So much going on and so little time write in the journal!

I've been teaching songwriting workshops on Saturdays at Pasadena City College, El Camino College and College of the Canyons. I've had great students, really motivated, ready to get to work on their careers. I always keep my eyes and ears open for new outlets for their songs. Music Libraries are currently hot. There is a lot of film and TV interest in indie songwriters with broadcast quality demos; the tracks are inexpensive to license and all the rights are usually controlled by the writer. Successful music Libraries like Global Graffiti and LukeHits.com will accept submissions from indies (just be sure to follow their submission guidelines).

The Taxi Road Rally is coming up next week. I'll be mentoring Thursday, Nov. 9th. This involves talking all the way through lunch with tables of people and then one-to-one song evaluations for three hours in the afternoon. It's exhausting but a lot of fun and I always meet interesting people. I just count on having no voice at all for a day or two afterwards.

Today I have some time to work on my own music. I'm in the midst of recording an updated version of "Sandy Grey." The goal is to maintain the original song intact but give it a contemporary singer-songwriter production a la Duncan Sheik, James Blunt, etc. I reworked one verse melody to turn it into a bridge, giving the song a more interesting structure, and added a brief refrain that underscores the way I feel about the song now (as opposed to all those years ago when I wrote it). We'll see what happens. I'll keep you poasted.