Musical Meanderings

This is a blog centered around some of the musical encounters and experiences that I come upon in my daily life as a musician.

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Location: Alameda, California

Saturday, May 03, 2008

April and May at San Pablo Recorders!

It's already May. Unbelievable!

I have been in the studio, working on the new CD. It's fun, exciting, tiring, and a little scary. (What if the music sucks?) But mostly, I would say, this process is eye-opening and interesting to me.

My cool engineer, who is a bass player and an excellent musician is Jon Evans and his studio is San Pablo Recorders. I am enjoying working with him. He has big ears---and big insights. He speaks gently, and not too much. He is great to work with.

Instrumentation varies for this project. Terrence Brewer and I played some original cello and guitar duos that came out really nice. We added Katja Cooper on hand drums and percussion to one of those yesterday. And Katja played some cello/percussion duos with me as well. Kelly Park came in with a bass player named Wade to record the title track, "Isabelle". (I keep changing the name of it!) That was a big party- as the music goes into a calypso groove near the end of the piece. The way Kelly was playing on this---we all agreed that if I put his picture on the CD, there should definitely be a pineapple coming out of his head in that photo!

How could I define the music? It's kind of worldy classical ethnic, I would say. For one of the songs, Butterfly Girl, Terrence Brewer summed it up best: "Native American gypsy circus..." Yup, that's about the feel!

There are a few more surprises for the recording. I am going to try to get Isabelle in the studio to record on her cello and to sing a bit. Also, I am hoping to have guest appearances by Ramana and Steve from the Ramana Vieira Ensemble, which is my new Portugese Fado Band. Fun! My Alameda friend Ana Nitmar, who is from Guatemala, is going to sing in Spanish too.

So- I am excited, but so busy right now. I have to go! Isabelle is attending a special princess tea party today complete with costumes and a castle, and we have to get ready for this exciting event!