CDs and EPs

Undiscovered Hearts

Undiscovered Hearts is really an EP, or extended play single, with a total of five songs. After spending the better part of the 1990s writing and recording scores for video and CD-ROM productions, I greatly looked forward to a return to songwriting. I also resolved to take a fresh approach to arranging and instrumentation. I started by putting away all those things that had served me well in the past; drum machines were dropped in favor of real drummers, and I replaced most of the digital keyboards with more retro-sounding instruments like piano and organ. My Martin acoustic guitar became the framework for most of the songs, although I layered generous portions of electric guitar over the basic tracks. I was lucky to enlist the talents of a session bass player I had long admired when I was first starting out playing in the clubs—David Henderson. Mike Altomare, a favorite guitarist of mine, also provided some wonderfully tasty guitar tracks: listen to the solos on “Madison Park,” “The Last Night On Earth,” and “Sheila.”

Quite intentionally, all the songs on Undiscovered Hearts really follow a common thread: longing for connections—connections to lovers, to the past, to the future. I suppose that by “undiscovered,” I meant unrealized or unrequited dreams or relationships. That’s why the cover shows underexposed images of people who appear isolated.

One very nice result of this EP was that “Loving Molly,” the last tune on the CD, actually received a John Lennon Songwriting award in 2001, in the Folk Category.