Instrumental Invasion, 5/6/20 May 7, 2020

The May 6, 2020, Instrumental Invasion show on WCWP was the last of the six shows I recorded between March 25 and 30. During my phone conversation with Jeff Kroll two hours before recording, Jeff told me I should work the legal ID into my hour 2 intro in case it doesn’t run in automation. So, I did. When he spoke to me again via text as the April 1 show began, he clarified that I should do it at the top of both hours, which I started in the May 13 show. As it turns out, the legal ID has run for all but the first segment of that first show.

The playlist was made March 23 with annotations the next day and during the recording session on the 30th. I had to redo talk breaks for the second hour’s first segment on the morning of April 30 due to a factual error in the original record. In a callback to Nelson Rangell‘s “By Light,” which Jay Rowe co-wrote but did not appear on, I noted that he was the keyboardist on Ken Navarro‘s “Walking Each Other Home.” A check of the liner notes last Thursday morning revealed it was really Dan LaMaestra. The redo instead acknowledged Rob Holmes playing three saxophones and Ken and Greg Grainger playing virtual drums. To get the segment to 18 minutes, I also had to shorten the top of the hour intro and back-sell of “Rise” by Ben Tankard. With that complete, I edited the playlist scan to remove my incorrect annotation.

I only cited album release dates in this show and the one on April 22. During the outro, I neglected to mention that Keiko Matsui‘s Echo came out on February 22, 2019.

Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:

Instrumental Invasion, 4/22/20; Show banner April 23, 2020

The April 22, 2020, Instrumental Invasion show was the fourth to be mixed in Adobe Audition 2020. The talk breaks were recorded March 25, but I had to pad a few out during the mix on the 28th. David Benoit coincidentally hosting a show on another 88.1 FM – KKJZ-FM – had to be acknowledged. I was listening to it while writing the first draft on April 1.

I made the playlist on March 23 and annotated it the next day. I made additional annotations while mixing and re-recording.

After recording this show, Dan Cox, WCWP Director of Broadcasting, informed me that my show would be airing weekly starting the following week. He suggested I should also record a promo:

The excerpts I included in that promo were inspired by what I had played:

• “To the Top” by Adam Hawley
• “Feel It Still” covered by the aforementioned David Benoit
• “Tidal Wave” by Nelson Rangell
• “When We Dance” by Ken Navarro

For the second week in a row, the show aired flawlessly. Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:

Four days earlier, on April 18, WCWP‘s social media handler, Kim Brander (a.k.a. The Original DGunboats) suggested I make a logo or banner for Instrumental Invasion. After 45 minutes in Adobe Photoshop CS2, I came up with this:

The keys are from my Yamaha YPG-625 located in the basement, which I photographed with my iPhone 11. The WCWP logo is from the icon toward the bottom of the station’s website homepage. If you right-click “view image,” you get this. From there, you can “save image as” or just do that directly from the homepage without opting to view it.

Kim is another male, just like the ones I referenced after playing female Kim Scott‘s “Take It to the Rink.”

Instrumental Invasion, 4/15/20 April 16, 2020

The April 15, 2020, Instrumental Invasion show on WCWP was the third I mixed between March 25 and 30, but the fourth show I recorded talk breaks for.

Like the first three shows, work on the playlist began March 22 with annotations on the 24th along with the other five.

I’m proud of the anecdotes about listening to “Heartbeat” by Spyro Gyra on the way back from my sister’s college graduation and Jessy J writing my name and then signing hers for my copy of My One and Only One. I also liked the allusion to Batman while talking up Jessy’s “The Tango Boy” and quoting Chieli Minucci’s March 7 Facebook post. I regret forgetting to say his last name, forgetting that I played Jeff Lorber in the first hour while talking up “Right On Time” in the second, and not acknowledging the Pat Bianchi Trio’s album, A Higher Standard, while talking up their song and signing off. I got wrapped up in the “from the bottom of my heart” segue.

The show was correctly programmed into automation and aired flawlessly. Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:

Instrumental Invasion, 4/8/20 April 9, 2020

The April 8, 2020, Instrumental Invasion show on WCWP was the second I mixed between March 25 and 30, but the third show I recorded talk breaks for.

I made the playlist on March 22 with annotations on the 24th and while recording on the 26th. It seemed like a good idea to share my love of that Gil Shaham recording that I first heard on The Weather Channel 25 years ago, but it’s such a long title. As I said on the air, I’ll just stick to jazz.

Due to a technical error, the April 1 show initially reran. I got in touch with Dan Cox, WCWP Director of Broadcasting, and he corrected the error after the second segment of the first hour.

Below is the show’s aircheck (or click here). The ones from the first two segments and the start of the third are directly from my mix with the broadcast multiband compressor effect applied. The rest is from the FM stream.

Instrumental Invasion, 4/1/20 April 2, 2020

The April 1, 2020, Instrumental Invasion show on WCWP was the first of six shows I recorded from March 25 to 30. My foolhardy plan was to livestream my recording of talk breaks for all six shows on March 25. It took way too long just to record the first show’s talk breaks. Not only that, but few people watched the stream. So, I abandoned it before recording a second set of talk breaks, which became the fourth show. That was as far as I went.

I encountered issues in Adobe Audition 3.0 while recording the second aircheck of the first show. The program constantly froze. I had issues recording with my USB interface before, but that was the last straw. So, I subscribed to Adobe Audition 2020 and the problem went away.

I was only able to mix multitrack sessions for this show on March 25. I’m required to record three segments per hour, six in all. I used one of Audition’s templates: Radio VO with Music Ducking. It was the only time I’ve used a template, so this show will sound different from the ones to follow.

Work on the playlist began on March 22 with annotations on the 24th and while mixing and re-recording. I miscalculated time remaining in the second segment of hour 2. I had to replace “Sorceress” by Return to Forever with the shorter “No Mystery” and redo the talk break coming out of it.

Unfortunately, each show has the potential to have anywhere from part of a segment to none of the show airing. The last few minutes of this show were cut off. I’m glad that was it.

Click here to download the aircheck MP3 or listen below:

4/24 UPDATE: I recorded the May 20 show yesterday, which included another song from Chet Baker’s She Was Too Good to Me album: “Autumn Leaves.” I turned don’t know why my brain turned “to” into “for,” but I realized my error yesterday. I missed the error with “It’s You or No One” in the premiere.