Wow!

          Really, that's about all I can say about this whole recording process.  I have a lot of people to thank - John Rice, without whom this would never have happened.  He offered me a trade of recording time for music classes for his daughter.  My "Healing Through Memoir" group run by Debra Burger.  Without that, the memoirs would never have been a part of this project.  All of the wonderful musicians who played on the CD, John Rice, Ryan Dunham, Brenda Fisher, Kevin Smith, Dick Kavanaugh and Mike Nass.  Carol Coogan for the beautiful artwork, and last, but certainly not least, Joel Patterson who encouraged me to record my reading of the memoirs, recorded them and two of the songs and helped produce the entire thing.  He also put the fundraising video together and has helped and encouraged me in too many ways to name.

          The memoirs were very hard to write and even harder to read.  But, I like to get down to business and just finish it up so, the basic tracks for the first nine songs were recorded in a day, the bass and back-up vocals were done in an evening, the last two songs (recorded live with vocals, guitars, bass, and drums) were done another evening, and all eleven memoirs were recorded last Saturday.  Whew!  I felt like I needed a vacation after that marathon.  Although they probably thought I was nuts, everyone was wonderfully supportive throughout.  Of course, now I've had to listen to it all over and over and over again.  Hearing my own voice telling my stories is still very powerful for me.  Some of them even made me cry the first time I heard them.  I guess if I still like it, it's done.

          Now that the recording and mixing is done and the mastering close to being done, the hardest part for me is ahead.  Now, I need to raise the money to print it and do the promotion.  Please help me out by spreading the word far and wide.  The GoFundMe video has a tiny clip of the title track ("Highway in Your Eyes") at the end and, one of the tunes ("Maggie's Waltz") plays in the background while I'm talking.  I've gotten some pre-orders already for both the music CD and the double set of music and memoirs.  And ... so far, everything is right on schedule. 

          The CD release party will be at Caffè Lena on Sunday November 16th at 7 pm, and I'll be joined by some of the great musicians who play on the CD.  I'm very excited about the whole thing.  I hope you all can come and join in the fun!