British/American Composer Jordan Plotner | Inspirational Musician

Jordan Plotner

Location: Los Angeles, CA

Challenge: Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome

Jordan Plotner is a British/American award-winning composer and writer based in Los Angeles. His music has appeared in over forty films, television shows, and commercials worldwide, and his concert music has been premiered in New York, Los Angeles, London, Beijing, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur, and Malta. He has worked with esteemed film composers Marco Beltrami and Joe Trapanese, and has worked on projects for artists ranging from Hans Zimmer and Angelina Jolie to Daft Punk.

After graduating from The American School in London and the Royal Academy of Music pre-college program (concentrating in double bass and jazz studies), and after a brief gap-year stint as an avocado farmer, Jordan enrolled in the Yale Class of 2017. Thanks to a Creative and Performing Arts award, his original filmed opera, Harold, was premiered at Yale, and won "Best Narrative Film" at the Yale Student Film Festival.

In December of 2014, Jordan designed and built a new musical instrument using twelve beer bottles, a computer battery, recycled arcade video-game buttons, solenoid valves, a compressed air tank, and twelve 3D-printed mouthpieces modeled after the shape of his own mouth blowing across bottles.

The instrument, 'Helmholtz's Harmonious Homebrew' was profiled in various newspapers and online publications, and led to him being a featured speaker at the 2014 New Jersey Music Tech Expo.

On April 12, 2015 the membrane surrounding Jordan's spine and brain spontaneously ruptured, causing cerebrospinal fluid to leak, and his brainstem to compress against his skull. Jordan adds "The neurological and cognitive impairment was severe and unending, with neither diagnosis nor treatment in sight. I was a medical mystery and a bed-ridden college sophomore at the very beginning of what would become my medical odyssey".

Over the next four years Jordan saw nearly sixty different doctors, made five visits to the emergency room, and was prescribed over thirty different medications. He adds "I was eventually diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a rare genetic condition that affects all the connective tissue in my body, weakens my joints, and wreaks havoc on my central nervous system. Having a chronic illness/hidden disability has made daily life a tightrope walk of sorts - irrational, reactive, treacherous, and all-consuming, always with the promise of great existential threat lurking just below. But it has also prompted rich adventure (and much creative inspiration)".

The following year, in partnership with the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Yale-New Haven Hospital, Jordan helped to design and build a new medical device to improve the process of pediatric blood drawing. The research has since been published by the "Design of Medical Device Conference".

This year, Jordan has been filming his daily life with the goal of creating a short documentary film about living with chronic illness. He adds "On March 26, 2019 I had surgery on my spine and skull to address the issues brought on by my initial CSF leak, and am now feeling better than I have in years". While recovering from surgery Jordan set out to write a piece of music for the film that would not only help him process his own experiences, but also potentially help others going through something similar.

Jordan has written Resonance for orchestra and choir to be recorded by those around the world living with chronic illness/disability. He is encouraging musicians to colaborate on this project and has links on his website where you can download music and upload your interpretations.

Jordan adds "By uniting our voices in song, and giving a face (or many faces!) to pain, we can create a platform through which we can improve both public and clinical awareness of our conditions, and ultimately inspire research into new diagnostic and treatment practices".

There are no auditions! If you are able to sing/play an instrument, and are also living with chronic illness/disability, all you need is a way to record a short video.

Jordan completed his Yale degree in American Studies (graduating cum laude) with his honors thesis screenplay, "Sammy’s Field" - a fantastical story grappling with collective memory as it relates to the Holocaust and Little League Baseball. His advisor, Pulitzer Prize-Winning playwright, Donald Margulies, wrote that "Sammy’s Field achieves a kind of magical realism that captures a child’s sense of wonder at the enormous, inexplicable mysteries of life. Jordan Plotner’s own search for meaning and the seriousness of his artistry - whether expressed through music and sound, prose or screenwriting - speak to a young man’s genuine promise. That, in itself, is cause for celebration"

Jordan Plotner