Milestones

Last night I had a chance to hang out with some composer friends here in Nashville. We get together every other month or so and chat about what's going on in our lives and with our music, talk a little bit about TAXI (as that is the reason this group began in the first place), listen to some music and just really spend time enjoying each other's company.

After I got home from the hang I noticed that the latest issue of Recording Magazine (Apr 2013) had arrived. As I flipped through the pages a familiar face caught my attention. It was my own... while I knew that eventually that was going to happen, didn't know which month, it was still kind of a shock to see myself in the magazine. And then I saw they also included the first part of the transcript from the Road Rally Panel I was on as well. That I was not expecting, so that was a neat surprise!

I've tried to think of a clever segue into the Milestones topic but I'm not coming up with anything so I'll just make a cold transition... Milestones... :-) As I was updating my web site today with the latest placement news which you can see by clicking here I realized that I have now received over 700 cue sheets and my music has been used in over 100 different productions! And while I'm nowhere near where I want to be with my career, I know I'm heading in the right direction and I'm making forward progress each and every day.

Another milestone that I'm hitting this week is the one year mark of when I made the decision to take control of my personal health. It was March 15, 2012 when I went to go watch Kentucky play basketball in the opening round of the March Madness tournament. I'll never forget that day. I never would have imagined the impact on my life that one decision was going to have. I'm happy to report that after reaching my goals a little over four months ago, I've managed to maintain my goal weight. And while I'm very excited to have passed the 700 cue sheet mark, that pales in comparison to how proud I am about keeping the weight off for the past four months.

It was also eight years ago today that my grandfather passed away. That was a very pivotal moment in my life as it was on my way back home to Nashville after his funeral when I decided to get back into music. I wish he was here to see how things have gone for me.

Time to get back to the studio, I've got some new shows that I'm writing for at the moment and the deadlines are coming up soon!

2012 Year In Review

I did a little bit of reflecting over the past year and thought I'd do a little wrap up of 2012 so I can start moving forward with 2013! Without a doubt, 2012 was one of the most rewarding years I've ever had, both personally and professionally. From signing deals and building new relationships to growing and strengthening existing relationships to even having to say goodbye to others, last year was a very significant year for me.

The year started off with the premiere of It's A Brad, Brad World on Bravo, my second main title theme. I was happy to find out a few weeks ago that the show got renewed for a second season.

The in March I was able to take some time to attend some Kentucky basketball games during the NCAA March Madness tournament. I had no idea that going to see them play in Louisville was going to completely change my life. See, it was the walk from the parking lot to the arena for the first game in which I finally got to the point concerning my health that I knew I had to make a change.

That change began one month later when I started the RevAbs program. My goal was to lose 100lbs in 6.5 months. By the time I stepped on the flight to head to L.A. in November for the TAXI Road Rally I wanted to be 100lbs lighter. That was my goal.

During the next 6.5 months I put most of my focus and attention on losing weight and getting healthy. And while I did some music during that time, it really did take a back seat in my life. But it was worth it as I was able to reach the goals that I set out to achieve with the weight loss. I'll never forget the moment after I boarded the plane and got in my seat of when I put my seat belt on. For the last 4 years that I attended the Rally, it was always a struggle to get it latched together. Not this time. I remember looking at all the slack that was left in the belt and then I became overwhelmed with emotion and tears began to flow. It was at that moment that I finally felt like my goal had been achieved.

The destination for the flight was the TAXI Road Rally. This was my 5th one and 2nd time as a guest panelist. And of all the Rally's I've been to, this was by far my favorite one. I'm sure it had something to do with the "Barry?!?!?!? Is that really you?!?!?!??" type moments, but I think it had just as much to do with me being able to give back to the community that's been so giving towards me over the past 5 years.

I finished out the rest of the year working on an alt rock project in the style of the Black Keys as well as trying to enjoy the holidays while trying to rest up and get recharged for the new year. If 2013 is anything like 2012 was then it's going to be an incredible year.

Until next time...

May Update

Thought it would be a good time to update the blog with some of the latest news about placements and deals and stuff. This is the time of year that my musical output tends to increase a bit as I find myself having more time to spend composing since the college basketball season is over, the NBA playoffs are nearly finished and most of my favorite TV shows are on summer hiatus (or cancelled!).

I had a chance to write some pop/rock cues in the style of Colbie Callait and Sheryl Crow for a new series that's about to debut on ABC Family called Beverly Hills Nanny. I wrote seven tracks for it and all seven were accepted and sent to the editors of the show. So I'll likely record that show to see if any of my cues get used.

Currently I'm writing some Hip-Hop cues for Fox Sports. It's been a stretch to say the least, but I've watched quite a few mix tapes of Kentucky basketball players to help me get a feel for the genre :-) I'm also co-writing with a couple of other people on these, one in particular who's VERY well versed in Hip-Hop. Thanks to most of their home games against lesser opponents being broadcast on the UK Basketball network via Fox Sports South, my dream of having my music played during a UK game broadcast is one step closer to reality!

On to some placement news... Since my last update, I've had placements show up in Clean House NY (4 episodes), The Rosie Show (14 episodes), NY Ink, It's A Brad, Brad World (8 episodes), and Last Call with Carson Daly (4 episodes). Now here is one of the rare times that I actually know in advance about an episode. The episode of What Not To Wear (episode title - "Desiree") that will be airing on Tuesday night, June 5th at 9pm Eastern / 8pm Central will feature 3 of my tracks in it. And since I know which tracks are being used, I can actually let you know which ones they are as well :-) So here they are, the first two are acoustic guitar based tracks and the third one is a driving pop/rock track:

Making Choices


Tough Decisions


Leave It All Behind


I'm not sure the exact moment when they will be used in the episodes, but it does appear that it will be in the back half of the episode, with the third clip being the next to last piece of music they use, and it gets played for 56 seconds. So it might be used during the final "reveal" scene based on the type of cue and placement in the episode.

And finally, an update on my progress with the RevAbs program that I started over 6 weeks ago. I'm VERY excited to announce that I just completed Phase 1 of the program and so far I've lost 37.1lbs, 4" off of my waist and about 18% of my body fat. I'm feeling great and can't wait to see the results at the end of Phase 2 later next month!

Until next time...

March Madness!

I don't think I could have come up with a more appropriate title for this entry. As many of you know, I'm a huge Kentucky basketball fan and (most) every year during the month of March they compete in a little basketball tournament affectionately known as March Madness. Well, they're not the only ones dealing with madness this month. I'll get to that in a minute but first I've got a quite a few items to update everyone on.

Let's start with where I left off, and that's with the film score project. In spite of the fact that my main studio computer was down for over half of the project ( It was a power supply issue, and after a poor job by the 2nd service tech that HP sent, I was able to get the machine back up and running by myself later that night), I was able to meet my March 1st deadline.

I can share more about the film now as well. It's a faith-based movie called Decision and it stars Natalie Grant and Billy Dean. I'm not exactly sure when it's going to air but the latest I heard was they expected it to be on TV sometime near the mid/end of April. Once I know more, I'll be sure to let everyone know. It was a great experience working on the film. The production company is planning on shooting more films this year and I've already been told to expect a phone call from them in the upcoming months about scoring those as well. Needless to say, I'm pretty excited about that.

About 15 minutes after I found out that that every cue had been accepted and I was finished with the score, I got a postcard from our water company stating that our usage for the past month was higher than normal. This is where the madness begins...

Back in the swing of things

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joiseyshowaa/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

I knew it had been awhile since I last posted, but until I actually looked at my site, I didn't realize it had been almost a month! Yikes! Gotta say that the blog contest I participated in definitely helped me post on a more frequent basis.

One reason for my lack of posts is that March is the height of the college basketball season here in the States and I end up spending quite a bit of time following my favorite team, the Kentucky Wildcats. I really thought we were going to bring home Championship #8 this year but alas, that didn't happen. We had our worst shooting night of the season against a team that was having one of their best and in a one-and-done type tournament, that usually spells disaster for you. But regardless, I was very proud of our team this year. I can't remember when I ever had so much fun watching the team play but it was probably the '95-96 season, ie. Championship #6, and the first one that I could remember. I was only 4 when they won #5 so I don't remember that one. But I can tell you exactly where I was at when we won #6 (and #7) :-) Earlier tonight several of the players announced that they would be entering the NBA draft so it looks like next year's team is going to be a brand new group of players. Let the fun begin!

An update

I've got another blog entry coming up for the contest I'm in but before I get to that, let me get everyone up to speed on what's been going on the last few weeks. There have been several things that have both helped me stay focused and at the same time keep me distracted.

The short version is that it took me a few weeks to really work through the grief of losing our cat, Grey. There were several days that I just didn't feel like doing anything with music or being active online with Twitter or Facebook, and for the most part I didn't. Now let me say, I'm not one for drama and I'm not out for attention. I wouldn't go so far to say that I was depressed, but I was definitely not myself.

Even today, I still miss our cat but I think the grief is over with. One reason for that is we are now the owners of TWO cats - Ronan (the tabby on the left) and Teyla (the calico on the right). And to any Stargate: Atlantis fans out there, the answer is "yes" but I'll save that story for another day. Needless to say, they have definitely filled a void that our last cat left, and it definitely took the both of them to fill that hole.

Another distraction for me is college basketball season is in full effect right now. My love for music is equaled (some might even say surpassed) by my love for Kentucky Wildcats basketball. And with the season we're having, especially compared to the last two-four years, I'm in hoops heaven right now.

But all has not been lost. There were a couple of weeks in which I actually was very productive on the music front, thanks in part to one of my friends and colleagues, Lydia Ashton. She gave me a chance to work with her on scoring the music for a short action/drama film. We had a quick turnaround time (2 weeks, start to finish) but we were able to get it done in time and the director really liked the stuff we came up with. I'll put a link up to the film as soon as I get one.

This was my second score-to-picture gig and I gotta say that I absolutely loved it. We had to stay close to the temp music, which was fine, but we still had a chance to be creative. I enjoy the challenge of trying to write something that's similar to what the director originally heard when they put in the temp music but is still original and unique and sounds like me. THAT... is fun.

One of the most exciting things that I took from that project was getting to write my first ever non-guitar and non-drum kit based cue. Typically, every piece of music I've ever written has either started with a guitar riff (electric or acoustic) or a groove on the drum kit. But while working on this film, I got to write a cue that was based more on synth pads, ambient sounds, percussion and strings. I had a blast! Once I figure out a "formula", I hope to start knocking out some more cues like that.

Speaking of cues like that... Earlier tonight I got an offer to work on another project for one of the larger libraries that I write for. I'll only be writing a couple of cues for this one. It's a VERY quick turnaround but should be fun.

Until next time...

September Update

What a crazy month it's been! I had a wonderful time hanging with my buddy Logan over the weekend and we made some great progress on the Crushing Gray album.

In addition to that weekend of awesomeness, I got to hear my music on TV for the first time ever. During the 2nd episode of a very popular daytime talk show one of my cues was played as they were cutting to commercial. It was only for a few seconds, but it felt great nonetheless!

In total, I landed 4 cues with this show and so far I've heard one of them used at least 3 times this week! Again, a great feeling!

Next month I'll be heading up to KY for some UK Basketball excitement. Can't wait to see what October holds!