Are You Getting Toasted?

Ran into this tonight and thought I would share it.

If the person who is going to be toasting you at your wedding reception is nervous about doing so, you may interested to know that a book has been written about the subject called Wedding Toasts Made Easy. It was even recommended by Regis Philbin and Amazon has a used copy for $6.

RJ

Weekend Update

Congrats to Velincia and Breyon on their new beginning! Saturday night was a great night at Angel Springs Events Center. This venue is first class all the way. It is beautiful all around with lots of trees, space and is well maintained and clean. The owners, Norma and Anthony are on top of things. I wish I had taken more pictures of the place. Got to finally see people doing the Chicken Noodle Soup and I enjoyed that quite a bit. The kids were all over me to play it. Ran lots of old-school and we had a great time.

The ice sculpture was beautiful and was created by Doug at Amazing Ice Designs.

Special thanks also to Kasha, Inez and Kristin from Bella Occasions who helped keep the evening flowing smoothly from the reception to the end.

Found out today that Adobe has a new version on Audition out (2.0) which I was unaware of since I wasn't getting their email updates. We got it at the radio station on the new computers that were installed this week, so it is time to do an upgrade here since I do a lot of audio editing with that software.

I am starting a new thing with the Monday radio show called All Request Monday. I took calls from listeners today to get their old school requests for songs they haven't heard in a long time, esp rare things that aren't so obvious. This will be on the 1st Monday of the month from 1-2PM on KAZI 88.7 FM. If you have a request, let me know: REQUEST.

The highlight of my evening tonight was when my daughter Alex came over to hang out and was teaching me music theory with the notes on the bass and treble clefs. She is on it!

All for now...

Musically at your service, RJ. :-)

Happy Thanksgiving

Hope everybody had a great holiday with family and food and all that! I hung out with my mother all day. We got to play some music together which was nice. She played piano and I played bass. We played some Elvis songs and other various things from the 70s songbooks she has so many of.

After that we hung out and my Uncle David came over and we got to catch up with him which was nice. We ate and got stuffed and hung and talked for awhile, then Mom and I watched Cast Away with Tom Hanks which I enjoyed. Later we watched some Jerry Seinfeld comedy stuff that was funny until we both passed out.

Lots of interesting discoveries and happening this week with music and business. The big news is that the new Music4Life website launched finally. Special huge thanks to Bryan Chaney who designed it and made it beautiful.

The other big news is that we are now on TheKnot.com and I know that will lead to many good things and more new friends to have fun with. Special thanks to Cindy Elley & Angie Fenn who have been providing great service to me. No graphics there yet as we're are working on scheduling a photo shoot with Linda Lucas of Dream Images. She does some great work if you are looking for a photographer.

I got linked in to Last.FM this week, so you can see what I have been listening to and top 10 chart for the week. It's very cool and so far I love it!



Looking into setting up a Music4Life podcast and trying to figure out which provider might work best to host it. Looking at LibSyn and also Podomatic, which I am already using every Sunday at Unity Center.


Monday morning, had my first recording session with Sister Lissie. She has a great song called Just One that we began laying a track for. I'm excited to be working with her as we have worked together at Unity for about 4 years already.

Had rehearsal on Wednesday night at Unity to begin preparing for a Christmas performance on December 18th which I will be playing 2 songs in. Very challenging stuff to play!


Special thanks to the German Cowboy, Sylvester Becker for all the great ideas in our coaching session this week and keeping me up to speed on new Web 2.0 developments. I think we must be geek brothers! LOL

More on the recent post about Level 42...I also found former drummer Phil Gould on MySpace and his blog postings are very articulate and insightful and reveal many of his thoughts about songwriting and his time in the band. The new music he is producing is really great too! Check him out: Phil Gould.

Beyonce has the top song on iTunes today with Irreplaceable. Saw her for a moment on Oprah this week promoting her new movie Dreamgirls which looks like it will be good.

I'm listening to the Funky London podcast this morning and quite digging the vibes.

Tomorrow it's a wedding for Velincia and Breyon at Angel Springs Events Center in Georgetown which I am really looking forward to. Should be a funky good time and I'm looking forward to working with Norma who I met at a networking event recently.

All for now. Have a good weekend!

DJ-RJ

Level Headed... Still!

So imagine my surprise this week to get a friend request on MySpace from one of my all-time favorite keyboard players; Wally Badarou! He found me by searching in my musical influences and it made my day for sure!


He has been an insiration to me since the 80s. He has played with the Talking Heads, Grace Jones, Black Uhuru and many others folks, most notably for me he was the 5th memeber of an English pop band Level 42, who you may remember for their big hit Something About You which blew up here in '85. After linking up with Wally I decided to do some more digging and see what the rest of the band has been up to as I have been out of touch with their works for awhile. Their last studio album was released in '94 and I was fortunate to get a copy while in London that year and even got to visit their management office. I did some digging and found out that they had a new album out called Retroglide, which I received in the post from Amazon.co.uk today. I have listened to almost all of it and the grooves are deep and the melodies beautiful as usual for Level 42, not to mention Mark King's incredibly funky basslines. Grab it on Amazon.com if you want.

Level 42 pianist Mike Lindup also has a new jazz album out that features him on solo piano and it is beautiful. Click the link and listen to the samples.

On a related note, I have have been playing a new version of Something About You, by an American R&B singer named Anthony David that is excellent!

Amazing how one band can have such an influence on so many people with the music they make. Thank you to all the members of Level 42 for such awesome quality music!

DJ-RJ

"forever now
as the world goes round and round
one eternal moment in time
to live forever
live forever now"
Level 42 "Forever Now"

Awesome Fireworks!

Last night I attended an event held by Austin Wedding Guide and one of the vendors did a demonstration of fireworks that were incredible! He can do them for weddings or any special events. If you are interested, you can contact Steve Wolf at Austin Wedding Fireworks.

RJ

Gift Certificates Available Now

Do you know somebody who has a passion for singing?

Why not give them a gift certificate to do some recording?

At Music4Life Studios, we can take karaoke tracks and add vocals to them and mix them down and put them on CD. We can also produce and record your songs and bring your ideas to life.

Afterwards, we can create a place for them on MySpace and include their music for the world to hear.

We are currently offering a three hour recording session to new clients for only $50. Click on the Paypal button to pay with credit card and we will send your certificate to you via email today.

RJ

What A Weekend!

Taking a moment to post a lil about what's been happening since the weekend...

On Friday, I played a gig for John Deere at The Hyatt Lost Pines out by Batrop. What a cool place! I played mostly country and had a great time in my Texas Tuxedo.

On Saturday, I had a great breakfast with my sweetie at The Original Pancake House on Parmer & Metric. They have awesome pancakes! After that, had client meetings all day and got to see my daughter before she headed off to homecoming. She looked beautiful in her black dress!

On Sunday, did audio at Unity Center. Later that evening I had an audition with Don Chani playing bass and I'm excited to start playing with them. We hope to play out in December. Hopefully opening for Grimy Styles somewhere.

Today, I had a coaching session with Dana Minney and then did my R&B radio show from 1-3. After that I came home and had a recording session with Laura Vella (click to listen to it on her MySpace). I got to play bass and build a track for a song of hers that she wrote for her mother called Breath Away. Special thanks to mom who hooked me up with her. This was our second session together and we had fun and great vibes together!

RJ

Here Come The Holidays!!!!

I am planning to end this year with a huge bang! KAPOW!!!!! Happy New Year! One of our specialties is customized holiday theme parties for any size group or theme with a choice of the music that YOU want to hear: Jingle Bells, Frosty The Snowman, Winter Wonderland, and all your favorite holiday hits!

If you or anybody you know has to plan a holiday party, please call or email me their names and numbers and I will make it as easy as fruitcake in December. Oh yummy!!!!!

DJ-RJ
Music4Life

YeeHaw!!!!!

This week I am doing a party for John Deere. I'm to be dressed up in cowboy gear and it has been a long time since I did that. It is definitely going to be interesting revisiting that part of my past. I'm having fun with it so far.

Tonight, a reunion of graduates of The Soul of Entrepreneuship class. It will be good to see my old classmates again.

All for now, RJ.