Studio Bound

I’m super stoked! It’s always exciting to be heading into the recording studio! My plan is to record four covers and four original songs during a multi-hour session. I recorded some jazz standards at a topnotch Montreal recording studio in 2001 and again, in 2003. I haven’t been in a recording studio for my own projects since then. The material I'm recording this time around is more pop-oriented. I'll be singing, playing guitar, percussion and drums. Montreal bass player Dave Watts has performed with me in-studio, on-stage and as part of a telethon. He’ll be part of this recording project. Gotta get on YouTube! It is such a mind-boggling and powerful tool for publicity and networking. I’m hoping tomorrow’s session will allow me to post a few music performances on YouTube! I'll definitely provide links when I can.

The Lap of Luxury

I'm wrapping up my first week in a long time, anchoring news. It's been nearly six months since I last hosted a newscast.

Talk about a change of pace!

I’ll anchor Global Montreal’s 6 o’clock evening news for two weeks. As it turns out, compared to the morning show, I feel like I’m living in the lap of luxury!

The sometimes grueling and unpredictable nuts and bolts of preparing, building and presenting an automated news program have been hidden from my view this week. I merely write the news and then walk into the studio to present the news.

Glitches, technical problems, line-up issues, choice of visuals, rundown changes, banner spelling, supers and a million other aspects of live television, for the most part, happen somewhere else. The control room for the evening news is in Edmonton. There’s no fumbling for the teleprompter foot pedal under the desk, or forgetting to cue it to the right place, it’s all taken care of, thank-you very much.

By contrast, the morning show control room is right in front of us our desks, so we are, inevitably, intimately aware of the multitude of extraneous variables that can hamper smooth show preparation and presentation. The growing pains over the last six months have included, but not been limited to, software oversights and random technical glitches, as well as connection problems and sudden on-air equipment crashes!

We operate our own teleprompter, which, at least in my case, has, at times, posed some minor attention challenges!

Alas, the morning show is three hours of unscripted fun, high energy interaction between co-hosts, columnists and interview guests, whereas, the evening news is thirty minutes of scripted, serious news delivery. Either way, I’m so fortunate to be part of the Global Montreal team.

The biggest visible change, though hardly jarring, may involve wardrobe! A couple of months ago, as I wrapped up a morning show interview with my buddy, trumpet player Ron Di Lauro, he boldly wrestled a necktie over my head and around my neck!

I know he’s happy now.

So Much More To Learn

Without a doubt, after presenting news for so many years, it’s tremendous fun to let loose on the air! As host of Global Montreal Morning News, in virtually constraint-free circumstances, I get to be myself. I’ve always loved being able to interview people and, consistently, many of the people I’m privileged to meet are incredibly talented and interminably fascinating! In the last few weeks, I had the opportunity to meet and speak with Juno award winning singer, Lorraine Klassen.

She had been on the show in March as a Juno nominee and, after waiting for several weeks for her Juno to be engraved, she finally returned to the show this week and spoke energetically about winning the award, her latest recording project, ailing icon Nelson Mandela and signing the Golden Book at Montreal city hall. She was on the show Friday and came in for the interview in spite of a sore throat! We quickly ushered out  members of the band, Tcha-Badjo, after their live performace and had very little time to put a microphone on Lorraine, carefully remove her Juno from its box and take the cue to begin speaking! Through all the last second mayhem in our studio, she was smiling, gracious and sincere.

I also spoke with bassist Alain Caron this week about his jazz festival show. Alain had just been named recipient of the Montreal International Jazz Festival’s 2013 Oscar Peterson Award. He’d won it once before as a member of Uzeb. He’s won 11 Felix Awards, been named “Best Electric Bass Player” eight years in a row by Jazz Report and had recently released his eighth studio album.

After interviewing Montreal saxophonist Joel Miller last month about winning his Juno Award, I had a chance to meet and speak with Juno-winning saxophonist and jazz composer, Christine Jensen. I own her third album and was delighted to meet Christine and speak to her about her inspirations and jazz festival show.

It was terrific fun to meet and speak with Mikael Kingsbury, two-time World Champion moguls skier.

He spoke about his incredible season, his training and the upcoming Olympics. I had forgotten to ask him to bring in the Crystal Globes, which are awarded to freestyle skiing’s world champions. I'm grateful that he kindly remembered to bring them in for the interview! The 20 year old is a dedicated and highly talented young athlete, as well as a credit to our province, our country, Quebecers and Canadians!

I haven’t even missed a day on the morning show yet and, already, I’m eagerly looking forward to settling back into the hosting chair!

There’s so much more to learn!

Punting Nostalgia

I bought a bunch of songs by the Canadian prairie band, Streetheart, a couple of weeks ago. Now, every time I listen to them, I’m transported back to Currie Gym, when, as students at McGill, some buddies and I went to a dance featuring the band.

I was a fan then and, after recently downloading the Streetheart songs I remember from the late seventies and early eighties, I discovered I’m still a fan!

Streetheart’s “Under My Thumb” remains my favorite version of the Stones’ classic song!

The band earned six gold albums, four platinum albums, a gold single and a Juno Award, yet another reflection of my good taste in music!

I hate climbing into my time machine. Feeling nostalgic and dismayed over the lightning-fast passage of time rarely proves to be an enjoyable experience but, in the case of Streetheart, I can’t resist; besides, when you crank their tunes up loud enough, wistful nostalgia is punted aside in favor of the urge to flat-out rock!

Morning Twist

He was in our studio a few weeks ago, eloquently promoting McHappy Day! I’ve met the diving sensation before and, as usual, Alexandre was a pleasure to interview. He just happened to be at our studio on, as Camille pointed out, “No Socks Day” and he happily lifted his leg to show he was celebrating appropriately!

Having already heard rumors, I peppered him on-air with questions, prompts and provocations in the hopes Despatie might spill the beans on our show, but to no avail! The beans were spilled today, as we learned one of Canada’s greatest athletes is changing platforms.

Quebec’s anglophone community certainly wins, with two Montreal-based English language morning shows. Communities are being connected and that’s wonderful news! Quebec’s anglophone community is being connected with francophones and francophones are being connected with anglophones and, of course, anglos are being connected to each other.

All of it promotes communication, understanding and unity; we hope, essential ingredients in Quebec's quest  to keep moving forward.

No Mistake Here

Since I was a young child, music has been my therapy, recreation and salvation.

Up or down, music has put me back on track and keeps me there.

I thrive writing it, performing it, listening to it and observing its performance. I’ve performed as part of an orchestra, combo, duo and as a solo artist. I’ve had the honor of singing national anthems in front of hundreds and tens of thousand of people. As a musician, I’ve experienced attention, appreciation, standing ovations, adulation and I’ve basked in one of the great life fuels – applause.

I owe music so much.

Even now, privileged to be working in television in an incredibly vital city, I am committed to exposing music to people and people to music! Up until now, our new morning show has travelled to musicians in order to tape musical segments with Effusion A Capella, MIJF Blues Camp, Paul Deslauriers and Dawn Tyler Watson.

We have not yet had artists perform in our morning show studio, but, my boss, Karen, vows it’s a goal toward which we are working.

To that end, a few Global Montreal musicians, Paul, Alain, Phil and myself, jammed in the morning show studio yesterday so our directors could put our equipment and themselves to the test, with a view to having more acts perform on our show.

By all accounts, the test went well!

Whether it’s John Paul Jones, John Densmore, Ben Harper, the Appice brothers (see last blog), Walter Rossi, Chubby Checker or Judi Richards, who I listened to when she was singing with Toulouse, working in the media has afforded me the opportunity to meet and speak with so many great musicians!

Johnny Reznik of The Goo Goo Dolls

Yesterday, I met Johnny Rzeznik of the Goo Goo Dolls and, through Global Montreal, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Sarah Brightman (see "Dazzling Diva" April 20, 2013) and Steve Hill (see "Stellar Steve" June 8, 2012).

Many of the friends I had in college, have gone on to impressive music careers and it’s been fun interviewing them on various occasions! The exception would be Ron wrestling a necktie over my head as I interviewed him at the beginning of April! Lol

I’m eager to go back into the recording studio in early August to record some new songs.

It was Nietzsche who commented, “Without music, life would be a mistake.”

No mistake here.

Drum Interview Snared

At first, I thought I was the goat in a skit by Abbott & Costello, but Carmine and Vinny were perfectly serious! They’re brothers with the same last name, pronounced differently!

Carmine Appice pronounces his last name, “apiece”. Vinny Appice pronounces his name “AH-pissy”, like “apathy”. They told me their brother Frank Appice pronounces his last name, “AH-peachy”.

Between the two of them, the drumming brothers have played with such rock greats as Edgar Winter, Rod Stewart, John Lennon, Black Sabbath, Vanilla Fudge, Jeff Beck, Rick Derringer, Ted Nugent, Dio, Heaven & Hell and Cactus!

Uh, impressive a bit.

Carmine (left) and Vinny Appice

I had the pleasure of interviewing the Appice boys this week! As a young drummer, I would always take time to read the album jacket to see who was drumming on the records I bought. Carmine’s name was often listed.

They were in town to promote their touring show, “Drum Wars”, which features drum battles, solos and music from both of their careers.

While Vinny points out Carmine was the type to throw televisions through windows while out on tour, he says he was more likely to toss his ipod through a window.

After reading an article in which drummers Liberty de Vito and Kenny Aronoff talked about their drum-related injuries, I asked Carmine and Vinny, off-camera, about career-related aches and pains. Both admitted to serious shoulder problems and rotator cuff surgeries. Carmine, who wrote such hits for Rod Stewart as “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy” and “Young Turks”, confessed he no longer mounts his cymbals up high and has lowered them to a more physically manageable height.

As they were leaving the studio, I mentioned I was a drummer. Carmine asked if I could play “Wipeout” and when I assured him I could, they both invited me to go up on stage during their show to play.

Interviewing Carmine and Vinny was great fun and, from a drummer’s point-of-view, getting to meet them was a smashing stroke of luck!