"It drew me in from the moment I heard the opening pulsing rhythm, like a weary heart beating from a long journey, and then the encouraging words “Pilgrim Man, don’t give up. Though the road may be long and the journey hard…” I think we’ve all been there at some point in our lives, wondering if this is all that life has to offer, wanting to let go and give up. Pilgrim Man is a song for everyone who needs to know that they are NOT alone on this journey of life. That every day IS a brand new day and the best is yet to come.
March 26, 2010
"Pilgrim Man" - Update
Thank you to everybody for responding so amazingly to my "Pilgrim Man" tune. This might sound weird, but people are saying things that I have always dreamed of them saying. Does that make sense? I have hoped for so long that people would be impacted by my singing and writing, and so to have those two things combined into one package called "Pilgrim Man" is quite a joy for me. Check this out from Julie Branham, Director of the Nashville Soul Choir:
March 5, 2010
Radio Stations Are Playing My Song!!
I couldn't be more excited about the fact that even though we just finished the mix of "Pilgrim Man" this past Monday night at 12:30am, we already have FOUR stations that have said they will play my tune! Can you believe it?! Awesome. I'm thrilled at the comments people are making about the song - and how they're being encouraged by it.
Here's the roll call:
WFST: Northern Maine and Western New Brunswick
WKBO: Harrisburg-Lebanon-Carlisle
KGPS: Kingman, Az.
WBYN-AM: Lehighton, PA/ Allentown, PA
(more stations added - see next blog entry!)
Please feel free to call your local station and tell them you'd like to hear "Pilgrim Man." Or geez, call me and tell me you'd like to hear it! (Or find the song on iTunes, if you'd like it for your iPod!)
Thanks for all your support!
Mark
Here's the roll call:
WFST: Northern Maine and Western New Brunswick
WKBO: Harrisburg-Lebanon-Carlisle
KGPS: Kingman, Az.
WBYN-AM: Lehighton, PA/ Allentown, PA
(more stations added - see next blog entry!)
Please feel free to call your local station and tell them you'd like to hear "Pilgrim Man." Or geez, call me and tell me you'd like to hear it! (Or find the song on iTunes, if you'd like it for your iPod!)Thanks for all your support!
Mark
February 28, 2010
Pilgrim Man - What’s It All For?
I'm sitting at the mixing console with my good friend Tim Brown at the reigns. We're working on the mix of my tune "Pilgrim Man" and I couldn't be more blown away. It is sounding so amazing -- I can't wait for you to hear it. My friend and producer extraordinaire, Chris Davis (Veggie Tales, Ruth McGuinness), created an amazing track. We got fellow Minnesotan Paul Eckberg (Eager) to throw some awesome drums on it, and Mike Payne (Matthew West) did killer guitar parts. Then we had a small soiree at my house, with members of Nashville Soul Choir over to sing the big chorus parts and the blessing at the end—they blew me away. Then Matt Huesmann let us use his studio to record my lead vocals. To top it all off, JR and Jonathan Davis (Winco Productions) caught the whole thing on HD video. I'm struck by a couple of things about this whole process:#1 - I'm blown away by the amazing talent of my friends, and their willingness to step up and help me, even when there doesn't appear to be anything for them to gain from it all. I hope I can repay them somehow. For now, love will have to do.
January 31, 2010
Singing For My Life...er, My Vacation
You know that feeling when you pull away from your house, drive down your street, and then you suddenly remember something you’re going to need real bad? So you turn around and pull back in the garage, dog wondering why you’re back so quickly because she barely had a chance to close her eyes, and then try the whole leaving thing again.
Well, this recently happened to me. But instead of being down the street, I was 30,000 feet in the air, and somewhere over New Mexico. I was on my way to Whistler, British Columbia. A beautiful mountain village about 1½ hour north of Vancouver—in metric that’s about 90 minutes.
But I wasn’t sure if I was even going to be let into the country, because it’s not like I forgot my contact case, or a hairbrush. I had forgotten my passport. Not usually one to panic, I waited until we landed in Las Vegas for a brief layover and then hit the internet to see if I could find out exact details about border crossing. The best information I could find was from the Canadian Border Patrol—sounded credible enough. They said, officially, you don’t need a passport to get into the country, but you do need one to get out. The catch is, you need to prove your U.S. citizenship. All I had was my driver’s license and my Starbucks card. Not quite enough.
We decided to give it a try—surely they’d have some kind of computer system that can look up citizenship, credit score, horoscope sign—it is 2010, for Pete’s sake. Not so fast, Yankee.
Well, this recently happened to me. But instead of being down the street, I was 30,000 feet in the air, and somewhere over New Mexico. I was on my way to Whistler, British Columbia. A beautiful mountain village about 1½ hour north of Vancouver—in metric that’s about 90 minutes.
But I wasn’t sure if I was even going to be let into the country, because it’s not like I forgot my contact case, or a hairbrush. I had forgotten my passport. Not usually one to panic, I waited until we landed in Las Vegas for a brief layover and then hit the internet to see if I could find out exact details about border crossing. The best information I could find was from the Canadian Border Patrol—sounded credible enough. They said, officially, you don’t need a passport to get into the country, but you do need one to get out. The catch is, you need to prove your U.S. citizenship. All I had was my driver’s license and my Starbucks card. Not quite enough.
We decided to give it a try—surely they’d have some kind of computer system that can look up citizenship, credit score, horoscope sign—it is 2010, for Pete’s sake. Not so fast, Yankee.
January 16, 2010
Listening to the Right Voice
“Don’t forget this one…” The muffled sound of music plays in the background.
“Which one?” I ask, not able to discern a melody. She can’t remember the title, but she will.
My sister, Jody, sings along with the music in the car, “Call me from this boat, I wanna walk on the water.” It’s my song about wanting to escape from the doldrums of life, into something more fantastic. There’s got to be something more, kind of thing.
“Oh yeah, I love that one,” I reply.
Jody and I try to talk on the phone every Friday morning on her way to work, me on my way to a weekly meeting with some guys. It’s our regular time together. And it’s usually therapy for one of us.
“But my favorite is still ‘hold onto me forever, and I’ll hold onto you,’” more singing. That someone would actually like my music enough to consider one a favorite is mind-boggling to me. But I don’t have the average sister.
Throughout most of the Nashville years, she has been a steady source of encouragement to me about my music. She keeps old cassettes I’ve sent to her over the years, and plays them in her car. Or jams along to the tunes in her basement music room. She makes me think there’s actually value to some of my songs, when it seems like no one else in the world cares. I have always believed what my sister said because she was older, which meant wiser.
“Which one?” I ask, not able to discern a melody. She can’t remember the title, but she will.
My sister, Jody, sings along with the music in the car, “Call me from this boat, I wanna walk on the water.” It’s my song about wanting to escape from the doldrums of life, into something more fantastic. There’s got to be something more, kind of thing.
“Oh yeah, I love that one,” I reply.
Jody and I try to talk on the phone every Friday morning on her way to work, me on my way to a weekly meeting with some guys. It’s our regular time together. And it’s usually therapy for one of us.
“But my favorite is still ‘hold onto me forever, and I’ll hold onto you,’” more singing. That someone would actually like my music enough to consider one a favorite is mind-boggling to me. But I don’t have the average sister.
Throughout most of the Nashville years, she has been a steady source of encouragement to me about my music. She keeps old cassettes I’ve sent to her over the years, and plays them in her car. Or jams along to the tunes in her basement music room. She makes me think there’s actually value to some of my songs, when it seems like no one else in the world cares. I have always believed what my sister said because she was older, which meant wiser.
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