Winter Mix Now Shipping!

After a month of nearly nonstop work, Winter Mix is ready to roll out the door. We are now packing and shipping online orders and I had the CD available at my Rock City gigs over the past couple of nights. I had to warn customers that the ink wasn't even quite dry yet on the CD face.


Listen to a two minute demo by clicking here.



Angie and I are embarking on a new venture with Winter Mix. We recently invested in all the necessary equipment to print, burn, and package our own products. This is my fifth CD and I'm in the process of producing two more CDs for other people and have plans for more of my own music. Jumping into production just seemed like the logical next step and while the up- front costs for high quality printers and duplicators was a little scary, we think it will pay off in the long run as the number of CDs in the pipeline continues to grow.

The bedroom-sized office outside my studio is slowly being transformed into a mini-factory and we're pleased with the quality we're getting from our gear. We are using Taeyo Yuden CDs as our blanks. These are widely accepted as the best in the business and our duplicator tower verifies every CD it burns. So far, we haven't had a single failure.

Aside from the normal hassles with getting Photoshop to actually print what we see on the screen, it looks like the jacket printing is going to be a breeze. The most time consuming part of the process is cutting the paper and assembling all the jewel box parts. We're still too early in the process to have developed a smooth assembly system.

The CD face is being printed on a photo quality printer that blends 8 different inks. The per CD printing costs are a little high but the quality is better, in my opinion, than you get with silk screened CDs. The down side is that you have to wait 24 hours to make sure the ink is completely dry or you risk smudging.

We should be completely caught up on orders by Monday or Tuesday so those of you who pre-ordered should all get your CDs next week. I'm anxious to get your comments so be sure and use the comments section attached to this or any other entry in my journal. All you have to do is click on the comments number and you'll be taken to the next page where you can leave your own thoughts. Think of it as a guest book but in a conversational form. The reason my guest book link is still not working is simply a matter of avoiding spam. Spammers have found easy ways to post their junk in standardized guest books so they are rapidly becoming a thing of the past. Too bad.

Winter Mix, as with all of my music, is a bit hard to pin down in terms of style. If you went to a music store looking for hammer dulcimer music with a distinctive percussive flair where would you begin? Judy commented that the demo has a definite Old World Christmas feel. I like that description and think it is the multiple layers of hand percussion and acoustic instruments that give that impression. Someone else said it reminds them of the group Manheim Steamroller except with real instruments rather than synthesizers.

Among the 16 tracks and over 50 minutes of music are familiar Christmas tunes like" Drummer Boy", "Silent Night", "Carol of the Bells", "O Little Town of Bethlehem" and "Sleigh Ride". Winter Mix also has a few not so well known titles such as the Celtic tune "Christmas Eve Reel" and the Huron Indian Carol "Twas in the Moon of Winter Time."

Instrumentation includes hammer dulcimer, mountain dulcimer, guitar, bouzouki, bass guitar, oboe, recorder and a host of hand percussion instruments including multiple djembes, bongos, congas, pandeiro, tamborine, finger cymbals, sambago bells, sleigh bells, agago, wood block, kpalogo drums, guiro, shakers, bohdran and snare drum. I know I've left something out. If it is a percussion instrument and you play it with your hand rather than a stick, it is probably on here.

One day while sitting at the editing console tweaking a hammer dulcimer part that my friend Christy Burns had just recorded for the cut "Christmas Eve Reel" I had Hershey, my standard poodle, stretched out in my lap. As I was listening to the take, my hands were half petting, half drumming on Hershey's rib cage (don't worry, she seemed to be enjoying it). It was a pretty cool sound and we came close to recording it but decided that it might be a little hard to explain that one of the percussion instruments was a poodle.

Other Musicians on Winter Mix include (alphabetical order):

Matt Broom, percussion
Christy Burns, hammer dulcimer
Randy Clepper, guitar and bouzouki
Marc Func, acoustic bass
Hussain Jiffry, electric bass
Kofi Mawuko, percussion
Carey Shinbaum, oboe and recorder
Jay Stanfil, electic and acoustic bass
Trey Wheeler, guitar
Members of the Signal Mountain Presbyterian Choir under the direction of Steve Phillips

The CD Face, and packaging design is by Steven Wade Brown. You can see more of Steven's work at http://www.reddirtdesign.com

I've been planning on producing this CD for several years now and even recorded quite a few cuts for it in years past but none of those songs actually made it on Winter Mix. I know some of you have been waiting for a CD that Alfreda Gerald and I have been working on, but don't worry, it is still in the works and hopefully we can complete it next year.

It is hard to let go of a project like this, to know when to call it done. I suspect every artist, no matter what the genre has the same experience. The hundreds of hours of time invested are worth it though when I'm finally able to confidently put the CD in someone's hand and say listen to this, I think you'll like it.

The CD's are available at the Brow Gallery, Tennessee Aquarium Gift Shop, Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church, through my web site or anywhere I'm performing. As always, if you are uncomfortable purchasing anything online with a credit card, just drop me a note and we'll make arrangements for you to pay by check.

Dan ¶ 5:29 AM