So, let’s start at the beginning. Isn’t it fun to remember first steps? Whether they be literal – like your child’s first steps, or figurative, like the first time you cooked a delicious dish that later became a family favorite. I remember well the first song I ever recorded on my own (of course, it helps to still have a copy of the end result!).
In 1993 I recorded my very first self-produced recording, in the little apartment that my wife Christine and I lived in, in Peekskill, NY. The song was written on our honeymoon (okay … one guess which tropical island we selected for our romantic getaway?). It was a couple of years later, after I had purchased my first 4 track recording deck, that I recorded and built upon the basic idea that I had developed while staring out at the azure ocean in 1991. My beautiful bride was at my side and we were in a tropical paradise when I first plucked the medody that would become the basis of this tune!
Since my very first experience with recording music, I’ve been enamored with the process … adding creative new layers to an underlying melodic structure to create a new musical “being” that becomes so much more than the sum of its parts. It’s not unlike adding layers of flavor to a something you are cooking … a soup, a lasagna, a chili … each can take on a new personality with the addition of new elements (yeah, I like food analogies almost as much as like food!). I imagine sculpting and painting must also be similarly enthralling for those who dabble in them, yet still music is uniquely its own experience.
With the recording of this song, I particularly recall having to put my little Fender “Mustang” amp in the closet in the bedroom to mic and record my electric guitar, so I didn’t disturb the neighbors! The end result of this first effort lacks in recording quality, and while it may not be particularly brilliant end product, it is sweet and pleasing in its own right, and I like to think it showed promise (that I hope I have since exceeded!).
Next … Introducing … The Sizzling Mice Kwartet and “Pass It On”.