My kids, God, family, friends, music, the outdoors, nature, wildlife, walks, hiking, camping, cayaking, canoeing, mountain biking, golf, fishing, water skiing, movies, book stores, good coffee, good beer, Long Island wine, spirituality, reading, NY Yankees, NY Giants, concerts, tennis, justice, ADHD, snow days, gardens, my corgies, ferrets, and other pets, thinking, sleeping late, pizza with anything on it except anchovies, ancestral homes: Ireland (I have dual citizenship), Denmark, and Scotland, birds, butterflies, flowers, trees, (yes, I'm a nerd), playing keyboards not as often as I'd like, and art - especially Claude Monet and other impressionists, plus Georgia O'Keeffe, Emily Carr, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, Harold Weston, and Caroline Abbott.
"The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side." ~Hunter S. Thompson
"I've never known a musician who regretted being one. Whatever deceptions life may have in store for you, music itself is not going to let you down." ~Virgil Thomson
"It's the music that kept us all intact, kept us from going crazy." ~Lou Reed
Everybody on my music list, all my favorite MySpace artists, singers, songwriters, musicians, and nice people who share similar interests, not necessarily in the music business.
Recording in New York? Check out On Track Recording Studio, Long Island
"Music is a higher revelation than philosophy." ~Ludwig van Beethoven
"Women's music is underrepresented." ~Beth Anderson, composer
"The earth has music for those who listen." ~William Shakespeare
Buy 'In the Head of a Dreamer' by Mary at CD Baby!
Buy the new album from Michael Dimitri at Amazon!
Available now at CD Baby! Monica Shannon's new CD, "Beyond 9"!
"Second Nature", by Tony Lowe and Alison Fleming, with mastering by Bill, was balloted for 6 Grammy Awards in 2007.
If you like Brian Wilson, you should check out this masterpiece by Billy D.
Sonik Wheel donated mastering services to support Sound Aid.
Sonik Wheel donated mastering services for the Tara Vigil Camp CD to help save the Tara Valley in Ireland.
I don't use any type of bot or automated software for adding friends or commenting. I actually try to listen to everyone's music.
Independent artists work hard to entertain you, and often struggle financially. Please work hard to support them by buying their music.
"There are only two kinds of music, the good kind and the other kind."* I like the good kind. Here are some of my favorites from over the years... a rather eclectic mix...
Marie Ingerslev - Brian Wilson - The Beach Boys - The Beatles - John Lennon - George Harrison - Led Zeppelin - Dusty Springfield - Frank Sinatra - Billie Holiday - Hilde Hefte - B.B. King - Katie Melua - Eric Clapton - Johnny Cash - Joe Cocker - Chuck Berry - Robert Plant - The Byrds - Jimi Hendrix - The Monkees - Michael Nesmith - Nat King Cole - Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young - Black Sabbath - Ozzy - The Moody Blues - Pink Floyd - The Rolling Stones - early Blues music - Van Dyke Parks - Simon and Garfunkel - Diana Krall - Eva Cassidy - Johnny Hartman - John Coltrane - Hadda Brooks - Helen Merrill - Creedence Clearwater Revival - John Fogerty - Rosanne Cash - Johnny Winter - Muddy Waters - Korn - Pantera - Antonio Carlos Jobim - Dave's True Story - Avenged Sevenfold - Lacuna Coil - Atreyu - Good Charlotte - John Barry - The Rascals - The Association - Regina Spektor - The Hollies - Small Faces (pre 1970) - MC5 - Stevie Wonder - Bob Marley - Dick Dale - Martin Denny - Les Baxter - Arthur Lyman - Scott Joplin - The Doors - Bob Dylan - Quincy Jones - The Allman Brothers - Claude Debussy - George Martin - Nick Drake - Lisa Mychols - Rosie "Rojo" Abbott - Monica Shannon - Andrea Perry - India.Arie - Carlos Santana - Otis Redding - Louis Armstrong - Ella Fitzgerald - Stan Getz - Tony Bennett - Buddy Rich - Bing Crosby - Chubby Checker - Charlotte Church - Grand Funk Railroad - Fleetwood Mac - Van Morrison - James Taylor - The Talking Heads - Dire Straits - The Cars - The Kinks - Keane - Rancid - June Christy - Ray Charles - The Carpenters - Elvis Costello - Phil Spector (pre killer) - Free - Carol Kaye - Hal Blaine - Nelson Riddle - Leonard Cohen - James Brown - Evanescence - Charles Chaplin (Charlie wrote the music to one of my favorite songs, "Smile") - Jan and Dean - Eminem - Gene Pitney - Tommy Boyce - Bobby Hart - Burt Bacharach - Marvin Gaye - The Kinks - Stevie Ray Vaughan - Joni Mitchell - The James Gang - Joe Walsh - Thin Lizzy - David Bowie - Cole Porter - No Doubt - Rodgers and Hart - Amy Grant - George and Ira Gershwin - Chris Isaak - Erik Satie - J.S. Bach - Chopin - Beethoven - Pachelbel - Schubert - Sarah McLachlan - Billy Joel - Mozart - Vivaldi - Vanessa Mae - High Llamas - Irving Berlin - Sammy Cahn - The Chieftains - Anita O'Day - Etta James - Kyu Sakamoto, "I Look Up When I Walk" aka "Sukiyaki" ("Ue wo muite aruko" in Japanese), and lots more.
*"There are two kinds of music: the good kind and the bad kind (or the 'other' kind). I play the good kind." ~attributed to numerous musicians, including Lois Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and probably numerous others.
"All music comes from God." ~Johnny Cash
"All music is important if it comes from the heart." ~Carlos Santana
The meaning of life? Love.
Above: The Beatles, "All You Need is Love" performed mostly live on "Our World", the first ever live global television link. Broadcast to 26 countries and watched by 350 million people, the program was broadcast via satellite on June 25, 1967.
"A painter paints pictures on canvas. Musicians paint their pictures on silence." ~Leopold Stokowski
"Music is what feelings sound like." ~Author Unknown
Do you like great jazz and heavenly jazz singing? Check out the new CD by Hilde Hefte.
HILDE HEFTE AND THE CITY OF PRAGUE PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA, "AN EVENING IN PRAGUE".
Naked Gun, Austin Powers, Lord of the Rings, Forrest Gump, Anger Management, Wizard of Oz, Sound of Music, Matrix, Disney movies, Harry and Tonto, Gigot, Groundhog Day, Meet the Parents, The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), The Passion of the Christ, It's a Wonderful Life, Crash, Remember the Titans, Men of Honor, Field of Dreams, The Summer of '42, Saving Private Ryan, Somewhere in Time, October Sky, Harvey, James Bond, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Scary Movie, My Cousin Vinny
"Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life." ~Ludwig van Beethoven
"It seems to me that those songs that have been any good, I have nothing much to do with the writing
of them. The words have just crawled down my sleeve and come out on the page." ~Joan Baez
"It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play." ~Dizzy Gillespie
South Park, CSI, The Monkees, Mad TV, Fox News, The Three Stooges, Seinfeld, House, The Simpsons, Family Guy, King of the Hill, Cops, Reno 911, Craig Ferguson.
The Three Stooges Music Video!
"The Curly Shuffle" by Jump 'N The Saddle Band
"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music." ~Aldous Huxley
"My creed for art in general is that it should enrich the soul; it should teach spirituality by showing a person a portion of himself that he would not discover otherwise... a part of yourself you never knew existed." ~Bill Evans
Lisa Mychols: "Gonna Get That Boy"
"Gonna Get That Boy" - Lisa Mychols
Recommended books for musicians:
"The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution" by David Kusek and Gerd Leonhard
"The Self-Promoting Musician" by Peter Spellman
"I Don't Need a Record Deal! Your Survival Guide to the Indie Music Revolution" by Daylle Deanna Schwartz
"Making Music Make Money: An Insider's Guide to Becoming Your Own Music Publisher" by Eric Beall
"Mastering Audio: The Art and the Science" by Bob Katz
"Moneymaking Music: Your complete guide to making, keeping, protecting, and growing your music-success fortune" by Jeffrey P. Fisher
Lately I'm reading books on physics and astronomy. I'm also into reading old stuff... Greek, Roman, Medieval, Renaissance. It feels like someone from the far distant past is here today, talking through their writing.
The Bible is a great book.
Did you know that men, as well as women, are often victims of physical and emotional abuse? Men usually stay quiet about it, feeling that no one will believe them or understand. Abusive individuals so skillfully conceal their violence (emotional and physical) that they often come across as charming and kind. The hatred that the emotional abuser projects onto their victim calms the abuser's inner tension, allowing the abuser to act pleasantly in the outside world. In time, the identity of the victim is profoundly eroded, leading to depression, debilitating anxiety, and other symptoms of severe stress, even suicide. Victims are isolated from family and friends. They lose all self esteem in both their own eyes and their abuser's. The emotional abuser poses as the victim, only to seduce her next victim: another giver and healer. Here's an enlightening book about emotional abuse for men and women. It covers abuse in the family and the workplace...
"Stalking the Soul: Emotional Abuse and the Erosion of Identity", by Marie-France Hirigoyen
"If I were not a physicist, I would probably be a musician. I often think in music. I live my daydreams in music. I see my life in terms of music. ... I get most joy in life out of music." ~Albert Einstein
"Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness." ~Maya Angelou
Have a look at some great art by Caroline Abbott at MySpace (click the image).
"Quit playing what you think I want you to play!" ~ Gil Evans
"If it sounds good, it is good." ~ Duke Ellington
My Mom, my kids, my grandparents, great-great-great ... grandma and grandpa Ardipithecus ramidus and all my ancestors going back to the beginning of life without whom I and a lot of us would not be here, mastering engineer Bob Katz for his work to make recorded music sound good again, Louis Armstrong "founding father of American music", W. C. Handy "founding father of the Blues", Albert Einstein, soldiers fighting for freedom for all people, Jeanne d'Arc, and those who have found peaceful ways to change the world, especially Mother Teresa, St. Thérèse Martin, St. Francis of Assisi, Coretta Scott King, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
"The idea that beauty is revolutionary is a revelation to me... I've discovered the part of my brain that can't decode anything, can't add, can't work from verbalized concepts, but that does make melodies with pitch and rhythm... beauty is enough." ~Beth Anderson, composer
"I would advise you to keep your overhead down, avoid a major drug habit, play everyday, and take it in front of other people. They need to hear it, and you need them to hear it." ~James Taylor
“When you’re dead, you’re done.†~ Louis Armstrong
"Don't ask me, I don't know." ~Ozzy Osbourne
"I never tried to prove nothing, just wanted to give a good show. My life has always been my music, it's always come first, but the music ain't worth nothing if you can't lay it on the public. The main thing is to live for that audience, 'cause what you're there for is to please the people." ~Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong