Session Photos: "The Lodge" by Carl Weingarten

SESSION PHOTOS:  I met guitarist/producer/writer Barry Cleveland in 1991 during a visit to San Francisco, shortly before moving there the following year.  Robert Powell drove me to Barry’s house in the Oakland Hills which was referred to as “The Lodge”.   It was a combo live-work-studio-jam-lounge-hotel-party-recovery-sanctuary meeting place for musicians and artists.  After relocating from St. Louis, I was invited into this wonderful community of musicians.  Barry and I became friends and we began working together.  For months after, and I don’t know how I did it, I carted my 80 pound 8-Track TASCAM recorder back and forth across the bay to Barry’s studio where we tracked and mixed my CD, “The Acoustic Shadow”.  This is one of my favorite pictures.  I took this photo during a rare daytime session as Barry recorded his signature guitar on Light Years Dark Skies.  It captures the scene as it was; the studio-living room with gear everywhere and with Barry at the controls and inside the music. The song also features Barbara Else on flute, Dan Reiter on cello and I on “Morricone” guitar.  -CW

Session Photos: "Alex de Grassi" by Carl Weingarten

SESSION PHOTOS:  In the late 1990s, my friend Michael Manring was kind enough to put in a good word for me at The Noe Valley Ministry in San Francisco, and they booked me as the opening act for an Alex de Grassi concert.  Alex is among my favorite guitarists, and though we had met before, it was a pleasure getting acquainted with him for the show.  Near the end of his set, we played together on a new song, which led to him, several weeks later, recording on the same piece, “Read The River” for my CD escapesilence.  (You can download the song here: http://snd.sc/O6k6lr)  It was an honor to have Alex in my humble San Francisco apartment studio, though my neighbors unfortunately were less welcoming.  It was after 9pm when I snapped this photo of Alex as he was tuning up.  Behind the wall next to Alex was my neighbor’s bedroom.  The couple apparently kept early hours, and during one take, I heard a rumble.  When I pulled off my headphones, the neighbors were banging on the wall, “Turn it down!”.  I cleared things up with them, but I felt bad for Alex.  Here was a world class musician who performs for thousands of people every year, and yet my neighbors complained that the (god forbid) acoustic guitar was too loud.  In any case, Alex was a trooper, and wonderful, and the session went great.  “Read The River” includes Michael Manring on bass, Robert Powell on pedal steel, Alex on guitar, with myself on dobro.

Session Photos: "Fareed Haque" by Carl Weingarten

SESSION PHOTOS: I met jazz guitarist Fareed Haque through my friend Joe Venegoni in 1990.  Joe and I were still living in St. Louis at the time.  Our Critical Path CD was in the works, and Joe suggested bringing in Fareed to play on a few songs.  I resisted at first as I didn’t know Fareed or how his sound might impact the album.  But Joe insisted, and he was absolutely right.  Fareed was spot on.  The Blue Note Records guitarist turned out to be a recognized modern jazz guitar master and improviser.  Fareed came in from Chicago, and upon his arrival to the studio, he immediately dug in and recorded several inspired performances.  At one point, setting his trademark nylon acoustic aside, Fareed played my electric guitar on one song, breaking a string in the process, which I hung proudly on my studio wall.  While Fareed’s playing was excellent, the most inspiring moment for me was his work on “A Window”, a song I had composed and recorded as a solo guitar piece a few years earlier.  Joe and I had agreed to record the song again, with orchestration.  Fareed quickly learned the melody and began, like spreading wildfire, to improvise and embellish on the theme.  It was startling how quickly he connected with the tune, and for the first time in my life, I heard my music played by someone other than myself.  If you’re a composer, it’s like witnessing your child’s college graduation.  Fareed infused new energy into the composition and it was affirming to hear my music in such capable hands.   I didn’t take any photos at the session, but I did capture Fareed in action a few years later, during a recording session jam in the bay area.  The group that day featured Fareed, guitarist Henry Kaiser, bassist Michael Manring (also in the photo), among others. 

Carl Weingarten | The Simian River Video

Panomorphia in Super 8

Two years ago, while going through some boxes I had in storage, I came across an unfinished film I had made in the late 70s called The Fair. It was a project I had started during my summer break from film school, and ended up being some of the last footage I ever shot in Super 8. It was filmed at The Fair in The Square, a community summer event in University City, where I grew up. I transferred the film to video and uploaded it to Youtube in 2010. As I wrote in my original blog post, I was in full experimental film student mode when I made the movie, shooting all the footage in extreme closeup. What comes across, at best, is a mood piece for a dreamy summer day. In 2010 the music I chose for The Fair was a track I was working on called, “Panomorphia”, which has since become the title cut of my new CD. I’ve remastered and reposted the film here, with the updated CD soundtrack, which now includes Michael Manring on bass and Celso Alberti on drums. Enjoy the dream, --CW

Panomorphia (New CD release)

A few years ago, one of my favorite musicians had a guitar solo on a major movie soundtrack.  The piece was just a few minutes long,  but it was absolutely brilliant.  I spoke to a friend of his, who joked to me that the guitarist had actually recorded the song in his home studio, and it had likely taken him less than a half hour.  “Yes”, I said, “but it took him 40 years to get there.” 

Panomorphia actually took several years to produce, but the music is rooted in the tape delay improvisations I explored three decades ago.  Looping, as it’s called now, is the music technology that allows the artist to generate multiple layers of sound on sound, stacking melody and rhythm on the fly, creating spontaneous compositions.  But the method can be unforgiving.  As the music builds and takes shape, each new layer is critical.  A note out of key, a strum out of time, a phrase out of context can send the music in a different direction, spoil the mix entirely.

For me, looping is just the starting point.  It’s the paved road, but not the journey.  In late 2008, I recorded a series of electric guitar improvisations.  The recordings were made, usually late in the evening, directly to a stereo recorder. During each session, I did my best to put the day behind me, and play without expectations.  Afterwards, the new tracks were set aside for several months, in order to come back with the freshest ears possible.  The best tracks were selected based on those moments when I didn’t recognize my own playing, where perhaps, I had forgotten the recorder was running, and found myself at the end of an hour long space walk. 

Next, in came drummer Celso Alberti, bassist Michael Manring and trumpet/fluegal horn player Jeff Oster, who recorded live to each loop performance.  Sometimes responding to the ebb and flow of the music, or finding a pulse and driving home their own orchestral groove.  I added new parts of my own, building structure and melody. With each layer, the song evolved into something new, but all in keeping with the spirit of the original performance. 

Panomorphia will be released on April 2, 2012

Multiphase Records  MP-CD117

Bone Dog Blues ( video)

"Bone Dog Blues" is on both escapesilence (2002) and the Hand In The Sand Compilation (2004). The song received good airplay, including NPR’s All Thing Considered, and the CD also came in at number one on that year’s Echoes Radio Listener’s Choice Poll. The tune is a straight ahead instrumental, and the theme, featuring Brian Knave’s excellent harmonica, is up tempo and cinematic. Enjoy.



Check out the following video I just produced, a concert performance by singer percussionist David Dilullo and singer Nadine Risha.

Dreaming In Colors

Among the few thousand independent LPs that made their way into record stores during the mid 1980s was an electronic music recording I produced with my friend and keyboard wizard Walter Whitney. Dreaming In Colors was
the fifth, and last, vinyl LP released on Multiphase Records. The music received good reviews, including from
critic Dean Suzuki, writing for Option Magazine, described the album’s guitar and electronic landscapes as, ”smart
and well-crafted . . . fabric of elegant sound”.






However, within months, Dreaming In Colors sold out, as did our main distributors, NMDS and GEM in New York. They went Chapter 11, pocketed our receipts and disappeared with what inventory they had left. With no income from sales, Dreaming In Colors went out of print. Only 1000 copies were pressed.

Despite its short run, Dreaming In Colors continued a life of its own. Over the years the music has appeared on radio, internet broadcasts, record auctions, news groups, and music blogs.

Walter and I have kept in touch, and we even released a second recording, Primitive Earth (CD1989), which is still available. Last year I retrieved and listened to the master tapes of Dreaming In Colors, and was inspired to release the music on CD. I sent a copy to Walt, who in turn mailed me a disc of orphaned songs that we hadn’t used (due to vinyl time limits) on the original release. Teaming up with producer Noah Perry, we spent several weeks remastering the analog tapes to 24bit digital. With the new material added to the lineup, the CD now includes all the tracks produced for the original album.

Finally, the reissue also features a gift from writer/producer Dean Suzuki of KPFA-FM. Upon hearing a demo, Dean graciously agreed to write a new set of liner notes, which follows up his original 1986 OP Magazine review.

Dreaming In Colors is now available direct from Multiphase Records, or on CD and MP3 from CDbaby and Amazon.