20 June 2001
All the tracks for Holiday Mornings are now recorded! We finished with a day of miscellaneous overdubs, including guest appearances by Anna's and my fathers. They'll join an eclectic mix of players in the liner notes for this album.
How about a couple more snapshots to celebrate the occasion?
Next up: mixing!
Anna and her father prepare for a take...
...while my father and stepmother and Anna's mother relax in the studio lounge
New lyrics online
7 June 2001
We're not quite ready to post audio clips for the new album, but we have uploaded plain-text lyrics for all the songs. They were written before they were sung, so they might as well be read before they're heard! Click here to check them out.
Hey, it's a gig!
7 June 2001
Some of you might have noticed my father, Dave Leach, playing several horn parts on my last album, Music of my Ancestors. Well, the booker at Uncommon Ground here in Chicago noticed recently, and invited the two of us to play at a special Father's Day show on June 17. Coincidentally, we had already planned to bring dad up to record a trumpet part for Holiday Mornings, so we adjusted things a bit to accommodate the show.
We'll be joined by Tristen, who performs regularly with her father, plus Winston Damen from Ulele and a couple of his musically-inclined children. See the Shows page for more details.
Album progress
2 June 2001
We're making great progress on the new Arlo & Anna album -- we've been working at Chicago's Gravity Studios with producer Michael Freeman for the last two weeks, and have over half of the tracks recorded. We also have a name for the album: Holiday Mornings. That's right, a holiday album! Watch for its release next fall, and for prerelease goodies on my web site before then.
Meanwhile, here are a couple snapshots from the studio:
Anna and I discuss a middle eastern arrangement
with Najib Bahri and Adel Fadel
Anna directs our chorus of carolers
The next album...
14 April 2001
Less than a year after the dual release of Music of my Ancestors and the remastered version of Show Biz, Anna Belyaev and I are hard at work on our follow-up to A Day at Honey Creek, our popular kids' album from 1999. The as yet untitled new record will be produced by Michael Freeman, who did an astounding job with the "remake" of Buckingham Fountain from the Ancestors album. Watch this space for more details as the project progresses!