Baker Artist Portfolios

I have been building musical instruments for a number of years now and my new band "canopy" is finally out performing in Baltimore. all handmade instrumentation, mostly tamboura and kalimba, I have built the sounds from the ground up. I created a soundboard, which is a table fitted with pick-ups which allow the sounds to be amplified and sent to a few loop pedals. i build layers of melodic sound along with My art partner Mckenzie Ditter.

Throughout the years, I have been commissioned by various bands and organizations for logos and covers for their albums.

"Baltimore's mad genius beatsmith Blaqstarr is more known for his innovative club bangers than for ambiance. But on his latest EP Trinity, the performer/producer slows the beats down and cranks up the reverb for a moody and surprisingly beautiful set of songs." Nathan Leigh, Afropunk.com

Wine goes well with most occasions and this guitar was inspired by the Wine in the Woods craft show I participated in over the summer. It features a chambered ash body, walnut top, makore fingerboard and birds eye maple head cap. Wine cork accents for the knobs and truss rod cover along with a grape vine inlay at the 12th fret. Since I didn't find a buyer at the wine festival this guitar hung around for a few months until I decided to participate in a charity fund raising event for flood relief efforts from the 2016 Old Ellicott City flood.

This guitar was built for a local listener funded radio station. It features a one piece chambered mahogany body, quilt maple top and ebony fingerboard. The hand cut inlays feature the stations call letters in the headstock and the stations frequency on the fingerboard. The custom F-hole was designed to accompany the shape of the body and head stock.

MSP is an interactive database archiving mutations of an 8ft x 10ft x 10ft wooden stick frame structure, and a series of events and performances centered around the structure. To view the archive, read submission guidelines, or read the conceptual background go to: http://www.amillionviruses.info/msp

Impulse: Responses to Music, Rhythm, and Sound reflected months of exploration into the age-old question asked every concert: “What came first? The movement? Or the music?”

"The Headless Horseman of Furnace Hills & Other Tales" is an musical exploration of folktales and legends of Maryland. Rob Wilson revisits the ghost stories, songs and legends of the Chesapeake and surrounding areas, reworking each regional narrative to fit his own raucous brand of creative Americana. Themes include: The Goat Man of P.G. County, Black Aggie, The Headless Horseman of Furnace Hills, Puckam and other local anecdotes and legends.

Song that I wrote about the grace of God. I sung every part and played every instrument in the recording.

Album that was released. It is a collaboration with a saxophonist also from the area named William Pefok. I wrote the arrangements, and played piano.