Keyboardist John Pedersen's fifth CD, "Groovidi", has arrived! On this smooth jazz masterpiece, infectious melodies are weaved into a soundscape of hypnotic grooves and funky beats. In addition to John's considerable skills, this album showcases the sax and flute skills of Adrienne Nims, the tastful guitar stylings of Andy Machin and the rock solid drum talents of Jeff Winckler. Radio stations, from coast to coast, have been adding songs from this album to their playlists and sales are increasing. Although the album is a solid smooth jazz release, the title track, "Groovidi", is also getting airplay on a number of chill-out-lounge specialty shows.
Things get started with "It's Good", an uptempo smooth jazz tune with great keyboard, sax and guitar work. The romantic "La Playa de Amor" follows and, along with Andy Machin's sensuous flamenco guitar, Adrienne Nims provides some very haunting flute work. The title track, "Groovidi", is next and features some cool interplay between Andy and John over the anchor of a acid jazz drum loop. This tune captures the groove of the "chill out lounge" genre that is currently permeating the jazz scene. "Touch of Blue" features Adrienne on sax and brings to mind the work of other great sax players like Dave Koz, Boney James and Paul Taylor. "A Hot Case of Chill" is John's tribute to Stevie Wonder complete with Stevie's trademark clavinet sound. Add some flute, synth horns and a red hot rhythm section, and the track just takes off! The next tune, "Monterey Getaway", slows things down a bit and is an enjoyable solo piano piece. "Critter Caprice" was inspired by a pesky raccoon that harrassed John and Sherri Pedersen during a camping trip last summer. The "critter" kept trying to get into their food, and it wasn't until the raccoon ate several Advils that he finally exited the campsite and, presumably, fell asleep. The song features Adrienne's flute work, John's piano and swinging drums by Jeff Winckler. Another piano instrumental, "First Anniversary", follows with a hauntingly beautiful melody. "Do You Mean To Tell Me?" offers a return to a strong and funky beat with horns, guitar, organ and electric piano. The album ends with yet another piano instrumental entitled, "Afterthoughts". This medley includes several song snippets that John had been working on as well as a piano version of his tune, "New Horizons" from his "When Sun Broke Through" album. On October 20, 2009, an animated video set to AFTERTHOUGHTS was a 3rd place winner at the annual SWAN LAKE: MOVING IMAGE & MUSIC AWARDS in Germany. Also, that song appears on a piano music compilation entitled, "Acoustic Visions".
During the Spring and Summer of 2007, "Groovidi" received generous radio airplay on 38 stations. During 2008, another 15 stations and podcasts began featuring tunes from this album. In early 2009, several more stations added songs from this release onto their playlists, including "Smooth Jazz 905" in Sydney, Australia. By early summer, Mark Stanley of "Sound Traxx", Lady J of "Hot Clicks" and Ted Hasuik (from "CAFE JAZZ") have all been playing tracks from this album. There have been several positive reviews (see the links to the left of this text to read them). Sales on Amazon, CDBaby and iTunes have been excellent.
John performed a concert at the Hot Java Cafe (San Diego area) on September 15th, 2007 and exposed his music to a number of new fans. Just prior to this, the North County Times entertainment reporter, Jim Trageser, did a great newspaper write-up on John (see the link to the left). More recently, in 2008, John performed at Borders (San Diego area) and won over more listeners.
This recording features crystal clear engineering work from Andy Machin and was recorded at Andy's Big Rock Studios. The songs flow into each other in a most cohesive manner. All in all, this is a very satisfying album to listen to, and is definitely John Pedersen's best recording to date.
John used a Baldwin acoustic grand piano during the recording of "Groovidi". To compliment the piano, a Korg Triton and the various synth modules available on Apple's Logic Pro 7 were used.
In August, 2008, John released a collection of piano tunes entitled, SELECTED PIANO WORKS, available for free at New Age Piano.Net. Please use the link at the left of this paragraph and listen to some great music. If you like it, you can download the mp3s for FREE!
John Pedersen is also a full-time piano instructor with over 40 students. He keeps his own chops up by practicing on the piano around 2-3 hours every day. He also stays inspired by hiking up in the hills frequently and enjoys wining and dining with his wife.
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