Tracks I am proud to have worked on as a keyboard programmer/player and even got paid for!
Steve Winwood - Higher Love
This was a particularly exciting era and session as Steve was recording in NYC's Unique recording Studios where I was visiting between sessions for David Bowie and George Benson, thanks to a booking from arranger/keyboard player Robbie Buchanan. A chance meeting/collision between Steve, myself and my box of PPG Waveterm 5¼ inch data discs lead to a meeting with producer Russ Titelmann and then sessions on Higer Love and Finer Things. Thanks to Steve, Russ and PPL UK.
David Bowie - Undergound and Dance Magic Dance from The Labyrinth OST
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_(song)
George Benson - Did You Hear The Thunder and While The City Sleeps from While The City Sleeps
Stevie Wonder - Characters CD - various PPG Wave 2.3 patches ans Hard Disk Unit effects processes.
Julio Iglesias - another David Foster produced album project I never heard after the sessions with Bo Tomlyn (Yamaha TX816), Marcus Ryle (Oberheim Matrix 12).
Chicago - Niagra Falls from Chicago 18
David Foster - Love Theme from Saint Elmo's Fire (single) from The Best of Me
David Foster -The Colour Purple from The Best of Me
Greg Rolie - various PPG Wave 2.3 patches and Hard Disk Unit effects processes.
Laura Branigan - Overlove from the CD Touch - various PPG Wave 2.3 patches and Hard Disk Unit effects processes.
A partly autobiographical tale with links to recordings and artists I am proud to be associated with during my spell as a session synthesizer programmer (rather than a preset puller of today) and many sites that could be useful resources.
I was born in late 1960 in Abergavenny, South Wales at a time when the world, allegedly, was still in black & white. As a pre-school child I marvelled at the sounds emanating from the tv, my mother's red leatherette and brass foil battery radio and my sister's Dansette record player. Both the television and the Dansette were valve powered and offered an enticing glow via their respective air vents as the vacuum tubes warmed up. The Pye brand transistor radio offer some excitement as the back panel raised to allow access to the battery and a view of the printed circuit board and all those colourful components! What was delivered from these media devices of the day seemed to me even then a repetitive radio playlist for housewives but the tv offered some things that caught my ear and imagination: pop music from the show Ready Steady Go! and Doctor Who!
The recorded music played at home by my parents included, military bands, light classics, Christmas songs performed by Mario Lanza and a more carol based selection from the Salvation Army. I am glad to have had the exposure to the aforementioned tunes and styles. One of my sisters living at home took to the new groups playing pop music! YAY! Beaty, bouncy and certainly not boring as the 7" vinyl discs B sides often offered bizarre and amusing and even enthralling material.
TIMELINE
1962 - One tune getting airplay was The Tornadoes tune Telstar created by the 'Legendary Joe Meek'. Britain's first independent producer and composer was taken by the new breakthrough in internatinal telecommunications via Telstar and orbitting satelite and created a memorable tune that influences so many people from Pink Floyd to Tangerine Dream and a very young Andy Thomas!
1969 - Tomorrow's World | Moog Synthesiser - click to see BBC view of advances in music technology.
1972 - POPCORN - Hot Butter
I loved this bouncy synhesizer tune and wanted to find the source of these great rhythmic patterns and strange sounds.
1982
Thomas Dolby - Windpower!!!
More to follow...