People have often asked me about where I record my music. I have a portable recording studio that I have used in my home. My wife and I recently moved from the house where I did all of my recording. As we were moving, I decided to create a video of the different “studios” in the house. This video was made in the middle of preparing for the move and some packing had already taken place. I hope you enjoy this “studio tour”.
Late last year, there were several things going on in my life that inspired me to write Don’t Cry For Me When I’m Gone. One of my best friends was moving. I been alive long enough to realize how relationships change when friends move away from each other. Relationships change over time anyway, but those changes seem to accelerate when we are no longer around each other on a regular basis. So that was on my mind. I was also reflecting on friends who seemed to continue to grieve for lost loved ones, even when they have been dead for what seemed like long enough for the grieving process to be over. I pictured the long lost loved ones telling their friends, “Don’t cry for me when I’m gone”.
I wrote the song The Promised Land to sing during the memorial service at a church homecoming. The church I grew up in has a homecoming celebration every year on the second Sunday in June. Most of the people that go to this church are related to my mother. The same goes for the people that come to the homecoming celebration every year. For several years, I had been asked to sing special music immediately after the memorial section of the service. I usually tried to sing something that fit the tone of the memorial. I wrote this song probably about a year after my mother had past away. I wanted to try and write something special for her. As I approached writing the song, I thought about a lady in the congregation we called Aunt Erin who had written something special for homecoming. She read it as the memorial service every year when I was younger. I thought about how poetic her writing was and wished that I could set that to music. I never tried very hard to find her memorial service. I’m not sure but her memorial service could have died with her. I hope not.