|
|
 |
|
Most of the recording
was done either at Jim's house or in St. Joseph's community center where we normally have our weekly practice. Jim played
guitar on all the songs, and bass on all the songs except the Chaplet, which doesn't have a bass part. For the Chaplet,
we first recorded the keyboard at Doug's house, which was a rather monotonous task when you consider that there was no vocal
part to play along with, only the ticking of a metronome. (Try that for nearly 18 minutes!) Recording
the vocals for that was challenging as well, for we had only 2 or 3 people at a time wearing headphones to hear the accompaniment,
and the rest of the group had to sing along blindly (deaf-ly?)
For the other songs, after
recording the accompaniment we recorded the men's and women's parts separately, then the harmony, then mixed
them all together.
Healer of My Soul was interesting:
first we recorded all the women singing it together. Then, while listening to that, Jeannie recorded her melody line,
followed by Chris with her harmony line. Betsy, who was absent that day, later recorded her harmony part at Jim's
house. The final mix included only the three women's voices with the instruments, and Jim decided to add a guitar solo
to make it more interesting. That song turned out to be nearly everyone's favorite!
Sweet Mercies was another
one. We wanted to add a drum part to it, so Chan agreed to stay after Mass one Sunday and record his part along with
what we already had. I don't know how many takes we did, but we soon realized that it was not as easy as we thought
it would be! I took what I had and tried to mix it all together, but whenever his timing was right on, ours seemed
to be off, and vice versa. We then decided to just have Karen "shake her eggs" for that song.
There's almost a dozen of
us who are regularly involved with the Bread of Life contemporary music ministry. Here's a little about us and our roles
in making the CD.
|
|
We consider Betsy Wiest our leader, 'cause she's the one who chooses the music lists every week, makes us come to practice, and generally
keeps everything organized. She plays guitar and sings. Occasionally, she'll get out her psaltry for a special
occasion. (You can hear it on the fifth decade of the Chaplet.) Her daughter Louise Wiest sings in Sweet Mercies and plays flute in the 4th and 5th decades of the Chaplet.
Jim Dzuricky also plays the guitar and sings. For most of these songs, he first recorded the guitar and bass parts, then
added the individual and group vocals. For the Chaplet, he recorded all the keyboard parts first, then added the vocals,
which were done over the course of three or four sessions, to the mix. The guitar and other instruments were then added
at different points along the way.
Doug Konzel's voice is the one you hear leading the second decade of the Chaplet. He also did a nice job with the
keyboard in that song. He substantially reduced his involvement in our music ministry since he began to seriously discern
a calling to the permanent diaconate.
Jeannie Mleczko sings and usually adds a nice harmony to anything we do. We pretty much followed her lead for the Chaplet, since it was her vision to
do this project in the first place. Naturally, we "let" her sing the first decade solo.
Chandler Rees is our drummer when we play at Mass. You almost heard him on Sweet Mercies, but it is awful tough
to synchronize the drums to a song that's already recorded. If we ever do something like this again, we'd like to include
him in some of the music.
Erick Nicklas plays the trumpet at Mass, and almost sang for some of the music on this CD. Again, if we're
able, we'd like to get his trumpet recorded too.
|
|
|
Chris Brzozowski has one of those natural-born alto voices, the kind that can find a harmony that fits perfectly in any song she
sings. You can hear her harmonies in all the songs on this CD, except (believe it or not) the Chaplet.
Besides having a lovely singing voice, Karen Giannamore is our percussion section. Her instruments range from the triangle to hickory sticks to eggs to I don't know
what that thing's called. (She tells me it's called a cabasa, but it don't look nothin' like a sausage!)
You'll hear her shakin' the eggs in Sweet Mercies.
Doug Baird used a computer program we purchased to transpose the Chaplet to a key we could play it in. He used to sing
and play the guitar at Sunday Mass, but he no longer attends Mass at our parish.
John Fitzgerald is one of those background people. You know, vocalist, guitar. He seems to like it that way, but it
really rounds out the sound.
Speaking of rounding out the sound, Bob Malyuk runs the mixer at Mass. He didn't do anything on this CD, but he's such a nice guy, we wanted to mention him anyway.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
