What Inspired This

March 2020, the month the world came crashing to a halt. I was gearing up to debut my new custom BAC trumpet at SXSW with a couple local bands, Bourgeois Mystics, and The Capitol, on some of the big stages for the festival. We had just moved into our apartment downtown a couple months prior; I was a 15-minute walk from the artist’s tent for SXSW. Besides SXSW, I had a plethora of other regular gigs I had built up for myself that were going to lead to an enjoyable and financially comfortable 2020.

Then the news broke. SXSW was cancelled due to the pandemic. I remember hearing this news, then getting a flurry of messages confirming our shows had been cancelled. I had several other events going on that week I received cancellation for as well- wedding gigs, a pit orchestra gig, and multiple unofficial SXSW shows with other bands. As I sat there in shock and disbelief watching the messages come in with all of my work eroding, the motif for this composition, originally by HORSE the Band, popped into my head. It was then I knew this was going to be my first solo arrangement for my new horn.

It took a couple weeks to record all the parts at my great friend Alex Moran’s studio. All the sounds you hear were made by myself and performed in real time. Alex added some additional reverb and bitcrushing, but aside from that, all the effects are exactly as how they sounded when I performed them.

I was thrilled to receive a shout out by HORSE the Band for my arrangement. They were one of my biggest musical influences in high school and college. Their album The Mechanical Hand was in my car’s CD player for about a year my junior year of high school.