MUSIC
Gone and Done it
So I took on a project last year to take some old tracks and improve upon them to bring them somewhat more up to date. If you will, I took the wheel and reinvented it, ending up with 6 demos which I was initially not very happy with and using them to create 6 demos which I can take a bit more pride in, to the point that I actually have them available in CD form. While I have been very eager to release my fictional works and share them with the world, my songwriting has always been a more personal and terrifying process. Even the most benign of my songs have been tough to make available, fearing that the talent I know contained within my brain and soul will be judged to be inadequate. Well, I went and put this together and frankly, I'm okay with it. Hopefully, anyone who wishes to check it out, can take something from it... even if it is simply tapping along with a cool groove. Click on the photo to buy the CD.
Background
I have been composing music since I was twelve years old. At young ages I would pick out tunes on the family piano by ear, but when I got interested in the Beatles in 1981-82, I got interested in writing my own songs. My earliest music dates back probably to 1985 as I got a bit better at the music theory and my piano technique improved under the direction of my teacher Roger Bushell. In 1993 I started gaining some experience in what it took to record my songs. Unfortunately I am not as talented a vocalist or instrumentalist as I am a composer and lyricist, but out of necessity I played and sang on my songs. Periodically I will share some of my works here for your review.
HBAI started this project in 2000 a year prior to the events of September 11, 2001. It's music composed around a melodically delivered speech from November, 1937 by my great-grandfather Hartley Burr Alexander. Considering the time frame of the speech coincidental to Europe being dragged into war by Hitler's Germany and my own use of the recording just before 9/11/01, it became clear to me that his message was timeless. The music themes I used were common to a number of works I had written which were to pay tribute to the great american philosopher and iconographer in the context of the generations following him.
- Red Eye (For The Blues) DAT Audio Mix
This is a song I wrote in 1995. I spent a lot of nights working the 2:00 AM Las Vegas - Memphis Northwest Air flight 978 and the title of the tune was my nickname for the flight. This mix was one that I salvaged from my DAT recordings of the demos of the period. Not sure I can do much with this song now because of the CeeLo Green "F-you" song which uses pretty much the same chord progression. Just lettin' you know, mine came first.
- Dr. Quack (My Dentist) - preview
Written in 1986 after having my wisdom teeth pulled. Not a fun experience. I'm starting to record some of my earliest instrumental compositions through digital studio technology. I collected these writings in a single book titled "New Instrumental Works" but I feel like they should be released in three seperate collections: Jazz, New Age and Art Music. I'll throw a few of these on here from time to time.
- Jazz Menuet in G Major (a Bach Theme)
A jazz arrangement of a classic theme from April of 1986.
