More Hot RP500 Sounds With the Lucky 13, Plus a Gift for RP500 Patchset Licensees
Happy Holidays everybody! (And no, that is NOT a political statement.) I’m still working on the sounds to go with the songs for the upcoming recording sessions for my next record, “Blue Future.” My favorite tool for making orchestral sketches (“orchestral” used here in a…
Upcoming Performances
Schedules can change for lots of reasons. Please confirm performances with listed venues before you buy a plane ticket to catch one of our shows. Really. 2018 March 9-10 Recording the rhythm section for “Blue Future” at 1935 Studio, Philadelphia, PA February Sitting in with…
“Blue Future” is delayed, but don’t be blue
As regular visitors to this site know, I’ve been planning to follow up my record “The Lucky One” with a new set of songs called “Blue Future.” The recording sessions were scheduled for October, but I had some family medical issues on the very weekend…
My Three Big Contributions
I’ve been playing harmonica since 1967, recording for myself and other artists since 1970, and helping other harmonica players make better music since 1980. In the last fifty-plus years I’ve made 3 major contributions to the art of the harmonica: 1) I wrote Jazz Harp,…
How I recorded “Put The Lever Down” (2017 version)
Where “Put the Lever Down” came from I wrote the lick and harmony on which “Put the Lever Down” is based while I was hanging out in my car at one of my daughter’s skating meets around 1981, playing with a Dorian Minor tuned diatonic…
How I recorded the big harmonicas that light up “Make the Noiseâ€
Sometimes it takes years to write a song. I wrote the first draft of some of the lyrics to “Make the Noise,†the leadoff song on my record “The Lucky One,†15 or so years ago for a piece called “In the Time of Your…
How I Recorded the Effected Chromatic Harps for My Instrumental Love Song “Deeper”
I released my first recorded version of “Deeper” in 2002-3, when I had just started a series of monthly releases of free original pieces for harmonica. The recording of this song that I made for my record “The Lucky One” represents the first time that…
How I recorded the alien harmonica on my cover of Morphine’s “Early to Bed”
I love Morphine–the band, not the dope. I also loved Treat Her Right, Mark Sandman’s band prior to Morphine, with harmonica and vocal ace Jimmy Fitting (now performing with Session Americana in Boston) among others filling out the roster. Both bands featured unconventional instrumentation, Treat…
How I Wrote and Recorded “Why Should I Make History”
How I wrote “Why Should I Make History” Thanks for checking out my series on the harps and FX I used to record “The Lucky One!” If you haven’t heard the rest of the pieces in this series, check the record out on CDBaby. I’ve…
The Harps and FX I Used to Record “96 Tears”
“96 Tears,” the cover song that closes my record “The Lucky One,” is a perfect teenage-stupid song about unrequited love (and self-pity, of course–it’s a teenage-stupid song!). The original is as messy (the organist makes an outright mistake at one point, and the structure is…
