Friday, October 26, 2007

Old Inspirations

When I was in high school, the band teacher ran a jazz program before school. He was paid to lead the big band three days a week, and the other two days he'd open up the room, and the few kids in our school who really knew how to play would play in a combo together. I'd usually go and listen to them play, and listening to them was a big part of my falling in love with jazz. I just thought they were so amazing (and they probably were.)

I just searched for a bunch of them, and a lot of them are still musicians. Tenor saxophonist Ricky Sweum plays in the Air Force Band now. Pianist Toby Koenigsberg is now a jazz piano professor at the U of O. Alto saxophonist Tim Willcox, pianist Greg Goebel, and drummer Randy Rollofson are all jazz musicians living in Portland, and drummer Jason Palmer is still playing in the northwest as well. Guitarist Marcus Congleton is now the leader of Ambulance Ltd. The friendster profile of bassist Joel Root lists his profession as musician (though it also says he was born in 1770). And bassist Dan Stotz is not only a professional double-bassist- he's my neighbor here in Phoenix!

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Current Commuting Album

Yusef Lateef, Every Village Has a Song, disc 2. No one rocks the oboe like Yusef. I still have to buy the poster my friend DiDonna made for him.

Gigs!

I have my first regular gig in Phoenix!

Privas is me on trombone, Nick Watts on drums, Harald Weinkum on bass, and Dave Henning on keyboard. I was stressing about playing keyboard with them (see my last post), but I couldn't make their first gig, and my sub Dave asked if he could stay. So now there are four and I get to play trombone, and I'm psyched. We're playing every week at a Vietnamese restaurant in Tempe called Dragonfly. I posted before that it would be Thursdays, but we may be switching to Fridays. Stay tuned.

West Side Story!

So my company, One Light Music, now produces all the music for Stage Stars Records, which puts out karaoke CD's of musicals. I think we're listed on their CD's as "music programmers". I've worked on Godspell, Damn Yankees and Hairspray since joining, but neither of them have been released yet. Anyway, we're working on West Side Story now- I did "Something's Coming" yesterday and "Tonight" today.

It's fun! Wish I could play it for you, but you'll just have to take my word for it.

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Musical Identity Crisis

Can anyone give me some advice about this?

I think I have sideman's fever. I'm tired of playing in other people's musical groups and working hard to do what they want. I want to be in charge of some music that's MINE, based on my thinking and my creativity.

And I'm having a bit of a musical identity crisis. I teach piano and guitar lessons, I practice and play trombone at jam sessions and in a big band, I'm occasionally playing drumset at my boss' church, and at work I pretend to play all the instruments- and it's all fun!

At this point, the main ways I can think of to be creative and in charge are to:

- lead a combo playing trombone
- lead a combo playing piano
- sing my vocal songs alone at the piano
- compose music for local independent filmmakers

The last one sounds a little too much like going to work after work, so I think I won't worry about it right now. But the other three seem equally exciting and ambitious. I could do any of them if I worked at it, practiced, etc.

Any one of these would probably require me giving up the others. Being in charge of something takes more time and energy than just being a sideman. And I want time to relax and cook and be social, after all. I'm excited about playing trombone, and piano, and singing my songs, and don't want to give up any of them. But as long as I try to do everything, I don't seem to have time to do anything. So I have to pick one. I've spent a million hours writing, thinking and talking about this choice, and I STILL CAN'T DECIDE.

I've been stressing about this off and on since I moved, but part of the reason it's up now is that I just took a weekly trio gig at a Vietnamese restaurant in Tempe. I'll be playing piano, with my friend Nick Watts on drums and the amazing Harald Weinkum on bass. It was offered to me, it paid okay, and I was excited to be leading something, so I took it. But now I'm thinking- does this mean I'm about to give up trombone, just when I'm playing so beautifully? Does this mean I'm never going to be the singer/songwriter I imagined being? Why can't I make a decision about this part of my life?

If any of you reading have any ideas, perspective, or advice for me, please let me know!

Monday, October 8, 2007

New Spiritrax Vocals

We ran out of friends to sing guide vocals for our Spiritrax songs, so we advertised for singers on Craigslist and were lucky to get a call from Mandi Leigh. Mandi just got back from a tour of the Carribbean and Central America, and is going on an American college tour soon to promote her debut album, so we were lucky to catch her while she had some down time. She sang over three of my arrangements and sounds just wonderful.

Oh Holy Night
This is an orchestral track, slow and dramatic, intended for a solo performance. I wrote this imagining my teacher Pam Wood singing it- she's an astonishing soprano- but Mandi's pop alto worked great.

My Country 'Tis of Thee
Another classical track, but with a smaller orchestra. Trying to be sweet and not bombastic.

Go Tell It On the Mountain
A funky groove. I like the organ parts on this one.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Old Spiritrax Ditties

It occurred to me that my last post of Spiritrax songs would be hard to appreciate unless you know the songs, because they didn't have guide vocals recorded yet. So from now on I won't link to ST songs until they have vocals recorded.

Here are all the songs I've done for Spiritrax that do have vocals. We're going back in time here, so they probably get gradually worse as you go down the list.

The Four Questions
From the Hebrew Passover service. Klezmer style. 'Cause it's for Jews to use.

Joy, Joy, Joy
Christian kids song, music box style.

Jesus Loves Me
Another Christian kids song, in a Carribbean style, with pan pipes, steel drums, etc.

I Had a Little Dreidel
A hopeless attempt to get Jewish kids excited about playing dreidel, the most boring form of gambling ever.

The First Noel
The traditional Christmas carol. Strings with lite rhythm section (muzak alert!)

A is for Allah
Islamic alphabet song. Cat Stevens did a version of this after he converted. Yes, that's me singing.

Hava Nagila
I did this tune all the time at Jewish weddings with the K2 band, and I always wanted the band to speed up until all the dancers fell down. And they never would. So this one gets pretty fast. Well, it'll be fun for the kids.

Michael Row the Boat Ashore
We had just gotten an awesome new guitar sampler, RealGuitar, and all we could do that day was play guitar. So this one is "campfire style".

This Little Light of Mine
This was my first arrangement at One Light. We used to play this tune all the time with the Inner Orchestra horns- there's a live version of it here. And I had never finished a big band chart in college, so I had to get it out of my system before I could write anything else.

 

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