Thursday, December 27, 2007

Stoney Lonesome

Welcome to Stoney Lonesome, the Third Album to be recorded on Stoney Lonesome Farm.

Music has been created on the farm for years, certainly all the years I have been living on the farm, visiting the farm, and the music made by my parents and family on the farm before I was born, and generations of folks on the farm before us. It is a place that inspires music. Sounds echo through the hills, along Broad Run creek around the back of the farm, and resonate off the old floors in the farmhouse.

In the years of living here on the farm, we have crafted a sound, which we call the Stoney Lonesome sound- it is a rough-sawn, classical acoustic sound, centered on the hollow and beauty of the classical guitar, with driving homemeade percussive elements, from a collection of drums to pots and pans.

I am tempted to call all of these albums Stoney Lonesome in some way, yet there is so much Stoney Lonesome in all these albums that I don't need to over do it. I could never call a song "Stoney Lonesome" because there just isn't one song that captures this place, and this spirit, what "Stoney Lonesome" is to me. But the Third Album just seems right for the name "Stoney Lonesome"- I think of "Stoney Lonesome" as a self-titled album. It features songs that are at the heart of the Stoney Lonesome sound.

Before titling the four albums, I arranged the songs, and rearranged them, into four albums. Only a couple songs or part songs did not make it into these four albums. The albums form the heart of my work in creating music over the past seven years.

Some of the songs are similar to one another over the four albums, but I feel that a healthy diversity exists in this music. There is a difference between "diversity" and "completely different"- often times I will play a group of chords in two ways that really move me, and out of this similar pattern, two songs or parts of songs will emerge, with completely different feels and their own identity.

I arranged the songs like arranging songs for a performance. Sometimes I felt the need to change up the pace and feel, sometimes I felt the need to build on a pace and feel.

This has been a largely intuitive process, much like creating four blogs. These blogs are to enhance your experience of my music, and help you understand the creative process as I have approached it. Some of this may be useful for you in your own approach to projects, or not.

These blogs are also to enhance my own experience creating music, and build momentum in the recording process, which is something that I have really delayed until now. I think that I have arrived at a good place to begin recording music and sharing it with others, so let's begin.

To the piano room at Stoney Lonesome,

In Strength,

Farmer Pablo