Believe is the name of my new album. It is a collection of original songs centered around belief, hope, and resilience. Interestingly, this project was not on the radar and evolved quite by default.

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The original idea for this project was conceived in the late summer of 2025 when I had the occasion to go back to NH and visit with some old friends. I had rented a small bungalow at the beach where I used to spend a lot of time as a kid.  The unexpected loss of my best friend a year earlier made the alone time a welcomed reprieve from life’s noises. Tom’s sudden death in June of 2024 left me feeling down and depressed for most of the prior year.  Although I had recently found joy in learning to play and write music, the depression left me feeling unmotivated. I hadn’t touched a guitar in over a year.

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When I was young my folks had a cottage at Hampton Beach, NH where I spent many a summer. There is a specific spot on the south end of beach down by the dunes behind the state park where I used to spend so much time when I was growing up and it became a spot to which I would frequently return as an adult. As a kid, I spent hours there most days building sandcastles and fighting the crashing waves. As an adult, it was where I went when I was facing a difficult decision, an emotional crisis, or when I was feeling contemplative. It was a place that always grounded me.  It never changed. It always evoked a feeling of comfort and security. It is my safe place. It is where I am most happy.  I could sit there for hours looking out over the ocean and thank God for my ability to reflect on what has been a good life.

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As I sat there in the late summer of 25’, I reflected on lots of things. I was feeling thankful.  But most of all I was reflecting on how broken things felt. Sometimes it feels like the world is falling apart. It’s almost like the things that used to make me feel grounded have been uprooted. I was feeling a sense of fragility and wondering what about this world was genuinely authentic. Strangely enough, there was something in the midst of this mindset that was making me feel hopeful.

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I am reminded of a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson that goes something like this, “The only person we are destined to be is the person we decide to be.” Life is about acting in and reacting to the world around us. We are all doing the best we can do, what we need to do to survive in this world. Regardless of our circumstances and disappointments, we all have choices. But without belief we may not see how things could be different or better. Without belief we are blinded to what is possible. This was my state of mind back in the summer of 25’. As I often do, I like to write and started to journal my thoughts.  The thought occurred to me that there was a story here that could be told through music. 

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Someone once told me that only in dreams and art can anything happen. How else can you conceive of a world better than it is?  What you believe in is limited only by what your mind allows you to imagine. Believing in one’s dreams is not a silly concept. And if life can imitate art, (or is it the other way around?), then you have the basis for belief. I love a quote from novelist Tim O’Brien that goes, “What good is art if it can’t get at the truth when the truth itself is insufficient for the truth.” 

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On one of the nights that I sat there at that spot on the beach something distinctly happened to me. The inflection point was one night in particular.  I sat there as the sun was retiring for the day and the moon was beginning its rise over the water and there was a soft breeze coming off the ocean. I sat there on the sand by the dunes and off in the distance I could hear the far away laughter of the crowds on the boulevard and live music coming from the half shell. The smell of the salt air made me very calm.  It was August 26, 2025. That was the night I wrote the lyrics to two of the songs, Believe and Hampton Nights. I was struck by the ease with which I wrote these lyrics. And it was this occasion that triggered the energy to start writing and creating again.

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After spending that first night sitting there on that beach, I returned for the next several days to the same spot with pen and paper and started writing.  At the time I didn’t realize there was a theme to my writing. I also didn’t realize then how the journaling would become the genesis of a new album. After those few days at the beach when I returned home I couldn’t stop writing.  And I didn’t until late November when I realized I had enough material for a full song book. I knew then that I had another album in me, possibly even two. The thing I experienced the most was the return of this energy that I hadn't had in a long time to sit down and write music. I started working on some arrangements and decided that this was going to be much different than anything I had done before. I spent the rest of that fall writing all the arrangements and began the task of converting my journal into lyrical pieces. Having completed the compositions, the production and recording were done this past winter in my new Spring Lake studio. Anyone who doesn’t know my music should understand it is not perfect.  But it is the real me.

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How This Album is Different

Even though I’d produced over 30 songs, this is the first time I’ve taken a serious approach to the production process. Admittedly, I didn’t know much when I started in 2021. While my friends were quite kind, I didn’t think the earlier songs were that good. This is the largest and most complex music production I’ve ever done. To complete it I had to stretch new creative and technical boundaries. I was hell bent to learn new things on this production. I wrote all the arrangements, recorded all the instruments and vocals, and mixed the tracks myself. I collaborated with Becca Holcroft with whom I worked before who wrote and recorded the choir arrangements on Believe and It's No Wonder. Joe Gilder, the consummate music coach, was and is a great motivator, inspirer, and instigator.

 

Before, songs were written quickly and haphazardly in a largely disorganized manner. Now, with this album, rather than trial and error, the process was much better organized and disciplined. I gave much more thought to lyrical construction and tried to achieve a stronger synergy between the lyrics and the chord progressions to drive the emotional theme of the songs. I placed stronger emphasis on the recording source than on the mixing process. That said, I spent a lot of time on the mixing of these songs. Before, songs were put together quickly because I had publicly challenged myself to produce so many by a certain deadline. It was very much a learning process. This time the process was slower, more deliberate, more intentional. I worked harder to try and achieve a better tonal quality and paid particular attention to adding more expressive and percussive elements.  

 

My goal with this album is not perfection, but expression. It is the first full length album produced where all the songs are related by a common theme. That said, it is quite eclectic in that there is some country, rock, pop, and singer/songwriter tunes making it a truly mixed-genre production. Finally, it’s a project for which the songs express inspirations that are more directly related to my own experiences. The lyrics reveal a bit of mystery and vulnerability though refrain from getting too personal. This is also the first project that I have journaled completely, not presumptively thinking that others would ever read it, but rather for me to go back and remind myself why and how I made this album. 

 

 

Why I Made This Album

I wrote Believe to express the power of believing in ourselves and the strength of our resilience to overcome life’s disappointments. It explores authenticity and expresses a desire for truth. It is about believing in the goodness within us all and knowing we all have a child inside of us who is simply looking for love, kindness, forgiveness, and truth. Doing this album allowed me to express myself in ways that I am unable to otherwise. Producing it has been a source of joy for me. It has elicited several emotions that leave me feeling thankful. It is this joy I choose to share hoping it can remind others to take pause and consider those things that bring them joy. And that joy is sometimes simply in knowing that someone is listening to what you feel inside; that someone is hearing you.

 

I feel for so many who are facing some difficult challenges either due to a personal tragedy or physical ailment or difficult circumstances. Maybe this album can do for you what it does for me – take you away for just a while. By listening, maybe the joy is simply in the amusement of hearing someone live a dream he once had when he was a stary-eyed 17-year-old growing up in the 60s. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did making it.