Friday, August 27, 2010

Nashville Tracking Session


Just had a whirlwind day in the studio today...13 songs in 9 hours! I flew in yesterday morning, then met with Ben Speer and his song, Stephen, to discuss next year's "Stamps-Baxter School of Music." Visited with good friend Judy Nelon and then got to sleep early.

Picked up some Krispy Kreme donuts on my way to the studio this morning. (Thanks for the idea, Allison Lynn--they really appreciated it!) We got started about 10:00 and went to 1:00, then broke for lunch. After lunch, we got started a little after 2:00... when we got to dinner time, we decided to skip it and just press on, so we finished about 8:00pm this evening.

It is incredible to work with these musicians, hand them a chart full of numbers that looks like a scientific equation, and make beautiful music. Below you'll find a sample chart written in the Nashville Number system. This method uses numbers to indicate the chord changes for the songs.

Playing piano was the wonderful Tracey Phillips, Kelly Back on guitar, Jimmy Carter (not the ex-president--he was busy in North Korea!) on bass and Greg Ritchie on drums. (Greg's wife, Charlotte, used to sing with Jeff & Sheri Easter and with the Homecoming Friends). Tommy Cooper was our engineer and we had a wonderful time. The songs we recorded are "forgotten treasures" out of the Stamps Quartet Music Company catalog. Most of them were written in the 1940's and '50s and have a great vintage sound to them.

Flying home tomorrow and then back to the real world!