As well as a lot of playing, performing, teaching and learning, I've produced 5 "Ken Baird" Cds over the years: August from 1996, Fields in 1998, Orion in 2000, Martin Road from 2003 and Further Out from 2009. Each album has various styles and influences but hopefully they all sound like me. For more info I have a website at www.kenbairdmusic.com :) And I'm now in a band called Monarch Trail www.monarchtrail.com We released our debut album "Skye" in 2014 and are working on a second one now (hopefully for a 2016 release) We have our soundcloud here: https://soundcloud.com/monarch-trail

When keyboard player/vocalist Ken Baird had written some music which seemed to require more collaborative arrangements than usual, he asked drummer Chris Lamont and Bassist Dino Verginella if they’d  be willing to be a part of “Monarch Trail”. Lamont had played on Baird’s previous three albums and Verginella on the previous two, so it was a natural thing that it could be called a group.

The first stage was to set up several rehearsals for the trio to work on arranging the new pieces. Important changes were made to the charts; an extra set of bars here, a new melody line there, a different tempo over there and so on. Even more importantly, these rehearsals also turned out to be a ton of fun with no lack of shenanigans!

They made the decision to start recording the music right away and add other musicians when needed. As it turned out, there was to be a fair bit of guitar on the record, so guitarist friends were brought in providing “the right part for the right track”. True to the spirit of the project, John Mamone, Kelly Kereliuk and Steve Cochrane all had major creative input on their solos and sections.

The recording was done by Ken Baird, but in the final months of the record, Cochrane also lent his studio and his recording and mastering abilities. Drawings by Annette Roche had initially helped inspire the lyrics, so these drawings ultimately became part of the album artwork.

And so here we have it, the first album from Monarch Trail: “Skye”!

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