desire to create music that would, first and foremost, satisfy the members' own progressive and somewhat eclectic musical desires, the band went on to release its critically acclaimed (self-titled) debut CD on Mellow Records and also contributed music to both Gentle Giant tribute CDs (Giant For A Life and Giant Tracks) as well as the Procol Harum tribute CD, The Best Of The Whalers. Joined in 2005 by new drummer Drew Siciliano, the group has recently finished recording its long-awaited follow-up album, Cantus Firmus--and the CD is now officially available. More recently, the band has expanded to include two very talented new members - guitarist Greg Katona and bassist Benjamin Rose - and is currently busy preparing material from both the debut CD and Cantus Firmus for live performances. We hope to see you at the shows! Cantus Firmus may be purchased through the band at Advent's official website , as well as though the SNOCAP download option above (on a tune by tune basis in mp3 format), the iTunes Music Store, Napster, CD Baby, and a number of popular online progressive rock music vendors.Thanks for stopping by, and enjoy the music! Cantus Firmus artwork ©2006 Michael Phipps. For more by the very talented Mr. Phipps, please visit his website at www.michaelphipps.net .

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 27/04/2006
Band Website: www.adventmusic.net
Band Members: Alan Benjamin - guitars, bassesGreg Katona - guitarsHenry Ptak - keyboards, lead & backing vocalsMark Ptak - keyboards, percussion, backing vocalsBenjamin Rose - basses, backing vocalsDrew Siciliano - drumswith:Shunji Saegusa of KENSO (not pictured) - guest bassist on "Ramblin' Sailor"Ken Serio (not pictured) - guest drummer on "Alison Waits (A Ghost Story)"
Influences: English & Italian Renaissance Music, Film Music, Gentle Giant, Genesis, Procol Harum & The Tubes
Sounds Like: We like to think ours is a unique sound, but if you need a reference point, think of a Gentle Giant, Genesis & Procol Harum smoothie.
Record Label: Unsigned

My Blog

Bill Knispel interviews with Alan Benjamin, Mark Ptak & Henry Ptak

Greetings,Bill Knispel very kindly solicited an interview a few of the members of Advent as part of his "10 Questions With..." series--and recently published the results at:10 Questions With...
Posted by on Sat, 25 Oct 2008 22:11:00 GMT

GK CONTRAMUNDUM (Individual Vocal Parts!)

Ahhhh.....Hello,I've just posted a blog on my personal myspace site giving some background info on Advent's a capella piece, "GK Contramundum," and have uploaded 5 different versions of the song, each...
Posted by on Fri, 08 Aug 2008 05:22:00 GMT

Hey, check out a review of Cantus Firmus in the March 07 ed. of Guitar Player Mag!

Yep, ’tis true! The March ’07 edition of Guitar Player Magazine has a nice two-paragraph review of the album on page 66 in the "Rants & Raves" section. A big thumbs up to Mr. Barry Clevela...
Posted by on Mon, 31 Mar 2008 12:15:00 GMT

USA Progressive Music Interviews Advent

Jill Hughes has kindly offered to do an online interview with Advent which has been completed and can now be found on her site, USA Progressive Music (usaprogmusic.com). You can read the interview by ...
Posted by on Mon, 12 Nov 2007 15:13:00 GMT

ADVENT LIVE ON YOUTUBE ("In The Tree" @ NJ Proghouse)

Here's a glimpse from our 10/20/2007 performance at the New Jersey Proghouse on YouTube. The tune is from our debut CD and is called "In The Tree." Thanks to Vincent "Vinnie the Video Guy" Mineo for t...
Posted by on Sat, 10 Nov 2007 04:02:00 GMT

INTERVIEW W/ CANTUS FIRMUS COVER ARTIST MICHAEL PHIPPS

As mentioned in our profile, the cover of Cantus Firmus was painted by the very talented, Mr. Michael Phipps, whose work may also be seen in the backdrop of the progressive rock forum, Progressive Ear...
Posted by on Wed, 20 Jun 2007 13:21:00 GMT

Advent featured for June '07 Band Spotlight on usaprogmusic.com

Thanks so much to Jill Hughes for coming to our NJ Proghouse gig and for featuring the band on her site, usaprogmusic.com. It's a great site w/ lots of info, so please check it out in your spare time....
Posted by on Thu, 07 Jun 2007 17:26:00 GMT

OUR MAY 19th NJ PROGHOUSE GIG (W/PHOTOS)

Well, we had a terrific time during our first live performance (FINALLY!). Many thanks to Jim Robinson for giving us the opportunity to play at the Proghouse on the same bill as the talented band Pinn...
Posted by on Wed, 23 May 2007 19:41:00 GMT

Advent's Tribute Submissions

Well, in an attempt to clean up the profile a bit I've decided to stick all of the tribute info over here in this little blog. So, here it is... In 1997, we submitted our first c...
Posted by on Mon, 05 Mar 2007 11:22:00 GMT

CANTUS FIRMUS hits No.19 in GAGLIARCHIVES Top 100 of '06!

Well, all of our hard work seems to be paying off a bit. We were very pleased to find out that Cantus Firmus has made it into the top 20 CDs of 2006 on THE GAGLIARCHIVES, a weekly radio show focusing ...
Posted by on Wed, 24 Jan 2007 17:49:00 GMT