The Shapiro Files

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Michael Pease Music Online

I'd like to share some good news for fellow music fans. My good friend and singer-songwriter/multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire (not to mention one-time Shapiro Files guest blogger), Michael Pease, has entered the world of MySpace music sharing. After what I'm guessing was many laborious weeks (months?) of hard work on some very complicated multitrack recordings, Michael created a new MySpace page with three new recordings and one classic from his back catalog that I invite everyone to check out.

You'll definitely hear lots of his influences in the recordings (most notably Queen, Jellyfish, and Styx) and I hope everyone can appreciate how much work it must have taken to lay down all those many vocal and instrument tracks. Every sound you'll hear is all Michael. Every vocal harmony, every keyboard part, every guitar lick--it's all Mister Pease. Those of you who have done their own recording will likely appreciate all the effort it must have taken to put together these recordings. As for everyone else, just know that doing this type of stuff ain't easy!

So I invite you to check out his page and enjoy the recordings. If you do, please leave him some comments on the page to let him know you were there!

By the way, Michael's efforts have inspired me to start thinking about resuming work on my own recordings. But first, I need to decide which direction I should take. I have two different options:

Option #1 is going the more focused/targeted route by expanding on the piano-based instrumental work I've done for Marcie's company last year and release a CD of just these types of songs (sort of my own George Winston/Windham Hill type of thing). This would definitely be a lot easier to market--particularly to people looking for mellow/sentimental piano-based instrumentals for wedding videos and similar uses.

Option #2 would be finally making a dedicated effort at re-recording some of my more interesting songs from the past 20 years using our current digital home studio technology. This would be a considerably more ambitious effort, but with potentially much less "marketability"--not that such a thing is really the point of any of this. But, to be honest, I know my strength is my piano playing and instrumental arranging. Whereas, my octave-lower Barry Mannilow-meets-Neil Diamond vocal stylings aren't going to be for everyone. Plus my musical inclinations tend to go two ways at once (both long-form progressive and unabashedly mainstream mid-tempo). So, to re-purpose a classic line from comedian Andy Kindler: My audience might solely consist of people, my age, who are me.

Either project is going to take a while. So I wouldn't count on any CD release announcements any time in the immediate future!

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