The Story behind the making of the album "Supercollider"
I was listening to NPR when a segment came on regarding Wislawa Szymborska's poetry and I instantly thought her work was amazing. (Click here to listen to the NPR segment) I immediately drove to Barnes and Noble and purchased the poetry collection from Harcourt, "Poems New and Collected."
I devoured the collection of poetry (something that is usually difficult for me and poetry) and was incredibly inspired by her works. I began toying around and wrote a few songs that contained ideas found in her works. At first it was just a couple of tracks, which I believe were "4 A.M." and "Please Forgive Me." Then I had the idea that I could possibly do an entire album as a homage to her work. Even if I didn't use some of her poetry, I took an idea she had and ran with it. For instance, Ms. Szymborska has a poem called "Funeral," which contains words overheard at a funeral such as "stress and smoking, I kept telling him..." I decided it would be cool to have a song were the words could be overheard at either a wedding (happy) or funeral (sad). This turned into phrases like "so hard for a father to let his daughter go...." and the song became Wedding/Funeral.
In the end, I wrote an entire album of material. I then began the journey of finding the best musicians and tech to bring this concept to life. Enter Wayne Krauss who played guitar on every track of the album. He was the original sounding board for things that could work or things that needed to change. Then I needed to find a collection of voices to give the poems life. Kaeylea B. Van Keith (friend from my orchestra days in Miami), Damien Smith (colleague from church), Courtney Chambers (a friend of Damien's), and Joe Cameron (found on craigslist!) came onboard to assist in the singing of these tracks. They all four did an outstanding, professional job bringing this vision to life.
Phil McArthur, a friend and colleague of Kaeylea's, mixed the entire CD from West Palm Beach, Florida. The album was mastered by Stephen Marsh in Hollywood, California. The cover art, which has received very high acclaim, was done by Jason Graham at Polish Your Image. Some of the major hurdles included obtaining permission to adapt the poetry from Harcourt Publishing. Once that permission was obtained, it was possible to move forward with finishing the album. All in all it was approximately a three year project from the time I heard the original NPR interview and began composing the music, to the finished product which is now complete.
Phil McArthur, a friend and colleague of Kaeylea's, mixed the entire CD from West Palm Beach, Florida. The album was mastered by Stephen Marsh in Hollywood, California. The cover art, which has received very high acclaim, was done by Jason Graham at Polish Your Image. Some of the major hurdles included obtaining permission to adapt the poetry from Harcourt Publishing. Once that permission was obtained, it was possible to move forward with finishing the album. All in all it was approximately a three year project from the time I heard the original NPR interview and began composing the music, to the finished product which is now complete.