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November, 2007

Greetings, Everybody!
It’s been a long, long time since I’ve written. I
know that many of you have wondered what ever became of me, and
others have asked if they had been deleted from the mailing list.
Well, I’m back, with great high spirits and lots to catch
up on. I won’t bore you with excuses about why I haven’t
written. After all, at this point many of you are a bit vague on
who I am in the first place, and consequently are not too concerned
about where I’ve been all this time. So suffice it to say
that in recent years, my wife and I have basically devoted our lives
to raising a wonderful son, and now that he is more independent,
we have much more time to ourselves, to pursue music again and dust
off our little business. It’s exciting to be back in touch
with you all!
Of course, I never actually stopped making music all this time.
I could no more do that than I could give up breathing, or Chinese
food. And in fact, there have been some exciting adventures in the
last couple of years. For one thing, many of you might not be aware
that I won a Grammy Award! It was a highlight of my life, and I
wrote a detailed description of it which I posted on this website.
You can still find it here.
It’s called “What It’s Like To Win A Grammy Award”
(clever title, eh?). Check it out if you have a moment. I think
you’d really enjoy it.
I also have played a lot of concerts over the last couple of years,
throughout much of the U.S., as well as Europe and Asia. Many were
solo concerts, and many others were performances with Paul Winter
and the Consort.
For the last three years I was also the full time Music Teacher
at our local public elementary school here in Maine. With only 55
kids in the building, ranging from Kindergarten through 8th grade,
I combined everyone into one large chorus. We had a blast! Over
the three years, we performed almost 150 songs in concerts. All
from memory, and many with multiple verses. (There are at least
seven in The Ballad of Davy Crockett
alone!) It was breathtaking to see these young people just absorb
dozens and dozens of songs and lyrics without any apparent effort
whatsoever. And I will never again hear anything quite like the
sound of those little voices belting out everything from Take
Me Out To The Ball Game to O Sole Mio
(in Italian, no less). It was truly a joyful noise, and I think
all of us will remember it for a long time. There is also a
story about my stint as a teacher on my website.
And now I have returned to being a full time professional musician,
and Jill has returned to being my full time manager, so look out!
We are already off to a flying start. Since September, we have produced
a brand new CD, done a concert tour in Michigan, revamped the website,
composed several new pieces for the Pilobolus Dance Theater, and
gotten all of our wood stacked inside for winter.
Of course, there’s lots more in store. We have plans for
new CDs, sheet music for many of my songs, and lots of concert appearances.
We even have a theatrical production on the drawing board. So welcome
to the New River Music. As Jill said when she came back on board,
“we’re a start-up company with a long history”.
Here’s to a long and exciting future!
My Irish Soul
The centerpiece of our Fall is the release of my newest CD, called
My Irish Soul. It is something
that has been rattling around in my head for many years now. I had
sketched out melodies and fooled around with familiar Irish tunes
for a long time, convinced there was something worth pursuing, but
never having the combination of time and inspiration to actually
make it happen. Well, as soon as Jill got back to being my manager
again, she gave me the one ingredient I had been missing—a
deadline. And now we’re proud to announce that My
Irish Soul is finished and ready for sale.
My Irish Soul is a very personal CD
for me. I am 100 percent Irish, and that has been a sometimes happy,
sometimes not-so-happy, but always huge, part of my life. It goes
far beyond wearing a green hat on St. Paddy’s Day, because
along with all the Irish pride and bluster, I also inherited all
the restlessness and moodiness of the Irish spirit. It’s a
complex brew, and full of ambiguity. And until now I had never really
tried to investigate it musically. But with this new CD I have at
least begun the process, and I think you’ll be very pleased
with the results. It’s strictly a solo piano record—no
nature sounds or other instruments. I wanted to keep the music as
starkly personal as possible, and it works best that way—just
“me and my
piano”. The songs are mostly Irish tunes—some dating
way back— ancient hymns and melodies from anonymous pipers
and fiddlers centuries ago. But I also play some Irish American
classics, like Danny Boy, Tooralooraloora,
and When Irish Eyes Are Smiling. I
wasn’t interested in Celtic Purity. I was trying to share
my own personal experience, and those are songs I grew up with.
I used these tunes as a springboard, and improvised on them, arranged
them and otherwise made them my own. Some arrangements stick closer
to the original than others, but I am very confident that the old
vanished pipers and fiddlers who first invented them would enthusiastically
approve. I also wrote a few original pieces for the CD, which I
am quite proud of. They are new and yet familiar at the same time.
You’ll definitely recognize my style.
Another distinctive aspect of the music is that a lot of it oscillates
back and forth between Irish music and African American styles,
like jazz, gospel, and the blues. When I graduated from college
I played in New York jazz clubs for my living, and during that time
I would occasionally experiment with combining the Irish songs I
grew up with and the jazz harmonies and rhythms I had fallen in
love with. To my surprise, it was really a very easy connection,
and both types of music seemed to have a lot of common ground. Over
the years I have recognized that the common ground I discovered
is really common to all kinds of authentic music, from all times
and places. It’s very hard to put into words, but I think
we would all agree that it’s a feeling of spirit, of connection,
of joy despite the sorrow. I think the best word for it is “Soul”,
and that’s why I named my CD My
Irish Soul. It’s
an acknowledgement of this beautiful spirit that all real music
contains.

Another nice thing about the new CD...
In keeping with the “All-New River Music” theme, we
wanted to tell you about our new CD packaging. We have elected to
use ecofriendly packaging for all our new releases. These “Digipacs”
are the same size as the old plastic “jewel” cases,
with which we are all familiar. The advantage to the new packaging
is that it uses far less plastic, weighs less, and does not require
additional packaging to be sent safely through the mail. We can
just slap a mailing label on and head for the Post Office. Digipacs
cost us more, but we are not passing that cost on to you. We just
think it’s a better way to go, and we’re willing to
invest in it.
In Conclusion
It’s exciting to be back in business again, and to be able
to offer you some new music. As I promised, there will be lots more.
But meanwhile, both Jill and I want to thank you sincerely for sticking
with us with your loyal friendship and support for all these years.
We have always been unsure whether we have built up a business,
or just a huge network of friends. It’s a nice question to
ponder, and we’re very grateful for it. So thanks for being
one of them!
Yours in music,

Paul Sullivan
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