Back in the time when I had more time, I used to make music. I've gone through a few keyboards and MIDI controllers ranging from a Yamaha Clavanova with the old school MIDI ports to a hammer action M-Audio controller with bad hammer action to an M-Audio controller not even pretending to have hammers to what I have now, which is a Kawai MP5 stage piano, probably the best gear I had.

M-Audio served me well in the past. My cheapo MIDI controller and a pair of M-Audio monitors actually made the trip from Toronto to London to Lungi airport and then, on a really dangerous Soviet helicopter, to Freetown. I've now got a pair of Yamaha monitors.

Computer wise, I've moved up a few levels but my Vaio could use an update.

Despite wanting more and better equipment and software, I was nevertheless able to turn out some solid efforts in not-always-easy conditions using computers with old (single core!!!) chips.

This is a remix of Hayley Westerna's Prayer. It's a pretty minimalist affair with a few extra strings, some percussion and loops in the back.

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And this one might put you to sleep. The title is.... wait for it.... p13a.  The "p" stands for "project" and it was my 13th project, and the second version of it. Hence the "a".

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In June 2006, I visited a school in Lunsar, Sierra Leone. It was my first trip upcountry having arrived at the beginning of the month and we were there to do some inspections of schools where children had received grants for uniforms. I would later find out more about the importance of school uniforms within Sierra Leone culture (more on that another day).

One of the stops was a Catholic school and since we were guests, it of course meant we would be treated to a song. One of the teachers, Sister Frances, asked her class of third-graders who wanted to start with the song. No hands went up. She surveyed the room, picked out the least shy student, pointed at her and exclaimed: "This one is ready to sing!"

I returned with a few photos and video, material for what turned out to be my first music project in the country. I was able to rip the audio from the video after I returned to Freetown. Using a small laptop, a copy of Cakewalk's Sonar DAW, the Atmosphere soft synth, some drum loops and an evening hunched over a pretty basic M-Audio MIDI controller, I remixed it. It's here.

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