Randal's View #2
Spotify

Randal’s View #2

ARTISTRY TUESDAY

“Artistry Tuesday”!
Today I’m featuring “Billy-Joe” an amazing young musician who hails from the south of England!
The standard story and image for a successful musician is someone who slogs through years of anonymity, underappreciated, seemingly invisible, and desperately searching for recognition and eventual success. More often than not this scenario plays out, but every once in a while an artist emerges fully developed, with wonderful talent, creativity, and execution right out of the gates: that’s “Billy-Joe“!
From teen glam-band and rocker drummer, Billy-Joe took the fingerstyle guitar stage at the young age of 24 and nailed it! Billy-Joe has just 4 singles in his catalogue to date but each is a work of art, enticing, intoxicating, relaxing, balanced and unique. 2018 brought “Evening Sky”, “First Light” & “Serenity”. The titles alone draw you in with a promise of wonderment; the music delivers. Somewhere between soft, relaxing, and ambient, with just a touch of “edginess” to “Serenity”, Billy-Joe‘s music tugs at a longing in our being with a pull that is gentle but fully enveloping.
With a modest added instrumentation in “First Light” it is easy to see why this track has over 100,000 Spotify streams in just 6 months!
The newest release, just out, is “Springtime Serenade”. A touch more upbeat than the first three, “Springtime Serenade” is full of the promise of beautiful things to come and ends far too soon at only 3 minutes! I find myself reaching for the rewind button and listening again and again until I finally surrender and hit the “repeat” button while I get lost in my thoughts with a smile!
Billy-Joe‘s music is the perfect accompaniment to concentration, meditation, relaxation with friends at home or surrendering yourself to deep discussion at the coffeehouse.
Billy-Joe‘s success in such a short time would be nothing short of phenomenal, but he did not stop with just the music. He has also shown himself to be a sort of “Pied Piper of Playlists”! In a world where every would-be curator knows that “Followers” are difficult to find, Billy-Joe Clark has created three stellar Spotify playlists that everyone should “Follow” in their Spotify accounts. All three offer wonderful, creative, relaxing, nondistracting music for concentration, meditation, chilling out, studying or conversation. A combined 6,000 Spotify “Followers” prove undeniably that Billy-Joe has the goods to attract a following of listeners!
Here are the links to “Follow” and discover this talented artist for yourself:
Spotify Artist Page: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4yuk88pPSJUYCbSVJGiOYD…
“Springtime Serenade” Video: https://www.facebook.com/billyjoedrums/videos/2383910731884948/
Facebook Videos: https://www.facebook.com/pg/billyjoedrums/videos/?ref=page_internal
Spotify Playlists:
“Mindfulness & Meditation”: https://open.spotify.com/…/%2Aruby%2A/playlist/43j9sAZenNQc…
“Coffeehouse Mix”: https://open.spotify.com/…/%2Aruby%2A/playlist/1MIEdE9gfr6w…
“Monday Morning Chil”: https://open.spotify.com/…/%2Aruby%2A/playlist/1iZWtDZj940z…


 

This Week In Fingerstyle
20-05-2019

Monday, and you know what that means: Daryl Shawn‘s “This Week In Fingerstyle“!!!

“This Week in Fingerstyle” and the excitement of hearing what great new fingerstyle treasures Daryl Shawn has found!

First up is Simon Wahl‘s “Zu Spat”, a beautiful piece that moves nicely back and forth between a “single note” technique and a modified “strum”. Very interesting technique that shows off this beautiful, sweet melody in two different styles and creates a more “full” piece. Beautiful piece and technique Simon Wahl!

“Frazee, MN” by Phil Cook is from a brand new album by Phil. This is a pleasant piece that adds snare, piano, and slide guitar to create a swing-style piece that rings professional all the way around by a pro whose resume is as long as an elephant’s trunk.

“The Sun and The Sea” by Jelly Ellington is a beautiful piece of fretwork by this Austin based professional. This piece carries you away but keeps you attentive by adding in just a touch of dissonance every once in a while in a way that only an edgy blues rocker can pull off with finesse. Nicely done.

“Isa Lei” by Ry Cooder & V.M. Bhatt is fascinating and masterful! This piece is an exploration and mastery of multiple styles and genres all rolled into one beautiful whole. Combining Hawaiian, blues slide, bamboo, and many other techniques and instruments the piece slips & slides from continent to continent while never losing its way. Wow! Just saved this album to listen to the rest of it a little later!

“Spring Flower” by the amazing “Agustin Amigo” is sweet, flowing beauty! Like watching spring flowers bloom in time-lapse, this is one of those pieces that taps directly into your brain to create images of a beautiful spring bloom. Agustin’s ability to create imagery with a guitar hits a new peak with this piece. Beautiful!!!

“From Ashes” is a collaboration of John Clark & Matt Tondut and is another of John’s “big pieces” of late. Cinematic with orchestral and multi-instrumental techniques this is a wonderful piece. This piece on the heels of “Farewell Goblin King” reveals John’s full creativity that goes off the charts when he teams up with artists like Matt Tondut (and Eldar Ibrahimovic on “Farewell Goblin King”). Either of these pieces could easily find themselves in the movies or any stage. Wonderfully done John Clark & Matt Tondut!

“Lagrimas de la noche”, a collaboration of Lance Allen & Nathan McFarlandis a wonderful nylon string duo in a Spanish style that evokes images of sweet summer nights in the desert amongst the slight fragrance of cactus and desert blooms. Just a beautiful piece that is so good it leaves me excited knowing that Lance Allen has been releasing at least a new piece a week this year with amazing creativity and continues to develop and mature as an artist despite having already reached the highest levels. Looking forward to the rest of the year by this amazing artist and also anxious to hear what Nathan McFarland has in store for us!

“Moonshadow” by Mathew Joseph is a tantalizing take on an old classic. Mathew’s unique and exciting “sound” combined with his incredible musicality gives him the ability to deliver a fresh and exciting piece from one of the most popular classics of another era. Just 1 minute 7 seconds long and Mathew Joseph nails this one with a beautiful new take on a well-loved classic. Another in the long line of Mathew Joseph’s exciting pieces!

“Pavane pour un infante défunte” is a Maurice Ravel classic that everyone recognizes instantly although not always certain where we have heard it. Beautifully done here by JC Rodriguez on guitar alone without the orchestration, it is a beautiful rendition of this classic.

The View” by “Between The Dots” had me searching for who the guitarist is on this lovely piece. I instantly recognize that beautiful touch but couldn’t place the artist. Ah ha! It is the incredible talent of Roberto Diana! A wonderful find since I was not familiar with Roberto’s work with “Between The Dots”: another “Save” & “Follow” to check out fully later in the day! Roberto’s touch is perfectly balanced and sweet in a way that few other artists manage to execute, just a thrill to listen to. And it’s another of those “sweet spot” pieces to book-end “This Week in Fingerstyle”.

Daryl Shawn, I can’t thank you enough for making my Monday mornings a very special and exciting part of every week!

And that’s it for another “This Week in Fingerstyle” by Daryl Shawn who every week puts together “the most exciting playlist on Spotify”!

Remember to “Follow/Heart/Like” the playlist that Daryl Shawn so painstakingly creates every week!

 

 

 


Randal L Meek 

Randal L Meek
Randal L Meek

Randal L Meek is a solo fingerstyle guitar artist and singer/songwriter.

Randal’s songs, and his instrumentals, are gentle and authentic with a warm and sincere delivery that is both relaxing and emotional and the perfect accompaniment for relaxing to your own “Life On The Deck”!

 http://www.randallmeekmusic.com/


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