.:halftone:.

Taylor Christoffel is a multi-instrumental musician and a multimedia producer currently working and residing in New York City. Taylor is also known under his alias, Halftone, which he used as a stage name for his live electronic acts during the Arizona desert rave movement in the early 2000s.
Taylor was born in Tucson, AZ on November 19th, 1984 to an attorney father and a entrepreneur mother. His two main musical influences growing up were The Smashing Pumpkins and the Chemical Brothers. After finishing high school, Taylor enrolled at Pima Culinary School and became a Certified Chef. Early Influences
When Taylor was 9 years old, he received a mini Casio SK1 keyboard for a Christmas gift from his family. After discovering the sample button, he was sampling everything that was audible. A couple of years later, he earned a Karaoke machine that feature two recordable tape decks and a microphone. This was believed to be his first introduction to the mechanical recording process. Taylor then created mix tapes and radio shows with all of his parent’s records and sold them to his neighbors.
Around 3rd grade, Taylor became an avid listener of gangster rap. His teacher’s daughter would come by after school and give tapes to Taylor. At that time, he had begun duplicating the tapes and created rap mix tapes featuring artists such as Warren G, Bone Thugs and Harmony and Masta Ace. Taylor then wrote a rap song with his friend Paul dedicated to a girl they both had a crush on. The song was recorded with the Casio keyboard along with the Karaoke machine. His teacher quickly became aware of Taylor’s early talent, but due to the lyrical content of the music, she had to put a stop to the tape exchange.
During the summer of his 5th grade year, he met his friend Jerry Donnelly. Along with Taylor’s brother, Jerry was significant to introducing Taylor to the guitar.. Taylor’s started taking guitar lessons from Jay Shoptaugh, a heavy metal guitar instructor at Beaver’s Band Box.
Another early influence in Taylor’s life was from a young music teacher named Ms. Noel at St. Joseph’s Elementary School. One day she gave Taylor her two copies of Smashing Pumpkin’s “Siamese Dream” and “Pisces Iscariot” as a personal gift. She insisted that he listened to these CDs and write a CD review. She also rewarded him with a Student of the Month for “Outstanding abilities with a tape machine”.
When Taylor approached 8th grade, he became very interested in the drums. His parents made a barter with him that if he joined Drumline in the Marching Band for his freshman year in High School, they would buy him a drumset. At the time, During his 8th grade year,then started taking lessons from Mark Leversege.
When Taylor joined Drumline in his freshman year, he started in the percussion pit as the timpani player. During that time, He earned enough money to buy a Dr. Groove DR-202 when he was 14 and and that time he fell in love with electronic music. His friend, Gina Lorenzinni , who was a few years older than Taylor, became one of his greatest friends and biggest influences. Gina exposed him to the Tucson Rave Scene that exploded in 1999. She would invite him to all the parties, expose him to all of the new techno music, and teach him how to dance. Taylor had trouble convincing his parents to let him go to Rave parties when he was 14, but he found ways to sneak out of his house at night. Taylor saved enough money to buy an AKAI MPC 2000xl and a Korg MS2000. He quickly learned MIDI programming, synthesis architecture, and how to record to his computer. As he became more familiar with his setup, he was creating live electronic shows and moved his way on to the stage.
When a promoter from Shoot Da Moon Production heard Taylor’s live demo CD, he booked Taylor as the opening act at the desert rave “Two Full Moons and a Trout”. As he started getting exposure, he was getting booked at the infamous “warehouse parties” hosted by Air Tight Productions. He was performing with AZ acts such as DJ Alex Ruiz, Matty C, Elijah, and DJ Suede.
After graduation, Taylor worked at Terra Cotta as an Assistant Pastry Chef and it was then he met Chef Joey Campanaro., who instantly acknowledged Taylor’s ambition and convinced him to work for him in New York City.
After arriving to New York City, Taylor met Mark Pressman, who became a driving force in Taylor’s musical success in New York City. Mark brought Taylor on as an intern at Interflix Studios, where Taylor currently worked his way up to the Associate Producer and Video Editor.
During his first week in Manhattan, Taylor was on the subway on his way to a party in Brooklyn when, after asking for directions from the girl sitting next to him, he met signer Emily Cavanagh. They currently perform in New York City and are releasing an album this summer under the name, Says You.
Taylor then became an intern at Expansion Team, a music production house located in SOHO. He then teamed up with Drum and Bass producer Mike Genato of Mathematics to work on a Mountain Dew commercial for Japan. Taylor also performed live at venues in NYC such as Fat Baby, Bar 169, Club Moomia, and Club Gaxalie. He continues to produce and compose music for TV, Film, Web, and collaborates with other artists.
Film: "Ben's Plan" 2007 - Music: Taylor Christoffel ".:halftone:."