Saturday, September 12, 2020

A Very Candid Conversation with South of Winter

South for Winter (Nick (center), Alex (top left), and Dani (top right) (year unknown)

South for Winter is a folk band that started in 2018 in Nashville, Tennessee. The band is composed Colorado native Dani Cichon (vocals, mandolin), New Zealander Nick Stone (vocals, guitar), and Michigan cellist Alex Stradal. Dani’s vocals, Nick’s intricate guitar work, and Alex’s cello give South for Winter a unique sound. Dani’s lyrics alternate between romantic themes and dark themes (one of their upcoming songs is about America’s first female serial killer). This unique sound has been described as “folk blues,”  “folk jazz,” or “renaissance.” 

In 2018, South for Winter released a five-song EP titled How the Mountain. While making their EP, they met Grammy award-winning producer Matt Leigh, who helped them craft one of the songs on the EP, “Whispers in the Trees.” Since then, they have worked with Matt on recording their upcoming album Luxumbra. They have taken the time during the coronavirus pandemic to perfect this album. (In addition to being a gifted lyricist and singer, Dani also works as an ICU nurse in the Nashville Covid-19 unit.) South for Winter has released various singles in 2019 and 2020. 

In this candid conversation, we cover South for Winter’s beginnings, their future plans, as well as Dani’s lyrics and their unique musical sound. I want to thank Nichole Peters-Good from Good PR music group for setting up the interview. But most of all, I want to thank Dani and Nick for doing this interview.

Jeff Cramer: So whoever wants to take this first, I’ll start off with the first question: What got you interested in music?

Dani Cichon: Nick, do you want to go first?

Nick Stone: Yeah, sure thing. I got into music pretty young. Most of my family are classical musicians or jazz players in New Zealand. My uncle is an orchestra composer. Grandma has perfect pitch, so it was always kind of pretty standard in the family to follow down that line. So it wasn't until you get a bit older and you start finding the music that you really enjoy and it really connects with you. 

DC:  My family is also musical—not the same level as Nick's, but they are people who do other things for work. Music is on the side. My dad is actually a surgeon who plays four instruments, and both of my parents sing in the church choir together every Sunday. 

[My parents] always had us singing and taking music classes, but I was the first one in the family to really want to do it as part of a career. So I started writing when I was younger, and then realized that I could combine my love of music and my love of writing with songwriting. It was kind of this big revelation when I was around 12 years old that I could take poems and turn them into songs.

Since then I've kind of just been completely addicted to it, taking opera classes in high school and learning several instruments. And then getting to Nashville. I actually did a degree in nursing and became a nurse there, but I have always done music on the side.

JC: How did you two meet?

NS: I used to be a tour guide for an Australian volunteer organization. I was doing some work out in Peru and Dani was also there. I saw this beautiful girl playing with the guitar and I thought we should jam. That was kind of how we first met.

DC: Yeah, so the long and short of it is that we met in Peru. We actually dated long distance between New Zealand and the US for several years. Then I moved to New Zealand to continue the relationship and he moved to Nashville afterwards, and we started South for Winter here in Nashville.

NS: Yeah, that was when we met the cellist, Alex Stradal from Michigan.

DC: We pretty much just started the band when we met Alex. He is a classical cellist. He was looking for friends and connections, and we were looking for a graphics designer. So we posted on a Facebook page, “Hey, are there any graphic designers out there to help us create this website?” Alex posted and asked if we wanted a cellist instead. We had talked about wanting a cellist in the band but hadn't really pursued it. We first jammed with him in September 2017, and that's pretty much how we all met.

South for Winter (year unknown)

JC: How did you come up with the name South for Winter?

DC: Well, I was starting to figure out a way to describe all of these random places that we have met up in the past few years because the relationship has been in so many different places, and that's kind of the same with the music. Most of the places that our music really took shape was in the south, so South America, the South Island of New Zealand, and the South in the United States and in Nashville. So it kind of just felt like we were traveling south for the winter.

NS: Something like that.

JC: I like to discuss your first single, “Whisper in the Trees.” It’s on an EP, How the Mountain. On the cover of the EP there’s a mountain, and it looks like it's cold at the mountain. I’m also thinking of winter because of the band name. Yet, when I played “Whisper in the Trees,” the melody and guitar riffs reminded me of surf music. (Surf music is a subgenre of rock music associated with surf culture, particularly as found in Southern California.) 

NS: Yeah, yeah, it's definitely got a surf-folk element to it. Interesting. Yeah, well the mountain on the cover of the EP is Mount Cook or Mount Aoraki. It's the highest mountain in New Zealand, so we try to tie back into my homeland quite often. 

When it comes to the actual music that was a huge leap for us. I played in rock before, so it's kind of normal for me, but playing in a folk band was very unusual. "Whispers in the Trees" was the first song we did with our producer, Matt Leigh. It was just a great opportunity. He was doing a course for a sound engineering school here in town, and he was just offering a chance to do a free single.

We played him the song acoustically and he said, “How would you feel about putting a drum kit on this and bass?” I was like, “Yeah sure, give it a shot.” And we turned out to the studio, and the cellist got on the bass and a drummer turned up with a drum kit. We ran through it a couple of times. (To hear “Whispers in the Trees,”  click here.)

It was the first time we played the song in that format. So we basically gave our producer all the options in the world to see what he could create. And I was really quite blown away. It's like you can still hear all the acoustic instrumentation, but you can hear a band as well. I think that helps in the studio recording environment. Whereas live, I don't think you necessarily need all the additional players.

DC:  Yeah, when played live, that song tends to feel more gypsy. Because we play as a trio, it's acoustic guitar and tambourine and cello, but in the studio setting that gypsy sound translates more into surf when you add an electric guitar. (“Gypsy music” is recognized as instrumental music played in Eastern European countries notable for its style in idiom and ornamentation. It is usually played in coffeehouses, restaurants, at parties, and sometimes on stage.)

It's really interesting because that happened with another song, “Fallen Seeds,” we just recorded for the album, which will be coming out in a couple of months. "Fallen Seeds" has always been our South America song. We wrote it in Peru. It's very gypsy, and then it becomes a surf-folk song when you add in all the other elements and some grooving electric guitar.

JC: I want to talk about the guitar work in these songs. Usually in folk music, a guitarist strums a few chords. But the guitar work is very intricate here. There’s a lot more notes here than there is usually in folk music.

DC: Yeah, that is all Nick. It was one of the things that really drew me to writing with Nick in the first place. He has these guitar parts that already had a melody in them. He has these really creative guitar parts with these riffs that were so easy to write to because they already felt like a song . . . like you could hear the song in them. He is really good at that. 

NS: Well, thank you. It's definitely a relationship that goes both ways. If there is a melody that Dani has created, I can incorporate the melody into the guitar parts that I'm playing and then add a harmony to the melody that I'm playing.

I'm not the fastest guitarist out there, but I like creating interesting guitar parts. Alex, the cellist, is really great too because he alternates between playing bass lines and harmony lines. Yeah, I really appreciate the compliment on that. Thank you.

JC: Your guitar riffs on “All We Have” remind me of one of my favorite guitarists Ritchie Blackmore, who played guitar in Deep Purple and is now with Blackmore’s Night. Ritchie likes to come up with riffs that were inspired by classical music. “All We Have” has guitar riffs that sound inspired by classical music.


“All We Have” single cover (November 2019)

NS: A lot of these riffs were written over a decade ago. In fact, I came out with a lot of these ideas when I first started getting into acoustic guitar when I was 9 or 10 years old. But it's brought to life in such a different way when you play with other instruments. When you play with a cello, it gives you this extra sense of melody and lead and drive to it. So I think the instrumentation that we have leans itself to classical motifs all the time. (To hear “All We Have,” click here.)

I've always really enjoyed the sound of an orchestra arrangement. Alex does maybe two or three cello parts and all of the sudden it sounds like we just hired a whole string section. We're very, very lucky to have the talent that we've been able to run into, and I think that is largely in part to making the move to come to Nashville.

JC: The other thing I noticed in the How the Mountain EP is that Nick occasionally sings lead vocals. With the singles that came after the EP, it is almost entirely Dani taking up the lead vocals.

NS: Yeah, for the most part for me personally it’s nice to be able to focus on riffs rather than doing both myself. I also like to focus more on the guitar than singing a lot of the time as well. There is definitely a lot more lead vocals for Dani on our upcoming album. That's all right. I'm still learning how to sing. I'll get there one day, mate.


South for Winter  (year unknown)

JC: I also want to talk about your single "Ten Black Crows.” I think it’s interesting because I listen to heavy metal, and even though “Ten Black Crows” isn’t metal, it doesn’t sound like you would need to do a lot to turn the song into metal. (To hear “Ten Black Crows,” click here.)

DC:  Yeah, there is a song that you'll hear later called “Black Widow in White Lace.” It's actually the story of Lavinia Fisher, who is the first documented female serial killer in the United States. That’ll be coming out in about two months. And that one you'll be like, “This is a heavy metal song.”

NS: It’s definitely metal folk, yes. Like there is no other way to put it. If you like the "Ten Black Crows" song, I think you'll probably enjoy "Black Widow" because it takes the concepts that you heard in that song to another level.

JC: Dani, you’ve written some very dark lyrics that wouldn’t be out of place in heavy metal. First, there is "Ten Black Crows.” Another song is “Devil Is a’Calling,” and now “Black Widow.” Where do all the dark lyrics come from? (To hear “Devil Is a’Calling,” click here.)

DC:  I love dark folk, and it's weird because I am not a dark person. I mean, I work as an ICU nurse and I deal with a lot of heavy stuff, but I have always loved crime shows, thrillers, and listening to heavy music. I’ve always been really attracted to dark stuff in storytelling songs. And I always say I learned in literature class when I was in high school that a good story never ends happily. 

I think maybe I'm taking that literally, but it's just so much fun to write those kind of songs. I used to write pop songs. If you look at my old music on Spotify, you wouldn't think it was the same person because it's all very up, very happy. I just started to get bored with these pop songs as a songwriter. I think with these murder ballads and these stories, you can't run out of topics. It's so much more fun to write, and it's mostly what I listen to as well.

JC: Another interesting thing I found lyrically was the single “Twine.” What I find interesting is that you rhyme “twine” with “mine” or “your kind.” Now “twine” is not thought of as a personal word, but the words “mine” and “your kind” are thought of as personal words. What was sort of the inspiration in that? 

DC:  That song was one of those cool songwriting moments that don't happen often enough where the song kind of just falls in your lap. I was actually listening to a lot of the Paper Kites. Do you know the Paper Kites?

JC: No, I haven't heard of them, but I'll check it out.

DC:  Such a beautiful, beautiful folk band out of Australia. And they have a lot of really gorgeous songs with these running bass lines going through them.

Nick was at work, and his guitar was on the wall, so I took his guitar, sat down, and started strumming some notes and ended up being inspired by them. There was this melody . . . so I just hit my recorder on my phone and was playing a few things and singing along. And I just kept having this image of a beaver and a sparrow.

JC: Oh really?

DC:  Whenever I introduce it at shows, I say this is a love story of a beaver and a sparrow, and it doesn't go well for the beaver. It is the love story I've told from the beaver's perspective in terms of trying to create something stable, trying to create something here on earth, but it's just not meant for the sparrow. They're just two different kinds of creatures. I think that's applicable to many love stories, where there is nothing wrong with either one—they just need different things. (To hear “Twine” live, click here.)

"Twine” cover (April 2019)

NS: Yeah, now that you know it's about a sparrow and a beaver it might change the perspective on the lyrics for you.

JC: It sure does. Even though “Twine” is about animals, two of your songs—“To Be Next To You” and your most recent single “Always You”—appear to be love songs about humans. Dani, while you do write some dark lyrics, there are also some romantic lyrics you write as well. (To hear a live version of “To Be Next To You,” click here.)

NS: It's like we have happy folk songs and murder ballads. I think there is a good balance between the two.

DC:  We actually named our upcoming debut album about the balance between happy folk songs and murder ballads. On every show that we played in 2019, we would ask people, “What would you name this album based on what you heard?” One person who I actually grew up with Colorado Springs said, “You should call it Luxumbra, which is Latin for “the light and the shadow.” So the name of the album is going to be Luxumbra.

JC: Also the recent single “Always You” has a faster tempo than most of your songs. 

DC:  Well, “Always You” really picks up the energy and people can clap along with it, so that was definitely the inspiration for that. We’ve done a lot of touring and have been lucky enough to play with a lot of different incredible folk artists. You look at all this interaction. You look at someone tapping their feet. Look at someone moving in their seat and clapping along, and you want something like that in a set. 

The idea was really inspired by everything going on right now. In all these dark times, there is that one person or pet or whatever it is that is your companion that you can hold on to. I really feel like we needed to balance. None of us love writing. I mean, I don't mind it, but Alex doesn't love playing happy songs.

NS: It's no secret that the single was Alex's least favorite song we've written. But I think as songwriters it's good to challenge yourself and not just stay in the same realm of what you're comfortable with. So yeah, we definitely try to look analytically as well at what people will listen to. It's like we can't just have five murder ballads in a row, you know? That might get a little depressing. (To hear “Always You,” click here.)

JC: I like to get back to the debut album coming out in a couple of months. Is it different or similar to your earlier EP How the Mountain?

NS: The album is more evolved. 

DC:  Yes. How the Mountain was a test for us. It was the first time we recorded as a full band. Besides recording it in our closet in our apartment, we also put together that EP. We wrote the songs and recorded them within two months. 

NS: Yeah, it was pretty quick turnaround, so we did a lot more producing our own music on that EP, and then we sent it to our producer to make a mix out of the parts we created. Although, I still love that EP, and I think it's got a lot of great, great moments to it. 

I just think that lot of the ideas are more thought out and get  executed on the album largely in part to the studio equipment we had and the time that we put in to preproduction as well.

DC: And we’ve been working on this album for almost two years.

NS: Two years.

DC:  So we end with all this studio minds on it, having our producer Matt Leigh constantly in the studio and challenging us.

NS: Yeah, Matt did a phenomenal job saying like, “Hey, you guys are musicians. Why don't you create interludes?” Something that ties the album together and makes it a little bit different, or draw in a motif from one track to another. The album feels like a well thought-out piece of a  body of work rather than just a lot of singles.

When you hear Luxumbra as a full album I hope that it will take you on a bit of a journey where you still hear the three-piece acoustic folk band, but also that we are in a studio and built the music as big as we can. 

And yeah, I'm really, really excited to release our upcoming single, “Stone” because I think that’s one of my favorites off the album. Our drummer used African custom instruments on that one. It was really quite a beautiful thing that he created. (To hear “Stone,”  click here.)

JC: Definitely curious to hear that.

NS: Well, the cool thing is that our drummer is primarily a classic rock player, but he’s also been a drum teacher for years, and he plays very classical percussion style as well. 

DC:  How the Mountain felt pretty folk. I mean, there are drums in it and some rock elements, but in general it's somewhat like a folk album. Whereas Luxumbra definitely feels more like a folk rock album, but we tried to make it really diverse. It's got a jazz track on it. Actually, one of the first songs that Nick and I wrote is a straight-up jazz track. We really tried to push ourselves to write something that we hadn't created.

NS: Yeah, that jazz song has a guitar part from a song that I had worked on in my early twenties. And so I played her the guitar part, and she just said, “Don't sing . . . don’t, you know, you'll corrupt the music with your melody.”

DC:  He has some ideas.

NS: I think that's really awesome because it brings these ideas back to life in a completely different way. That's the joy of collaborating, you know? So it's been a real labor of love working on this album, as all albums are. But yeah, we're super excited to release it this year, to finally get it out there, you know?

JC: I'm going to shift a little . . . Dani, I understand you are a nurse who works in the Covid-19 unit. There are no words to say how impressed I am by that, because that's really frontline work in dealing with the coronavirus.

DC: Yeah, it's been a weird time to be between both worlds, where you see your musician friends' livelihood getting destroyed, but then you see the other side and how serious the virus is. We’re in Nashville and most of our friends are musicians. Each of us has gone through our own “corona depression,” as I call it. 

We've had all these really exciting plans. We were actually in New York City in March and played a sold-out show with this amazing artist. This was the night before the city shut down with Covid-19. 

South for Winter on tour (year unknown)

And at that show we were getting all these offers for summer concerts, and we were like, “Oh great, we can each go part-time or quit our jobs within the next years and tour all the time.” All of that is gone.

But at the same time, it let us really focus on the album that we're releasing, because we would have been so busy this summer. It's given us the time to focus on it. It's given us time to think about our plans for the future, our online presence, and we now have a manager and a publicist and a distribution deal that we might not have had time to really think about before.

And also I'm an ICU nurse. I did one crisis nursing assignment in a Covid-19 ICU, and then I've worked in the Covid-19 ICU in Nashville. And so I think sheer gravity of the situation with how sick those patients are and how real and scary the virus is . . . 

So we're not touring at all until it's safe. It's just not worth it to even play a couple of shows in-house, even if you're trying to be safe. I think other bands might be touring a little sooner than us, but because of my perspective and what I've seen, I think we should be the most careful. But we're just lucky to be safe and be healthy, and I think that's all we're thinking of right now.

NS: We just bought a new van. We got a ProMaster Dodge Ram, so we're kind of getting that out for touring hopefully next year. Yeah, so we’re just working that out, like how to convert that van to be exactly what we want to take on the road. We're looking at building a stage on top of the van so that we can do socially responsible concerts.

DC: We'll be six feet away.

NS: We'll be always six feet away from everyone, that's right.

JC: Hopefully you’ll be on the road soon.





A Very Candid Conversation with David Rosenthal



David Rosenthal has the gig of a lifetime. Since 1993, he has been the keyboardist in the Billy Joel Band. David has also toured with several other artists including Cyndi Lauper, Robert Palmer, and Enrique Iglesias. 

David had a fast start with his career. Shortly after graduating from renowned Berklee College of Music, a tape of David’s piano recital made its way to guitarist Ritchie Blackmore. Ritchie, who had previously played with Deep Purple, created the rock band Rainbow and invited David for an audition to be the keyboardist. It was during his time with Rainbow (1981 to 1984) that I became familiar with David. I particularly like his keyboard opening of “Can’t Let You Go” (1983), as well as his playing on Rainbow’s concert in Tokyo in 1984.

In 1984, Rainbow dissolved, so David teamed up with Little Steven (aka Steven Van Zandt of the E Street Band and actor on The Sopranos). Shortly after his world tour with Little Steven, he played with Cyndi Lauper and Robert Palmer. After playing with these big names, David formed a melodic rock band called Red Dawn, which included Chuck Burgi who had played with David in Rainbow and future Rainbow member Greg Smith. Red Dawn attracted listeners all around the world with their 1993 album Never Say Surrender. (You can find my interview with Chuck Burgi here.)

In 1993, David landed his gig with Billy Joel. Despite the high-profile gig with the Piano Man, David also toured with Enrique Iglesias (where he would reunite with Chuck Burgi again) and worked with guitar virtuoso Yngwie Malmsteen. David later joined the group Happy the Man for a reunion album and series of concerts when their original keyboardist, Kit Watkins, decided not to participate. 

Since then, David has continued with Billy Joel, including a historic concert at the closing of Shea Stadium as well frequent sold out shows at Madison Square Garden. In addition to his gigs, David has done keyboard rig design and synth programming for various artists such as Bruce Springsteen, Lady Gaga, and Phil Collins.

In this candid conversation, we covered David’s extensive career from Rainbow to Billy Joel. I want to thank David for his time. In addition, a special thanks to David for letting me use photos from his website. 

Jeff Cramer: What prompted your interest in music?

David Rosenthal: I was about seven years old and I asked my parents for a piano. We didn't have one in my house at the time. I have absolutely no idea why, but I was determined to play piano, and I kept pleading with my parents to get one. And finally they did and I started piano lessons. But I don't know where the inspiration came for me to want to play that particular instrument . . . I guess I had some sort of calling to it.

JC: Were you a classically trained pianist?

DR: Yes, I was classically trained but not from the beginning. When I first started playing, I only wanted to learn songs that were on the radio. So I learned how to read sheet music—I learned all the chords, I could read anything, and I learned how to solo. I was already playing in bands by the time I was 12. I started studying some jazz when I was 13. I really got into classical when I was about 14, and I dove in deep. I have a very extensive education, but I didn't start with classical right at the beginning.

JC: I understand you studied at Berklee College of Music. 

DR: Yes. I continued my study there. Berklee is mostly known as a jazz school, but they do have all other types of things there. I studied jazz, classical, synthesis [“synthesis” is the technique of generating sound from a synthesizer], audio recording, and orchestration. It was a great school and I got a really well-rounded education there. 

JC: A tape of you playing a Liszt piece when you were in Berklee made its way to Ritchie Blackmore. His reaction was being a little fearful that you probably wouldn't want to join Rainbow because Rainbow was rock and the tape of you playing was classical. 

DR: Oh, really?

JC: Yeah. Ritchie said, "He's gonna be too good for us," and at the same time, Ritchie wanted a keyboardist who was oriented in rock and classical music. After auditioning several keyboard players that didn’t work out, he finally called you in.

DR: That's funny because the cassette tape that I sent him, which got me the audition, had my classical piano recital from Berklee on one side of the tape. And on the other side was my cover band at that time, which was playing all rock and roll songs.

I assume he listened to both sides of the tape. Maybe he didn't, I don't know. In any event, the tape got me the audition with Ritchie. But that’s interesting, I've never heard that side of the story before.

It's funny because I totally have rock and roll running through my veins. I grew up on rock and roll and I love it. It sounds like a cliché but it's true. I studied classical because I wanted to become the best player I could possibly become and I wanted to take my playing to a point of virtuosity. But I never had any intention of making a career as a classical pianist. However, my teachers at Berklee were suggesting that I become a classical pianist. I was like, "No way. That's not at all what I want to do." I just wanted to elevate my playing up to that high level. 

JC: I have interviewed several people who played with Ritchie and one thing just about everyone tells me is that they have a story about Ritchie. What's your Ritchie story?

DR: I endured some of the traditional initiation things that he does to all new Rainbow members. But I had a great relationship with Ritchie. He really respected my musicianship and I had tremendous respect for him and we got along great. I know a lot of people didn't have similar stories to that, but I always got along fine with Ritchie. Yeah, he's a prankster—he does his pranks and everything—but when it came time for the music, we really clicked on a lot of levels I think, musically.

JC: I can hear the chemistry between you two when I listen to Rainbow. I particularly like the keyboard opening you do for “Can't Let You Go.”

Rainbow (Dave in middle) (1984)

DR: Yeah. That was actually improvised on a pipe organ sound that I played on an Emulator. Ritchie and I both loved that sound. We wanted to do something with it, and he asked me to create an intro like something reminiscent of Bach's Toccata in D minor, a piece which we both love. But it needed to be something that would work well for “Can't Let You Go,” and that’s what I came up with. [Click here to hear “Can’t Let You Go.”]

JC: One of the most memorable times in Rainbow was when the band did “Difficult to Cure” [a rock instrumental of Beethoven’s Ninth] with the Japanese orchestra. What are your memories on that?

DR: Oh yeah, that whole experience was a lot of fun. I did all the orchestration for the live performance of “Difficult to Cure.” We got to Japan and rehearsed with the orchestra. We were doing two shows at the Budokan and both the shows were sold out, so we didn't need to announce the orchestra in order to sell the shows. We did it unannounced; it was really a surprise to everybody. 

And all of a sudden at one point in the show, we started the beginning of “Difficult to Cure” and it gets to that big chord . . . we're all holding out the chord and suddenly there's a curtain that opens behind us and there's an entire orchestra lit in rainbow colors. The whole audience gasped and went, "Whoa." On the live album you can hear the crowd doing that. And then we launched into the song with the orchestra playing along with the band.  In the middle of the song the band stopped and the orchestra played an excerpt from Beethoven’s 9th. The whole thing was really cool. [To hear “Difficult to Cure” with the Japanese orchestra, click here.]

JC: Who did you play with after Rainbow?

DR: After Rainbow was Little Steven. I did a world tour with Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul in ’84. 

David (top right) in Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul (1984) 

JC: And how did that come about?

DR: Well, Rainbow had come to an end because Ritchie decided to put Deep Purple back together to do a reunion. So I was looking around to see what might be out there for something I could get involved in next. I crossed paths with Steven Van Zandt, and he invited me to do the tour with him. So that's how that went. [To hear Little Steven’s cover of Black Uhuru’s “Solidarity,” click here.]

JC: And then I know you worked with Cyndi Lauper. 

DR: Yes. That came a couple years later. After Steven's tour ended, I produced an album for a band called Hammerhead in Germany for EMI Records. I was writing a lot of music and put together my own band called Infinity. Some of the songs from my Infinity days made their way into the group I later formed, Red Dawn.  But in those early years I was working with singer Mitch Malloy and writing songs for Infinity. Then I got the gig with Cyndi Lauper on the True Colors tour. That was 1986 to 1987. [To hear a 1986 live performance of “Time After Time,” click here.]


David (far left) in Cyndi Lauper’s band (1986)


JC: Okay. What's interesting is going from Rainbow, then Little Steven, and now Cyndi Lauper. All three acts are different musically.

DR: Yeah, well . . . they're completely different. But I have a lot of musical styles that I'm very comfortable with. I love pop music just as much as I love rock and hard rock. And there’s lots of keyboard parts in Cyndi’s music. The band was great—it was all top-notch musicians. She was at the peak of her career at that time, so yeah, it was kind of cool. Yes, it was completely different, but why not?

JC: And then  you also worked with Robert Palmer.

                David (left) and Robert Palmer (1988)

DR: Yeah. I did the Heavy Nova tour with him. That was also a great tour with great musicians. We are actually in The Guinness Book of World Records for that tour. On one leg of the tour we did 56 shows in a row in 56 cities in 56 nights. It was pretty crazy. [To watch a video single of “Early in the Morning,” click here.

JC: Now to the group Red Dawn you mention earlier . . . when I had interviewed Chuck Burgi about Red Dawn, he had said you were the musical leader of this band. How did the whole Red Dawn project get started?

DR: Right . . ., I had been looking for a deal for quite some time for my previous group Infinity, but we weren't able to get a deal at that time, so everybody went in their own direction. I eventually ended up getting a deal in Japan to do the Infinity record, but Infinity no longer existed at that point.  The label was fine with that, and they said, "Just put together a new band." I said, "Okay." And so I signed the deal in Japan with EMI-Toshiba and I put together a really, really amazing band which became Red Dawn. I asked Chuck if he would be willing to do it. I didn't even know if he was available or if he would consider it, but he was really enthused about it and he was a great addition to the band. 

There was Greg Smith on bass who also went on to play with Rainbow in the nineties. Greg's an awesome bass player and a great guy. That was the first time Greg and Chuck had met, and right from the first day when the two of them played together it was magic instantly. I knew immediately that was the rhythm section I wanted. 

I had worked on some other projects with Tristan Avakian, a great guitar player from New York; he was my first choice for guitar. Larry Baud was the last piece of the puzzle to put into Red Dawn. He was just a tremendous singer. I just think the band was great, and I'm very proud of the album we made Never Say Surrender. [To hear a live acoustic version of “I’ll Be There” in Japan with David on keyboards and Larry on vocals, please click here.]

JC: When I interviewed Greg Smith about Red Dawn, he told me he was in a foreign country—I forget which one—when he was asked to autograph a Red Dawn CD. 


David (far left) in Red Dawn (1992)


DR: Yeah, we have quite a following around the world. Never Say Surrender made a lot of noise over time. It’s a shame that it didn't really do well when it was first released because maybe then we would've had a different trajectory than we did. But the record was very highly critically acclaimed, and it was loved by a lot of AOR fans all over the world. [“AOR” stands for “album-oriented rock” focusing on album tracks by rock artists. AOR evolved from hard rock and progressive rock.]

JC: So after that, I understand you met Billy Joel. How did that gig land?

DR: I heard that Billy was looking for a keyboard player. You know, I was at that point in my career when my name popped up in those circles when somebody was looking for a keyboard player. So I was invited for a closed audition and I beat the other guy out. I got the gig and I started on the River of Dreams tour in 1993. [To hear “Pressure” from the River of Dreams tour, click here.]


The Piano Man and David (right) (1993)


JC: I've watched some videos of Billy's early shows and there was only him on piano and keyboards. Were you the first keyboard player to have played alongside with Billy Joel? 

DR: No, I wasn’t. It was Billy on all keyboards in the early days. Sometimes he would play piano and then he would jump to a Minimoog [a Minimoog is a type of keyboard] and a couple of other keyboards. And sometimes some of his other bandmates would double on keyboards. But he did have a keyboard player through the eighties on some of his tours. Dave Lebolt was first, and then Jeff Jacobs did the Storm Front tour and then I started on the River of Dreams tour. But yeah, it’s been 27 years that I’m with him now, by far the longest of any keyboard player that he's had.

JC: One thing I've heard about Billy live is that even his own band doesn’t know what songs he’ll be playing in concert.

DR: Well, we do have a set list, but he will sometimes veer off it or he'll throw a song in spontaneously or just start playing something. Sometimes he'll play a song that we haven't done in a long time, and sometimes he'll even play a song that we never did before and we just go for it. So it's a lot of fun. Everybody in the band is a phenomenal musician, but it keeps us on our toes and it's really great because we never know what he's gonna do next. As a result of that, no two shows come out the same, and that makes it a lot of fun. 

I think the audience really picks up on that and they love it too because they can see that we're really up there playing and we're just going for it. The audience loves that and they appreciate the spontaneity of what we're doing as well. That’s a big part of what Billy does, and it takes a unique group of players to be able to do that. I think we have a really unique chemistry within Billy's band—it's really a unique band. 

JC: What's your keyboard setup for playing with Billy?

DR: Well, all the keyboards that I’m using on stage are MIDI controllers [a MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) controller is any hardware keyboard that transmits MIDI data to devices to trigger sounds and control parameters of an electronic music performance], and I'm running MainStage [a music application by Apple which is designed for use in live performance]. All the sound sources are coming from a computer, but because computers can crash, I have a second computer system running simultaneously at all times should that ever happen.

JC: I understand that you've done some keyboard rig programming for other artists like Bruce Springsteen.

DR: Yeah. Since programming is a big part of what I do, over the years not only have I done it for myself but I've also done it for several other keyboard players and some big artists. They bring me in to program their setups, design keyboard rigs, things like that. I'm always pushing the envelope of technology and I love it. I’ve had a lot of experience with redesigning my own rigs over the years, so I have been called to do some of that for other artists as well. 

JC: I want to talk about some of the other artists you played with after you initially played with Billy. First, let's talk about guitar legend Yngwie Malmsteen.

DR: Right. Well, I played on a couple of tracks for Yngwie’s Inspiration album. When we were working on that album, he started telling me about his concerto that he was writing, so he brought me aboard as the orchestrator for his concerto. It was a big, big project. We first recorded his Millenium Concerto Suite in Prague with the Czech Philharmonic in 1997, and then we recorded it again in Japan live with the New Japan Philharmonic. I think that was 2001. [To hear Yngwie and the orchestra’s “Icarus Dream Fanfare,”  click here.]


David (right) and Yngwie Malmsteen

JC: Well, I've noticed throughout your career you got to play with a lot of guitar greats.

DR: Yes, I've been fortunate to play with a lot of great guitar players maybe in part because I have a deep understanding of guitar. In high school I played guitar as well as keyboards. When my band played a song that didn’t have keyboards in it, I would just play guitar. But I kind of gave guitar up when I met Steve Vai because he and I played in a band together at Berklee. When I saw how he played guitar, I thought, "You know what? I'm gonna put this instrument down and just do what I do best" [laughs] and that was keyboards. 

So even though I don't play guitar professionally as part of my career, I do have a deep understanding of the instrument. I think that comes in really handy when I play with a lot of guitar greats like Ritchie, Yngwie, Steve Vai. and many others. I've just been fortunate to play with so many great guitar players over the years, and they all seem to like what I do.

JC: In addition to guitar greats and Billy Joel, you also played with Enrique Iglesias. 

DR: Right, that tour was in 1997. Several of the guys in Billy's band were involved in Enrique’s band. I was playing with Chuck Burgi again. We had played together in Rainbow, then Red Dawn, then Enrique Iglesias, and as you know, Chuck would also end up in Billy's band. [To watch the video for Enrique’s “Solo en ti,” click here.]


David and Enrique on keys (1997)

JC: I understand you were involved in the Movin’ Out Broadway show.

DR: Yes, I was on the creative team for that. I was associate music supervisor and I did the synth programming. I was offered a position to play in the band, but I didn't want to do it because it was eight shows a week. I preferred to just be on the creative team and not have to do that. Although, I did sub a bunch of times. I did quite a number of shows as a sub on Broadway and also on the touring production. They would also bring me around to work on all the touring productions of the show. There was a national tour of Movin’ Out in the US, then there was a non-union tour in the US, and there was a West End production in London. I was involved in all those productions as well as the Broadway production. Another part of my job was to train each of the piano players to be sure they were playing Billy’s parts correctly.

JC: While Movin’ Out was going on, you got to play with Happy the Man. That band had been one of your favorites.

DR: Yeah, they were one of my favorite bands of all time. Happy the Man is a progressive rock instrumental band. When I was at Berklee, I studied their music heavily and transcribed a lot of [keyboardist] Kit Watkins’s solos. I think I wore out their records listening to them so many times! The band was a big inspiration to me musically, and their keyboardist Kit Watkins was a big inspiration to me as a keyboard player. Unfortunately, by the time I found out about Happy the Man, they had already broken up. 

In any event, fast forward 20-somewhat years later—I think it was 1999 or 2000—and Happy the Man were gonna do a reunion. I had become friendly with the guys over the years. Kit Watkins didn't want to do the reunion, so I was like, "Hey, I'm your guy. I'll do it. I know all the songs." They were thrilled with that. We got together and we played, and the chemistry clicked immediately and we started writing songs. Most of the song “Contemporary Insanity,” which is the lead track on the album,  I had written when I was at Berklee wishing that I could someday be in Happy the Man. At that time, it  was an impossibility because they had already broken up and didn't exist anymore. 

So when it was time to actually play with them, I said, "You know, I got this song called “Contemporary Insanity” that I think is pretty cool . . . see what you guys think of it." And they absolutely loved it. So I polished it up, and it became the first song on the album that I did with them, The Muse Awakens. I also wrote a couple of other songs on that record. It was just a thrill to be able to play with those guys and to be able to make a record with one of my favorite bands of all time. 


David recording Happy the Man’s The Muse Awakens (2004)

JC:  Now getting back to Billy Joel . . . the concerts with him had hit a new dimension in recent years. There was a live performance at Shea Stadium, and then of course there's now the residency at Madison Square Garden. 

DR: Shea Stadium was an incredible experience. I mean, it was two shows and all of these amazing guest artists came up. It was sorta capped off at the end with Paul McCartney. To be able to play with a Beatle at Shea Stadium was really a cool moment. I grew up in New Jersey. Shea Stadium is a place that has a lot of history, not only for baseball but also for concerts. And it was really cool that we did those shows. At the Shea Stadium shows, we had a string orchestra as well which I did the arranging for. It was just a really, really cool event, definitely one of the highlights of my career. 

And now to be able to do the residency at Madison Square Garden has been incredible. We've done 73 shows sold out in a row, interrupted only by the pandemic. When this is finally over, we'll go back and continue, but who knows when that will be. We all hope it will be soon. As I mentioned, I grew up in New Jersey, and when I was a kid I used to go to concerts at Madison Square Garden. I saw so many great shows there.

Billy, David (back left center) and famed violinist Itzhak Perlman (right) at Madison Square Garden (2015)

Now, to be able to play there so many times has been an amazing experience. I mean, 73 shows on this run alone, but over the course of my whole career, I've played there well over 100 times. It's really something that I don't take for granted because most musicians are lucky to play there in their lifetime even once. And to be able to play there over 100 times, it's pretty special and I never take it for granted. I always try to take a mental snapshot of the whole picture of everything when I'm on stage each time to really write it into my brain and really remember how fortunate I am to be in involved in something like this. [To hear Billy Joel’s “My Life” performed at Shea Stadium, please click here.]

JC: I also saw that Billy has trusted you to do piano transcriptions of his songs. 

DR: Well, I'm actually still in the process of this. I'm correcting his entire sheet music catalogue, which has been sold for many years and has had tons and tons of mistakes and wrong notes and all kinds of crazy stuff. He trusted me to just go through the entire catalogue and make sure that all of his sheet music that's in print is correct. I'm going album by album—not in consecutive order, but I've finished seven of his albums so far and I'm working on the eighth one now. I'm gonna keep going until I get through the whole catalogue. 

JC: You’ve been with Billy a long time and he's trusting you to do the transcriptions. What do you think has been the key to your success with Billy?

DR: I just think that he saw my ability and my deep knowledge of his music and the job that I was doing as a band member, and  eventually he made me musical director. He knows that I really know his music inside and out. He knows that I also have a deep understanding of his music as a piano player myself, so he trusts me to make sure that it's all correct in print. I'm quite honored to have that job.

JC: My final question is similar to a question I asked earlier. It’s not just that you have played with many musicians, but the many musicians you’ve played with are different musically from each other. What do you think your success in playing different genres is due to?

DR: I'm very comfortable in a lot of different genres. The one thing I think is true across the board with any style of music is that it's great if it’s done right. And music can be great in any style. I enjoy the challenge of reinventing myself as a player and for the types of sounds that I use and what I can contribute to all of the different roles that I've had over the years. So I wouldn't say that I love anything more than anything else. I love music, and I've been very fortunate to play in some great bands with some great artists. I think every situation I've been in is special and unique unto itself.