Tag Archives: Rock and Roll

3 DREAMERS AND A HORSE

 

3 DREAMERS AND A HORSE

Raul Rodriguez Jr. knew his calling – at age six, he wanted to play drums. Born in Miami, Florida to factory working parents who immigrated from Cuba in the 1940’s, he lived in a multi-cultural neighborhood where the musical influences where diverse.

Begging his parents for a drum set, they took him to a Pawnshop that also sold new musical equipment. The cost of the drum set in 1964 was $300.00.  “Impossible, we cannot afford this kind of money”, said his parents, so they gave a ten-dollar bill as down payment to put the drum set on Layaway.

His mother had a solution and a valuable lesson, “IF you really want them bad enough, we can make pastries and I can sell them.  Together we can go and make weekly payments from the profits.” One year later the drums were home!!

Raul’s musical influences are quite diverse: Rock and Roll, Soul, Latin, classical, country.  There seems to be no music that Raul doesn’t like.   Playing professionally since age nine, Raul also developed an interest in other instruments and technology. While always maintaining his love for drums, he was fascinated with the production and recording process.

Switching careers in 1987, Raul started to work in productions and recording, producing and arranging for several record labels and advertising firms.

E.G. Holmes started playing piano at about 8 years old. One day when he was out with his parents, they heard him playing an electric keyboard at Woolworth’s having no idea Eddie even knew the instrument. By age 10, his parents bought him a piano and he began composing. At age 11 he won the opportunity to sing and also perform a short solo in the Opera “La Boheme” with the Metropolitan Opera Guild.

Eddie sang in various choirs for several years and continued writing through his teens and began recording at age nineteen and performed in several cover bands.  Around that same time in 1980, Eddie had the great fortune of meeting Donald Fagen (Steeley Dan) through friends of friends. Mr Fagen reviewed a number of his songs and gave him excellent critical advice, which he carries with him whenever he’s composing a new piece.

Two years ago, Eddie found an on line collaboration studio and met Casia on line. Together and with the help of great musicians and a singer, their first song collaboration “Mysterious” was ranked number one on KOMPOZ.com.  Soon afterwards Raul and Eddie worked together on some early projects and the rest is history …

Casia is a lyricist from Canada working with solo performing artists, bands and hobby musicians from Russia to Australia. Compared many a time to great songwriters such as Dianne Warren and Paul Williams, Casia just smiles. Her use of captivating words and metaphors is winning the hearts of musicians around the world and not only is she prolific and inspiring, Casia’s passion to never give up is taking her places she never expected to go.  Dubbed “Master Of Collaboration”, Casia has written over 400 lyrics in the past three years, has 200 completed songs with 208 musicians worldwide.  She has completed three albums and has songs on various compilation albums.

Casia is at the heart of the business end as well organizing album projects from concept to completion and is always researching and looking for ways to promote her music to the masses.  Between writing business proposals and mini musicals, Casia is an international talent scout for an inaugural festival in St. Ausgustine, Florida in May 2012 and she always finds time to connect and provide advice on music collaborating.

On February 27^th in Cyprus, at the International Golden Melody song contest, Casia’s lyric “I’m Alive” was sung by award winning pop sensation Viktoria Linskaya of Moscow, Russia. Viktoria has been placing in pop festivals with Casia’s lyrics in Bulgaria, the Republic of Moldova and televised live on national TV in Romania. (results of Cyprus:  pending)