Welcome to Guitopia – a CD of 13 guitar instrumentals with an “electronic orchestra” back-up, composed back in 2004. I’m re-releasing it now in 2022 to a new and hopefully larger audience. With a history as a progressive rock guitarist, this album was quite a 180 turn for me. Back in 2003, I found myself entrenched in what was called “New Age” music. As a consumer of this new sound for about a year, it was inevitable that I would try my own take on the more mellow side of music. What I came up with, was a hybrid of New Age meets Pop with a dash of jazz and classical elements. But rather than trying to describe it further in so many words, feel free to take a listen to these snippets from Guitopia.
Perhaps you might be interested in the back story of how this “easy listening” album came to be. It takes me back not just to 2004, but some fifty years ago when my musical journey began!
All my life, as both a musician, as well as a music consumer, I’ve been genre hopping. Before I could play an instrument, I listened and danced around the living room to whatever was playing on my parents’ giant Hi-Fi console. There were Beethoven symphonies, Sousa marches, Polkas, and so many other “sounds that I loved the sound of!”
When I was 8 years old, along came “Meet the Beatles,” and suddenly came a new singular mission in life— Get a guitar, learn how to play it, start a band and become the next big thing in rock ’n’ roll!
As time went on, I was part of countless bands playing many other genres including school concert bands, rock, swing era jazz, syrupy pop hits, country, bluegrass, and progressive bluegrass just to name a few. I loved them all in one way or another and my record, cassette and CD collection to this day reflects my total lack of ability to latch onto any one genre.
Then, sometime in the early 2000’s an incident happened that greatly affected me. One day on a whim, I bought the CD “Pure Moods” from the record store bargain bin. Returning home, I put the CD in the player and sat down to listen in my ratty-old easy chair. When “Orinoco Flow” by Enya came on, something came over me. I felt like I’d been hit square in the head by a velvet hammer!
The opening chords came out of the speakers, bounced off the wall, and shot through my frontal lobe like some kind of benign series of tsunami waves of sound! Enya sang with one voice, but it sounded like a thousand voices had been sewn together into this one massive mega-voice! I felt like I had leapt off the edge of a cliff but somehow I knew that I would hit the softest pillow ever conceived.
Needless to say, I was hooked and became a…NEW AGE NERD! Like an addict in need of his fix, I needed more of this new age, dream-laden, ethereal music. Scouring the record stores of the 90s – like F.Y.E. and Media Play – I added to my new age collection with music by Suzanne Ciani, Lori Line, Deep Forest and Adiemus.
I also wanted to find a way to make my own spacey and trippy easy-listening recordings. One day in Best Buy, I saw a display of a bunch of keyboards in various price ranges. I zeroed in on a Casio and started noodling around on it, trying all the different sounds it had to offer. And then a light bulb went off in the more marshmallowy part of my brain. “You’re gonna take this home and start making your own velvety, sweet, syrupy, and perhaps even cheesy New Age/Elevator music recordings, cowboy!”
I took home that Casio CTK-571 keyboard and began coming up with all kinds of “music to relax by,” or “music to drink your tea with.” Call it what you will. It was rolling out of my brain like a stock market ticker!
This magical instrument was loaded with sounds that just dripped of new age “noise.” I still own it to this day, some 20 years later. Anyway I set to work discovering all the capabilities of this keyboard and started writing dozens of pieces using multi-layers of electronic sounds.
I really felt transported to another realm while composing this music. I also started coming up with all kinds of whimsical titles for these pieces as they painted pictures in my head.
By the end of 2003, I had nailed down the formula for composing on my Casio – pick a general tempo and beat genre, push the “Intro” button, map out a chord progression, then push the “Synchro Ending” button. I came to know these as my “magical buttons!” Initially for a melody, I would add a flute sound or oboe or whatever seemed appropriate from the huge sound bank.
Then one day, I got the bright idea to add my classical guitar as the melody to add a human element to these electronic back-ups. I continued to come up with a mountain of material, now using the guitar (both acoustic and/or electric) as the solo voice. Now what was I going to do with it all? – create an album of course!
After sifting through it all, I came up with 11 instrumentals now with titles. To this repertoire I added an old piece I had written in the 70’s for my band Stockade called “N.B.C.” and also added a track that comes from classical guitar composer Fernando Sor (1778-1839).
Then – what to call it? Let’s see…When I listen to Enya and such, I’m in my own little “Elevator Music Utopia.” Hey! Wait a minute! I’ll call it “Guitopia!”
I came up with a homemade album cover and made about 25 CD copies (not to mention a few cassettes as well – lol). I gave most of them away and that’s about as far as the project went.
Recently, I learned about print on demand CD manufacturers and realized I could “re-release” Guitopia making use of this convenient system. It may be true that it doesn’t exactly mesh with my current mission to sell books on how to play bluegrass banjo.
But as someone with such eclectic and genre-surfing tastes as myself, I have many more musical stories to tell in the coming years. No doubt they will show up in the many, varied styles of music that I have been absorbing since my earliest days!
So there you have it…the making of Guitopia!
You can buy this CD here (free shipping!) I’m happy to autograph and personalize it for you too. Just let me know in the “Order Notes” section of the checkout cart.
Thanks for listening and think of me next time you’re in an elevator. Maybe you’ll hear Guitopia playing in the background!
