I get to my classroom a little before 7AM every morning. I sign in, fill the humidifiers, get the smart board up and running, and then I sit at my desk and begin improvising with the goal of finding motifs for a new piece.
Today, I wanted to write something for this month's newsletter, and this tune just popped out and immediately wrote itself. So it went into my journal, then into Sibelius, then I recorded a video. It was a productive morning.
The piece is fairly simple, with a laid back melody that weaves itself over an alternating thumb bass line. There are a couple tricky pull-offs in there that have to be timed with the thumb as it plays the alternating bass part, but other than that, it's straight forward.
I recently recorded a couple tracks at home for a song on Masako's latest project. This is the second track I've played on for Masako. Last year I recorded a guitar track for Walk Together from her Lost There Found Here album. It's a beautiful tune that features Will Ackerman, Tom Eaton, Jeff Haynes, Noah Wilding, and myself. If you aren't familiar with Masako's music, please check it out. She is an extremely brilliant pianist and composer.
My friend Denis Turbide recently sent me two more songs to collaborate on. I hope to complete these soon so they can be released later this year. If you haven't heard my past work with Denis, you can check out the tunes below. I have been a fan of Denis' work for many years now. Make sure you check out all of his other music.
I've been enjoying the process of creating videos for the songs on my new album. I import short videos that I get from the website Storyblocks into Premier and then edit them together with the music, trying to convey the emotion of the piece visually. It's been a lot of fun to work on.
If you haven't seen the videos, you can watch them over on my Youtube page. Please consider giving my channel a follow when you are there.
Newsletter Archive
I have finally added a page to my website that contains links to all of my monthly newsletters. If you missed any, you can now go back and read them and get your hands on the free monthly notation/TABs.
The Pirates report to spring training today. We already have our tickets for the home-opening weekend in Pittsburgh against the Stankees. Kian and I are ready for another year of yelling at our T.V.s and having our hearts broken…but you never know, maybe this year will be our year. (And by that I mean just finishing over .500).
Kian, my cousin Michael, Marie, and I smiling before a game last summer on the Clemente Bridge. I think the Buccos actually won this one, so we were smiling after the game as well.
In other baseball related news, I bought Strat-O-Matic Baseball this Christmas for Kian. Strat-O-Matic is a sports simulation game. They make games for baseball, football, hockey, and basketball, and cards that correspond with each year's players and their stats. I grew up playing the baseball and basketball games as a kid and haven't thought about it for years.
Kian has quickly become addicted to playing it, and I am totally re-hooked on it. My old friend Jason and I played Strat together religiously about 40+years ago, and he still lives on the block, so he has joined us and we've turned it into a Sunday afternoon Strat league. It's amazing how something can come right back to you after so many years. There's something really special about reconnecting with an old friend while passing on something that was such a big part of your childhood to your own child…well Kian is a man-child now.
Baseball Strat-O-Matic
That's all for February. Thank you for reading these newsletters. If you listen to my music on any of the streaming platforms, please consider adding me as a favorite artist. On some platforms this means clicking follow, on others clicking favorite, sometimes clicking a thumbs up or a heart. Whichever it is, it will help my music navigate the algorithm and find some more ears. I appreciate your continued support!
