May 2020
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| VOL 15 ISSUE 5 | May 2020 |
I can't believe it's been over 20 years since I wrote this song with Chris St.Croix in Nashville, 1997. The first demo we did of the song while we were working it out used a program called Band-In-A-Box that automatically assembled the midi tracks of drums, bass, and keyboards. Chris sang that first version of the song. I started refining the recording by adding some acoustic (six and twelve string) to the mix using my Session 8 digital recording studio. I had met Nashville recording artist Kristy Deck and submitted the demo to her to see if she would consider recording it and she gave it a fantastic country vibe. Roger Wiedabach (ANTI-M) recorded live drums and I replaced all the "canned" midi tracks with real instruments (bass, guitars, and keyboards). Using these tracks, I also sang on a version of it as well as a version with singer Dawna Bradford eventually.
Fast forward to 2020 and I decided to update it to a melodic rock song that is more guitar driven and embellished it with some new synth parts and even a glockenspiel, believe it or not. My sound/style has been influenced by the arena rock bands like Styx, Journey, Night Ranger, Survivor, and Rainbow so I wanted to get the song to be more in that vein.
The cover image goes back even farther. It is a water color painting I did in 1983 for a junior high art class. I believe it was the last year they had classes at Central Junior High School in Chambersburg, PA. It would have been 10th grade for me. I remember taking a prop mannequin home from the school that was painted metallic bronze as the "life model" for the painting. I set up a keyboard behind it and put the state-of-the-art headphones on it. Then I put a red light on one side and blue light on the other. It's funny to think about how long ago that was and I'm still producing images and toying with lighting effects. The song is on several different music platforms that you can reach by links on my jukebox page at http://www.markgreenawalt.com/classx/songs/jukebox.htm.
I'm thrilled to share another published photo! This was an ad for Creative Designs In Lighting featuring model Amy Nicole. It's in Luxe Interiors + Design Arizona edition for May/June 2020. It was an honor to feature this roaring 20's dress designed by Randall Designs for the reality TV contest Dancing with the Stars. This dress was worn by Kym Johnson dancing with Donny Osmond.
The photography session took place at CDL's lighting design studio in Scottsdale Airpark. The illuminated curtains and the chandelier (on consignment from Hinkley's Lighting Factory) are permanently on display in the studio. Although the frame might have been easier to photoshop into the image, that was a real antique frame that was borrowed for the session and hung from the ceiling with aircraft cable. Any tried on about a half dozen dresses at the Randall Design studio and all of them were stunning. This one was selected for the look of a 1920's style. Dania Blanco was hired to do the makeup for the shoot and did a fantastic job of getting the look. Dania even bought the matching head piece and one of those long cigarette holders that looked perfect, but didn't make it into this particular shot.
Covid-19 had put the Kaibosh on the Phoenix comicon known as Phoenix Fan Fusion over Memorial Day weekend. I was scheduled to do my anual Bodypainting Extravaganza panel and my model was intended to be the beautiful Elley Ringo. Since our plans had vanished for the weekend I asked Elley if she might still be interested in doing a project together. I wanted to do a music video for a song that I had be revitalizing called "Never Been Strangers." For the video, I wanted a model to play the part of a woman who existed in three different timeframes (essentially she was to have been a reincarnation of herself in three different generations).
We opted to do the filming at three locations in Prescott. Elley brought three outfits to represent modern day in downtown streets of Prescott, the roaring 1920's on the steps of the courthouse and inside the Bashford Courts retail shops, and lastly a timeless red dress that was filmed at Watson Lake. Although this was primarily a video shoot, I did take a moment to capture some still images at each location and here are three of my favorites. Hopefully there will be a finished video in next month's newsletter.
E-ya later,
Mark Greenawalt
Mark@MarkGreenawalt.com
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Nothing. Waiting for COVID-19 to go away.
copyright Mark Greenawalt, Future-Class X Publishing - Phoenix, AZ 85044
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