Saturday, January 21, 2012

Through the Bitter Frost & Snow

At last it's snowing in New York. On our way to her drama class my daughter didn't even want to take a bus or cab today but to skip in the snow and throw snowballs. When I was seven months pregnant and on tour in Ireland I remember finding it difficult to play guitar and then I more or less put it away. I took it up again a few weeks ago and have been playing regularly. About time as the child is now nine. Years.
Last week I had another recording session for 'Belong' at Excello Studios in Brooklyn with Ryan McGiver, Lindsey Horner, Erik Della Penna and Allison Miller. We recorded the basic tracks for two songs "Down By The Liffeyside" (not the traditional song but my own) and "I Could Be Happy". The chorus of the latter song still needs completion but music is there. There's another song that's been hanging around that I call "Bring Back the Dead" but I'm not sure that's what it ultimately wants to be called, and satisfactory lyrics beyond the one verse are not forthcoming, though it has withstood a few rewrites over the past decade.
I also had a recording session for 'Smarty Girl' the audiobook of my friend Honor Molloy's beautiful novel, her story of growing up in Dublin in the 1960s with her mother (an American writer), father (a well known actor) and siblings. Honor invited me to compose and arrange music for the audiobook which will be released by Simon & Schuster in the spring.
For that project Brendan O'Shea and Donie Ryan played guitar and banjo beautifully on melodies I wrote for Honor's lyrics of two songs "Dartinne" and "Goosetown". Brendan also laid down some harmonica. Next week Shahzad Ismaily is going to record some appropriate musical weirdness and Marta Cook will be recording harp.
In the meantime, I have a few songs to finish so that I can start into the home strait of recording "Belong".