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Interview with pro guitarist Marty Walsh.By: Steve Veloudos |
| Interview with pro guitarist Marty Walsh. By: Steve Veloudos, Zebra Music Can you tell me how you got started in the music business? My father was a musician. He started out in Chicago doing gigs and actually did a radio show with Les Paul on WJJD playing rhythm guitar for Les. From there he played in some big bands and eventually moved to California and started his own casual business. My oldest brother John had a record deal when he was 19 years old on Warner Brothers records and had a regional hit. I was just kid at the time. My other brother Dan was a great guitar player and when he was in high school he had a gigging band. The bass player in the band was Jay Graydon. I started a band with Jay's brother Gary when I was in grade school. As the years passed Jay really became my mentor, as he was to quite a few musicians at the time. He suggested that I go to Valley College in Van Nuys and study, which I did. I wanted to follow in his and my brother Dan's footsteps and become a studio guitarist/songwriter. I worked really hard and got my first break doing a road gig with Seals & Crofts in 1976. On my time off from the road I started doing demo sessions for some songwriters that were signed with the legendary arranger Don Costa. I learned quite a bit from those demo sessions and others that I did for the publishing firm at A&M records. In 1979 my brother Dan wrote a tune for Yvonne Elliman who was doing an album and he asked me to play on the demo. Yvonne decided to record the tune and the producer, Steve Barri, called me and asked me to play on the record. I get to the session and the musicians were Jay Graydon, Jeff Porcaro, (who I had played with in our "teen" years) and Michael Omartian. We cut 3 songs and the next day Michael's office calls me up and books me for a week of sessions. In the next few months I kept getting calls from people saying "Jay Graydon recommended you for some sessions I have to do etc." And it just took off from there. What was it like touring with Supertramp? It was quite an experience. The guys in the band were great and very well respected. They had come off of the "Breakfast In America" and "Famous Last Words" albums and asked me to do the follow up album "Brother Where you Bound". I did the "Brother" tour and in Europe it was just a huge thing. I was really awestruck. The whole thing was so first class it was amazing. Plus the show was so good it was a great thing to be a part of. At the end of the tour we did a gig at The Albert Hall in London and Princess DI and Charles show up. They wanted to meet the band and so here I am in this lineup shaking hands with the prince and princess of England. It does not get any better than that. How did you get the Supertramp gig? This is a good story. Bob Siebenberg (C. Benberg) the drummer, was actually from Glendale California, my home town. We used to play in high school together. After he graduated high school he moved to London along with his brother in law Scott Gorham. Time goes by and Bob winds up in Supertramp and Scott winds up being the guitarist for Thin Lizzy. In 1979 I was playing at a club in LA and one night Bob and Scott walk in. I couldn't believe my eyes. Bob had moved back to LA along with the other members of Supertramp and Scott was visiting. They had just come from a mixing session of "Breakfast". We hung out that night and many other nights after and I started recording some songs at Bob's home studio. I got invited to a party at Bob's house and I jammed with all of the Supertramp guys and had a ball. The next thing I know Rick Davies calls and asks me to come down to Bill Schnee's Studio and play. They were working on the "Famous" album at the time. We had a good time that night and when Roger Hodgson left the band Rick asked me to do the guitar work on the "Brother" album. How did you get the John Fogerty gig? I had all of my studio gear with Andy Brauer, an LA cartage/rental guy. One day Andy calls me up and says "Fogerty is going on the road and Dann Huff has been asked to do the gig but he is going to turn it down. Maybe you should look into it." I knew drummer John Robinson who was in Fogerty's band. We had played on many sessions together and it always locked. I called him up and inquired about the guitar spot and he invited me down to play. I went down and played with the band and that was that. Can you elaborate on the work you did as a studio guitarist? Was it imperative that you were able to read music for these sessions? Not notation but you would have to be able to follow a chord chart. Most of the sessions that I do are record sessions. On records the arranger typically shows up with a "Master Rhythm" chart which is basically the chord changes with a bass part and keyboard notation. He talks to the drummer about the feel and asks the guitar guy to find something that fits. Sometimes there is a riff that he will write for the verse or chorus but I have found that the written stuff is for the foundation instruments and the guitar seems to be more of a "feel" thing. The TV/Movie world is where you really need to read because the parts are written by the composer and although I can read the TV/Movie thing has not been my main call. How did you get hired for these sessions? Word of mouth. As a guitarist I have found that I get hired because people want what I can bring to the plate. How were you paid for these sessions? On a major label record session with "A Team" musicians, everybody charges double union scale. When it is an "overdub" session you are considered the leader and you get double scale for that. On film, TV and Jingle sessions you typically charge scale plus doubles (meaning that if you do anything extra you get extra dough). Can you go into detail about the work you did as a composer and arranger? I don't know how much detail there is to tell. Basically I will be asked by a producer to arrange a song for an album and the producer will send me a demo. I take the song and do an arrangement via midi at my studio, write a chart and show up at the session with a demo tape and the chart and talk it down with the musicians trying to leave the creative element up for grabs. As far as composing goes I have some music houses in LA that will call me up and say "We need this type of thing for the underscore for a scene in a film-TV show" and I write and record it at my studio and hand them a DAT tape and they fly it into the show. How were you paid for these composer and arranger sessions? For the record arrangements there is a flat fee usually $500 to &1000 per arrangement depending on the label and artist, and for composing you get paid a "sync" fee that the TV/Movie company pays you to use it along with the "airplay" fee the you get from ASCAP/BMI. How did you get hired to do these composer and arranger sessions? Personal relationships with people in power. Connections are everything in this biz and I have some people that I have met over the years that like what I do and call me and ask me to write for specific projects. Can you go into detail about the songwriter sessions that you have been involved in? I love writing and have always sought out good people to write with. Most of the time it comes from an artist that I meet who is looking for new material and we get together and write a piece for a specific album. I also write for the creative outlet but the successes that I had have came from personal relationships with people that want to write and have a vehicle for getting it out to the public. How were you involved in the latest Leanne Rimes album? I know a great engineer, Greg Hunt, who is in Tyler Texas. We have been working together for 10 years doing projects that have come through his studio. One day he calls me up and says "I'm on the charts man, # 1 with this singer Leann Rimes." He tells me that he wants to book me for some sessions with another country singer he is producing so I go to Tyler and do these dates for him. The next thing I know he calls me and says "Leann heard your work on the last thing we did and wants you to put some rock stuff on her new album." So I went down and did this stuff for Greg, Leann dug it, and they called me back for the rest of the album. Can you tell us about your two projects "Lucias Tokas" and The Key? The Lucias CD came about when I received a call from a friend/producer Roby Duke. He had just put together a production company and asked me if I would be interested in doing some tunes for his company to shop. We started working on the project and in the middle of recording his financial backer bailed out. We were really digging the project though, so we just finished it up and manufactured the CD's. We never actually shopped for a deal and I sell the CD's through mail order at my website. The story behind "The Key" is really interesting. I have a friend Billy Sherwood who I have been writing with over the past 10 years. Billy had a band in the late 80's called "World Trade" which was pretty well received in Europe. In 1993 Billy and I decided to work on some new material and shop for a deal. We did seven songs and our manager at the time says "It's not alternative, I don't think that I can sell it". We were both pretty busy at the time so we let it sit for a bit. Billy then got an offer to do another World Trade album so he put the old band back together and they came out with World Trade II. Well, the title cut "Euphoria" was actually a piece that Billy and I did for our project that was just sitting there. He lifted the master and put it on the WTII album. About 2 years after it was released I get an email from a guy in Denmark asking me if I am the same Marty Walsh that wrote Euphoria with Billy. We start communicating via email and he asks me what other stuff I have written with Billy. I tell him that we have an album in the can and I send him a copy of the seven songs plus five more that we had written previous. He tells Magnus Soderkvist of MTM Records in Germany about these masters. Then I get an email from Magnus and send him a copy of the stuff and his label offers us a deal. We did the entire contract negotiations over email. Billy put together the master and I did the graphics, and we sent these materials to Germany. When they were received, MTM wired our banks the advance. We did all of this without ever even talking to the MTM people. All of the communication was done over the net! When the CD was released Magnus actually called me on the phone and said "I thought that since we have finished up the project I should at least say hello to you over the phone". Pretty amazing what the internet can do for ones career...... What advise can you give to the musician that is trying to "break into" the music business? I am glad that you included this question Steve because I think what I have to say here is the real deal. I feel that there is a theme to my success in the biz and the theme is "Personal Relationships". Having the tools to perform is great but, the music biz is 10% talent and 90% who you know. In other words when you play in the big leagues everybody is talented and able to do the job, and the guy who gets the gig "just happens to know somebody". As young players coming up I would say that you need to put the dedication into schmoozing or networking just like you put in the time to learn your instrument. There are a bundle of guys out there that could have done what I have done but I was just in the right place at the right time and made the most of the relationships that I acquired along the way. There many talented musicians out there the are driving trucks because they just could not get connected. I think the key to developing personal relationships is "visibility". You have to be out there in the world gigging and meeting people all of the time. Even if it is just hanging out at some good music clubs you never know who you might be introduced to. The other thing is to make sure that you don't put all of your eggs in one basket. If you rely on one or two people that hire you for gigs, and their work gets slow so does yours. In order to make a living in the music biz you have to have people calling from all directions because when one guys work gets slow another guy is burning. What is your contact information? If any of your readers would like to get in touch with me my email address is: [email protected] Also I would like to invite everybody to take a look at my website: http://www.seacoast.com/~marto8/ |