Second full length recording for "Jar O'Comfort" with Steve Sharratt in 1990 called "Scatter the Mud!". Again done on the four track FOSTEX machine. A lot of original tunes on this one.
I produced two other album projects using this machine, "Born Neath a Star" for the "Eastern Kings Chorus", and "Stealing the Blarney" for Alan Molyneaux.
In December 1991, upgraded recording gear to 16 track. TASCAM MSR-16S tape machine, mixing down to 2 track TASCAM DA-30 Digital Audio Tape using a TASCAM M-2516 mixing desk. Added BEYERDYNAMIC C740 microphone, 2 YAMAHA SPX900 multi efx, DBX1 Compressor, BBE Sonic Maximizer, TANNOY Monitors, YAMAHA monitor power amp, and HARDMAN baby grand piano.
Helped compile Prince Edward Island MUSIC Series songbooks Vol I and II in collaboration with Dale McNevin (illustrator) and Rollie MacKinnon (research).
I provided the music chords and melody notes.
Foreword for Vol I by Stompin Tom Connors.
Foreword for Vol II by Eric MacEwen.
photo here with Stompin Tom at the Vol I book launch in Charlottetown at "Johnny Reid's" in Charlottetown.
To Tom's left, Johnny Reid, Dale McNevin, Rollie MacKinnon
This song was done in 1992 and performed on Canada Day. Written by Rollie MacKinnon and Steve Sharratt, the 16 track production in Guernsey Cove was elaborate, featuring five musicians, 17 vocalists, and the voices of children.
Listen here>>
The studio with new gear was very busy over this period recording a few dozen projects, developing relationships with Island Artists and turning out good product. Many were manufactured on cassette tapes, but more and more were on CD as well.
1993 solo recording "Will Ye Have a Pint?"
"Jar O'Comfort" was at its most creative with the addition of Margie Carmichael-Scotto, but disbanded in the spring of 1994.
Second daughter Siobhán was born in November 1994
A young (16 year old) Richard Wood was about to showcase at the 1995 East Coast Music Awards week in Sydney, Cape Breton (in February). I would call him up and ask if he needed a bass player... "yes" he said! I picked up the old Fender Precision, and together with Skip Holmes on guitar and Kimberley Holmes on the keys, we played the showcase...
The beginnning of another journey!
"Ancestral Voices Celtic Christmas", recorded with my gear, in summer 1995 at College of Piping director Scott MacAulay's house in Summerside. Features the talents of Patricia Murray, Michael Burgess, Catherine McKinnon, Ruth Sutherland, Rita & Mary Rankin, Jim Smith, Kim Vincent, Sigrid Rolfe, Ken Enman, Scott MacAulay, Konrad Pluta, Margie Carmichael, Maynard Schurman, Brad Fremlin, Iain Spears, Malcolm Stanley, Anne Bourne, and Gordon Belsher. It was released on Attic Records, and became the first project out of Guernsey Cove to be nominated for an East Coast Music Award in 1996.
