The Gift Putting a capo on a guitar tends to knock it out of tune, so one day I went to play both 'Reverie' and 'Sun Shower' and, after putting the capo on, strummed a chord to see if the guitar was now out. For no real reason, I performed the strumming you hear at the start of 'The Gift'. I immediately realized it sounded like a song, and I was off composing. This is the second song on this album, the first being 'Separating', that only exists because I wanted to see if the guitar was in tune. It received it's name because my mother has always loved these songs and since I'd finished the original recording shortly before her birthday, I sent this to her as a gift. The counterpoint section at :58 is one of my favorites on the album, and once again Jeff suggested I do the kick drums, on that one section. At some point, I added the opening lead melody but then turned it off, thinking I didn't like it. Months later I saw it sitting there, turned off, and dimly remembered this. I turned it on just to see and was surprised I'd ever turned it off. I don't know what I was thinking. Duo After not playing or writing acoustic guitar for about ten years, but still having this all-acoustic album in my heart, I decided it was time to finally resume in 2008. The big question was whether I could still write like this. I can't say I ever really doubted it, but with 'Duo', named for the consistent double-lead guitars throughout, I was clearly back. I tend to 'arpeggiate' chords a lot, meaning pick through the notes one by one instead of strum them. However, if I did that in every section of every song, there wouldn't be much variation, so with that in mind, I sought interesting music to strum in the newer pieces, and this is what led to the opening music and the rest of the tune. Dee 'Dee' is the only cover song I've ever recorded, as it was originally written and recorded by the late, great Randy Rhoads and appeared on the first Ozzy Osbourne record, Blizzard of Ozz. On the original, Randy recorded it with two guitars and added harmonies this way. Here, I've performed it with only a classical guitar. The recording is something of an accident, as I was rehearsing my own piece, 'Menagerie', and needed something similar to practice, so I learned 'Dee'. When recording my piece two weeks later, I decided to record this on the spur of the moment, but didn't intend to use it. It was only when I walked into the mixing studio late one day and the engineer had it playing that I changed my mind. I didn't recognize it at first and thought it was someone else and sounded better than anything I'd done. It wasn't until Jeff said, 'I forgot you recorded this', that I realized it was me! It's rare to hear yourself objectively. Anyway, I decided to include it after all. In The Round This is one of my favorite pieces not only because of it's sound, but for technical vanity! The second section (at :23) has a total of 6 melodies (rhythm gutiar, bass, and four different lead guitars that enter one by one). Most of the music is variations on the rhythm part at 3:12, which was actually written first, despite being more complicated that all of it's variations (this tends to be true with me). Riding With The Top Down Dating from around 1991-92, this was the second 'proper' instrumental and the second time I used some classical theory (the progressions in the strumming section), making this song a mix of old and newer influences. At the time, the strumming leads were some of my best and the song once again had some nice bass guitar lines. I was on the path to a new way of turning my ideas into greater material than what something started as. As for the title, for some reason I've always pictured three latino guys driving down the beach in a red convertible with the top down. Understand In 1990, I wrote the original version of this, which had an entirely different lead guitar part that was mostly improvised, not thematic at all. The song also didn't have two of the current sections, including the interlude and the last one you hear in the song. I added these in the last few years but wrote most of the current melodies recently. This is the only song on the album with the lead guitars performed entirely on a classical guitar, which suited the fingerpicked rhythm part well. Reverie I started writing this by accident when I still had the capo on the guitar after playing 'Sun Shower' one day. A capo tends to change how you view the guitar neck, since it changes what keys make sense to play in, so it was natural to experiment a bit without even meaning to, and out came the start of this song. The solo at 2:24 is one of my favorite sections on the album, and it's harmonized tremolo picking is the most 'intense' climax on an album of laid back songs. I love the mood of this whole piece. Tears This is one of the oldest pieces on this album, the rhythm guitar (and original leads) having been written around 1986. The song is a bit personal to me, as I was an unhappy teenager and, when depressed, often played this 3-4 times in a row. It relaxed me, the ending in particular still causing an almost trance-like state. The lead guitars are a mix of old (1986?) and new (late 2009, when it was all recorded). The entire first section is the original, unaltered. Various other sections are part of both. For example, at 1:19, the repeating melody is from 1986, but with more experience, I was now able to morph this into something more at 1:35-2:04. The next section alternates between old and new quickly. At 2:38 it's all new up to 3:41, when it's the 1986 lead again! Menagerie This solo gutiar piece is among the oldest here, from about 1986. I learned many similar pieces that inspired this as a teenager, and when I recorded it in 2009, I decided to repeat one section to make it longer. It hasn't otherwise changed in 23 years. Homecoming I have a strong tendency to write active rhythm guitar parts, so to challenge myself, I purposely wrote the 'verse' (at :25) on this to be a single chord each time, strummed once, and left it up to the unwritten lead guitar to carry the section. It doesn't get much simpler. However, I apparently couldn't leave well enough alone, for the lead guitar parts I wrote over it are essentially quasi rhythm/lead lines, at times with up to five note chords in them! Not once are they a single note melody, either, but usually three-note chords arranged in my usual melodic fashion. Jeff had limited time to prepare for the album, so he said I should peform the kick drums you hear through much of the tune instead of him taking precious time to remember where I wanted them. This also resulted in me doing two drum fills. Jeff is heard playing the main beat at 2:32. This song is named for my late cat Floyd, who was quite suddenly admitted to the hospital one day. I was shocked to hear that, at five years old, he was terminally ill and would die suddenly, without pain, probably soon. After a very long week, we learned one morning that he could finally come home that afternoon, and in between, I wrote the twin lead guitar melodies at 2:34-3:25. It has always reminded me of Floyd, who died in his sleep five months later. Fantasia Etude Back in 1995, a month after finishing my classical guitar degree, I recorded a slew of pieces (now available as 'The Lost Art' album), including this one, an original of mine, which is why it's included on this disc and not 'The Lost Art', with the others. It's the only classical guitar piece I ever wrote. It's the only song of mine I'll never perform again, as it's fast, long, and has the same right hand pattern throughout, making it a virtual recipe for tendonitis. Sun Shower I'd owned a capo for at least a decade without ever putting it on the guitar, and the second I did, out rolled the beginning of this song, which I found impossible to name for years. I also initially couldn't decide what order to put many of the sections in, which is uncharacteristic of me; I usu