Greg Allen Morgoglione: News

The CD is so close to being done - off at DiscMakers for replication - they estimate that it will ship to me on February 22!!

I'm psyched!

You can pre-order a copy for $15 and $2 shipping - send an email to greg at graspingatlaws dot net and I'll send ordering info. I'll include a cool 11 by 17 color poster and also a color postcard that complement the album artwork. I can sign things if you want of course - just let me know...

Tell your friends - thanks for hanging in there!

Greg

Returned yesterday from Duluth, Georgia, where Rodney Mills mastered the new CD. What a wonderful experience, and what a great job he did!!

Jeff Romano, C'ville's finest Recording Engineer and Producer, came along for the trip. He was armed with his laptop and all of the original song files, and a voracious Waffle House appetite.

We arrived a few minutes early at Rodney's, allowing us an opportunity to gawk at the walls and the halls. They're covered with Rodney's vast array of Gold and Platinum records, Ampex Golden Reel Awards, Georgia Music Hall of Fame recognitions, and all sorts of memorabilia documenting his 40 plus years of musical contributions to humanity.

The next 7 or so hours were dedicated to mastering the CD. Rodney is a master craftsman with a wonderful studio, and a great deal of fun to work with. The session was relaxed and focused, and the finished product is stunning. I'm very excited about the upcoming release - still a couple months away, but closing fast.

The trip validated my impression of working with Jeff at Greenwood Studio. This is my second record with Jeff, and I cannot overstate his competence, his creativity, and his refreshing absence of a C'ville/general music scene ego.

Jeff has also had an extremely positive influence on me as a player, singer & performer.

He's brought stellar studio players to the table for my projects, and has contributed top shelf percussion, guitar, keyboard, harmonica and bass guitar parts when needed.

Rodney was clearly impressed with Jeff's work - it seemed that overall we had brought something refreshing to Rodney's place. I jotted down a dozen of the many positive comments he made regarding the songs and musicianship. During the mastering of Human Race, a fairly short song, Rodney said that he wished the song "would go on for about another ten minutes!" :^)

I admit, my head was swelling - but not because I took his praise personally...

I am so-o-o-o exceptionally honored and proud to associate with the many musicians that have come to me through the SongSharing effort. Tom Proutt and Emily Gary (Tom & Emily), Chris Amsler & Abbey Linfert (The Rusticators), Julie & Kevin Caran (blue stone sky), Thomas Gunn, Granville Braxton, Jeff Romano, Emily Proutt, and so many more... These are the folks that make this record what it is!

SongSharing has been a musical pork chop, hung around my neck years ago - and a wonderful band of musical angels has come to play with me - and I am so honored, and having so much fun!

Gotta run for now - I'll post some pictures from the Duluth trip soon.

Stay tuned: It's the end of the world as we know it...

Peace,

Greg



visit Rodney at www.rodneymills.com
visit Jeff Romano at www.greenwoodstudio.com

The Nashville trip was great. Visited Velvet Apple Music, Dolly Parton's publishing company to drop some items off for their consideration. They were very gracious and receptive. We'll see... fingers crossed!

I played two senior home shows while I was there - great deal of fun. Nice audiences, a good bit of singing along. I often am pretty certain I have the coolest job in the world...

Monday night I went to the Bluebird Cafe for their open mic. Generally speaking first-timers do not get in to play (they give you a stamp and when you come back a second time you are guaranteed to be able to play.) I was a first timer.

It was in the cards for that night though - there were three first timers names drawn to perform, and I was number two!!

The Bluebird open mic is well worth it, just to listen. Excellent songwriters with some great songs. It's a true listening room, it was packed, and the applause was genuine.

Fantastic.

Send out good vibes for SongSharing - thanks!

Greg

http://country997.com/cc-common/artist_submission/player.html?art=34874
Please click that link and listen to "Yugen" at the Country 99.7 Clear Channel website.

Please pass it to your email friends and their email friends and... help us get airplay on Clear Channel Stations around the country!!

Thanks a bunch!!

Best regards,

Greg

Got back late from Athens last night - wonderful trip to visit some mixing and mastering facilities for the new CD, which is soooo close to finished - a few more vocal tracks.

No need to mix it elsewhere - the concensus in Athens was that Jeff Romano at Greenwood is doing a helluva job with recording and mixing.

I was referred to Rodney Mills Master House in Duluth, and they were my last stop in Georgia. I'm looking forward to putting the CD into their hands - Rodney has worked with many of the best in his lengthy career. His studio walls are coated with gold and platinum records he had a hand in, and countless awards and recognitions.

I played an open mic on Tuesday night and had a blast. I played a handfull of songs from the new record - mostly original, but also my version of "Jolene" (by Dolly Parton) and one of my Tom Proutt favorites called "Autumn in New England".

It was a very fun night and I met some wonderful Athens folks who were very interested in SongSharing and our Athens connection. A wonderful singer-songwriter named Andrea Waterstone accompanied me the next morning to play at an Athens senior home. It was a real treat for me as well as the folks at Arbor Terrace.

I had played at Athens Heritage Home the day before and met their Activities Director Chris Wrenn who is also President of Georgia's Activity Directors Association. I'm looking forward to coordinating some SongSharing on tour performances with Chris when we head back down that way soon.

It was a great trip to a great town.

See ya,

Greg

I spent a few hours yesterday afternoon with B.D. Hyman. She wrote a great book about her life and relationship with her mother, the late great Bette Davis. The book is called My Mother's Keeper", and she followed it up with "Narrow is the Way". My Mother's Keeper is a riot, by the way - in spite of the pain she's writing out, B.D. keeps a great perspective thru the book.

I was prompted to read her books through my relationship with her youngest son Justin, who I have known for a few years. We met in 1998 out of our mutual love for chronically fast roadracing motorcycles, and are currently working on a few projects together. B.D. heads B.D. Hyman Ministries and King's Corner Fellowship, a small congregation in Charlottesville. Justin came back to the church not long before we met, and is now the Youth Counselor.

So I went to chat with B.D. about her books and her mom, her ministry and her son, and just things in general. It was a fascinating afternoon - what I thought would be a two hour visit came closer to four. She is an incredibly pleasant, positive lady with a wealth of knowledge on many subjects.

I left her with a copy of Rebellion of Thought to watch with her husband Jeremy, who is the force behind the scenes in the televised Ministry. I'm looking forward to hearing their thoughts on it, as i am certain that their ministry has addressed many of the movie's issues and questions.

The movie, by the way, should be out this fall...

I'm in the studio - back to work.

Peace,

Greg

We are having so much fun in the studio!! It's a real treat to work with Jeff Romano at Greenwood Studio - www.greenwoodstudio.com - he's such a great coach, and I seem to get more done in less time during each session.

The first three songs are complete and mastered and I've made 100 copies of a demo to send out.

There are 3 more that are pretty well completed from the 2006 recording sessions - songs that did not go over to the SongSharing Studio Series CD.

Yesterday we laid down guitar tracks for 6 new songs that will go on the record. Originals we added are "Time Overthrown", "Grasshopper", "contucius: on shoes", and "Revolving Door". I'm also going to cover a few songs and we recorded "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" and Dolly Parton's "Jolene".

"Jolene" has proven to be a crowd favorite everywhere we play, particularly the SongSharing Community Venues! It's likely the most requested song at those shows. I'm going to contact Ms. Dolly Parton and let her know what I have done to her classic song, and what a hit it is with our audiences. I think she will get a real kick out of the lyric changes I made, and I am certain she'll want to know more about SongSharing. Of course I will invite her to come play for some of our folks!

Tom Proutt is coming into the studio soon to add his guitar flair to the CD - I am very excited about that. Tom is one of the finest musicians and songwriters I know, and I'm thrilled that he wants to play on my record! His influence on the songs I write is incredible - the slide work he does on "shoes" and "Time Overthrown" makes me want to stop playing and just listen to him...

Check out the "Pancake Mamma" CD and some of Tom's other work at www.tom-and-emily.com.

Emily Gary, of the Tom and Emily duo, is also going to join us on the CD with her wonderful vocals and some bass guitar work. Emily sang on the Studio Series CD with me - I am really looking forward to having greater involvement from her on this project.

Tom and Em have been huge supporters of SongSharing for years now, and are two of the greatest folks you'll meet if you're that lucky!

Back to the studio tomorrow for some vocals and a bit of percussion. More soon...

Take Care!

Greg

What an exciting week has just gone by. In December SongSharing received a donation of a very nice Baldwin Piano - a beautiful Vertical model in cherry.

We approached none other than the Piano Man himself about helping us with a Raffle Fundraiser by autographing the piano. Billy Joel visited Charlottesville this past Friday, February 23rd 2007 and true to his word, Billy Joel autographed our piano!!

He also signed a vinyl "Glass Houses" LP that our friends at The Music Store in Ruckersville donated when they heard about the piano. We'll put that up for auction on eBay most likely, although none of the details are ironed out yet! We're still reeling from the excitement of his participation in and support for what we do!!

To date SongSharing has had support from the likes of Richard Shindell, R.E.M., Dave Crossland, Paul Rishell & Annie Raines, Rebel Records and many other notables in the music world - and now we can add Mr. Billy Joel to our growing list of supporters.

Our longest running local TV station might continue to ignore SongSharing, but Billy Joel and Michael Stipe know who we are and support our efforts to Make Music More Accessible!!

There will be more details on the "Piano Man" Piano Raffle coming very soon - stay in touch and keep an eye on www.SongSharing.org. Drop me an e-mail with any questions or ideas!

Best,

Greg

Photo Here: http://www.graspingatlaws.net/photos.html

I opened up a Cafe Press store with a few t-shirts and mugs - if you would like the Grasping At Laws logo on a different item than we offer at the store, please let me know and I'll create what I can for you!!

http://www.cafepress.com/gregallenmusic

I'm back in the studio working on a new CD - very stripped down, acoustic as I'm going out touring to sell afew copies and spread the message. I've been playing guitar to support the fine duo Tom and Emily, who just released Pancake Mamma, a tasty CD - we're planning to do some shows together to promote our CD's and also do some SongSharing shows on the road. www.tom-and-emily.com Tom is going to do some guitar work on my CD, and I imagine we'll get Em' in there to do some vocals and bass.

Gotta run - thanks for all the web visits!! Lots of international visitors - we're honored!

Drop me a line - I shut the guestbook down because of all the stupid web-bots that write dopey things.

Email greg@graspingatlaws.net.

Dance in the moment!

Greg

...they hung Saddam Hussein today.

god bless his soul...

Greetings,

Jeff Romano and I finished up "Story of Our Lies" for the movie soundtrack, and I have posted a version of it on the "Some of Our Songs" page.

The movie website is at http://www.paladinpictures.com/RebellionofThought.html
There is a showing on Sunday December 3rd at 7 p.m. at Hinton Avenue United Methodist Church. It is free. Here is a link to directions and church contact info http://www.hintonavenueumc.org/child/map.html
luv ya - thanks for your support,

Greg

Greetings,

Below is a link to the announcement of a second screening of "Rebellion of Thought" taking place:

Sunday, December 3rd, 2006 at 7pm
Hinton Avenue United Methodist Church
750 Hinton Avenue
Charlottesville, Virginia

There's a link on that post for directions if you need them.

It is FREE - I have a feeling it will be packed...

Jeff Romano & I will be mixing and mastering "Story of Our Lies" for the "Rebellion of Thought" DVD and soundtrack CD that Paladin
Pictures will produce - I'm thrilled that they chose the version we
recorded at Greenwood Studio last year - an understated version with
two acoustic guitars (Thomas Gunn and myself), Julie Goldman-Caran &
I singing the "dueling" lead vocals, and Buster Braxton on percussion.

I'll also add the song to SongSharing's new CD as a bonus track, to help with cross-promotion.

Please pass this info along as you'd like - thanks, hope to see you
Dec. 3rd!

Greg

http://www.paladinpictures.com/httpdocs/RebellionBLOG.html

Greetings,

I'm very excited to learn that "Story of Our Lies", one of my original songs, has been included on the soundtrack of an exciting new movie called "Rebellion of Thought". The movie premiered to a sold-out crowd at the Virginia Film Festival, and everyone stayed afterwards for a lively discussion of the film's content. The producers, brothers Kent and Brad Williamson, were thrilled with the reception and have been invited to show it at the River Run Film Festival next spring in Winston-Salem, NC. They are hoping to have DVD's available by January - we'll keep you posted! I'm planning to add the song to the new SongSharing CD as a bonus track!!

The film link is below - the song is in some pretty illustrious soundtrack company - other songs come from artists like Stereovolt, JJ Plasencio, Mixed Tapes 4 Girls, and Abby Someone.

http://www.paladinpictures.com/RebellionofThought.html

Howdy "graspers" - :^) It's a great deal of fun to look at the web stats and see hits from all over the world - places I have to look up sometimes, like Burkina Faso. Thanks for your visits and thanks for expanding my world!!

It would be great to hear from some of you folks out there that like the music and the site - I'd love to know more about places like Seychelles...

Drop us a line sometime!!

Best,

Greg

The new CD is available - released in conjunction with SongSharing, a really cool non-profit org.

You can order one at www.songsharing.org, or drop me an e-mail.

Only $10 plus shipping - proceeds benefit SongSharing!!

Greetings,

You can pre-order a copy of the new SongSharing Studio Series Volume 1: Tales of the Uneasy Writer now - they will be ready by September!

Send check or money order made payable to SongSharing to:

SongSharing
8458 Seminole Trail - Suite #6
Ruckersville, VA 22968
attn: Uneasy Writer

...order extras for birthday and Holiday gifts!!

$12 / copy
$32 / 3 copies
$50 / 5 copies
(includes U.S. shipping)
We'll have a space on the website soon where you can use PayPal for that!

Thanks!!

The AP has picked up the Daily Progress story about my land to trade for SongSharing offer - awesome!! The VA media is picking it up pretty quickly since then, and hopefully it will continue to spread around the country.

The Daily Progress story is at this link http://www.dailyprogress.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=CDP%2FMGArticle%2FCDP_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1149189239888&path=!news
Please pass this story on to media in your town, state, country and wherever! Lots of our visitors are from overseas - it would be great to get this out to international press as well.

Thanks y'all,

Greg

For Immediate Release
Contact: Candace Schoner
Lapdog Productions, LLC
434-989-5480

REALANTHROPIST™ plans to trade land for arts endowment

(Charlottesville, VA - July 17, 2006) Inspired by Kyle MacDonald's
success bartering one red paper clip up to a house in 12 successive
trades, Albemarle County REALANTHROPIST™ & singer-songwriter Greg Allen
is beginning his quest to trade 8.623 acres of land up to an arts
endowment for SongSharing™, a non-profit organization that he started
in 1994.

The land is about 12 minutes south of Charlottesville on Old Lynchburg
Road, has division rights, and two home sites. “The site at the top of
the ridge is very private and has southeasterly views - looking towards
Monticello”, says Allen. “It’s a wonderful piece of land in arguably
the #1 place to live in the country!” (Allen, owner of the land, is a
licensed real estate agent in Virginia, doing business as Greg
Morgoglione.)

"I'm looking to trade up to a 7-year endowment for Song Sharing of
$250,000 annually to help expand upon our mission of Making Music More
Accessible™ he added. “I’m one of the first registered
REALANTHROPIST’s - real estate professionals giving back to their
communities”, Allen says. “It seems natural for a REALANTHROPIST™ to
offer up a piece of land in exchange for assistance and funding that
will grow the organization to a level I can not take it alone -
increasing the national impact of our programs.”

Since its inception, Song Sharing has operated on a small budget with
Allen at the helm, a few dedicated local musicians and business
sponsors, from as far away as Athens, GA and as well known as R.E.M.

Allen is pleased that SongSharing is now fulfilling two important
growth landmarks: releasing their first Studio Series CD and offering
SongSharing shows beyond Albemarle County and Virginia through touring
musicians like Proutt & McCormick.

Song Sharing is a unique 501c3 non-profit organization that has been
Making Music More Accessible (3MA) by bringing live musical
performances to a variety of underserved audiences. The 3MA Community
Venues program coordinates intimate on-site performances for seniors,
adults and children in special situations. Charlottesville area
"alternative venues" include the Kluge Children's Rehabilitation
Center, Region 10's Meadowcreek Center and Horizon Clubhouse, and a
number of senior living and care facilities. To learn more about
SongSharing, visit www.songsharing.org or call 434-979-SONG (7664).

- end –

Inspired by Kyle MacDonald's success - starting with one red paper clip and trading up to a house in 12 successive trades - I am looking to trade 8.623 acres of land for an arts endowment for SongSharing, a small non-profit I started several years ago.
The land is about 12 minutes south of Charlottesville on Old Lynchburg Road, has division rights, and two very nice homesites. It has been "perced" for one residence (and will likely handle two, although the prior owners did not ask the engineer to evaluate the land for two homes). The homesite at the top of the land has stunning south-easterly views over the mountain ridges - looking towards Monticello...
I'm looking to trade up to a 7-year endowment for SongSharing of $250,000 annually. SongSharing needs financial support as well as experienced non-profit guidance, an area in which I am limited. I have been doing this personally since 1994, and incorporated SongSharing as a 501c3 two years ago. I have been mystified at my inability to garner substantial support in the area - one known for its wealth and music. I chalk it up to my inexperience promoting and building an organization like this, and I am taking a renewed shot at gathering attention, assistance and funding for the organization.
You can visit www.songsharing.org for more info, and www.graspingatlaws.net for more info about me and to hear some of the music that SongSharing is responsible for producing.
Dance in the moment,
Greg
The craigslist posting is here: http://charlottesville.craigslist.org/bar/181494260.html

What agreat country - even I can blog... ;^)

http://www.gregallenmusic.blogspot.com/

Greetings,

Here is a link to a book you can have sent to your Representative in the House, where Impeachment proceedings must start. You pay book, they pay shipping.

http://www.mhpbooks.com/aoi.html
I've written Virgil Goode to let him know I'll happily buy him one if he does not have it.

Folks, you need to act. Now. And again tomorrow and on and on until that jackass is removed. Have you seen the Katrina briefing video they just released? That bastard knew, and he went to do a photo shoot with a country singer, and then he lied, lied, lied.

You know what's next - he'll accuse whoever released that tape of being a traitor and threatening our homeland.

If you're good with that, go back to watching disney so you catch the fairy tale ending...

I love you all , but we gotta get off our asses.

Write your reps every single day.

Peace.

I added a bunch of new song samples to listen to - these are final mixes from the new project - we plan to master this Wednesday!!

Please drop me a line and let me know what you think -greg@graspingatlaws.net

CD sales will benefit SongSharing

thanks - enjoy!

I have a weblog - a blog - dribble - tripe...

i wonder if anyone will find it...

http://contucius.blogspot.com/

I posted a clip of one of the new songs we are recording - let me know what you think! This is a very rough mix with pedal steel, bass and drums - the finished product will have Ian Gilliam's scorching guitar work in there as well! I'll post a mix of that as soon as I get it...

We have some backup singers coming in soon, and then we can mix and master!!