I was introduced in the 6th(?) grade to Indian classical music by Dr. Edward Friedman at East Hampton Middle School.  He played us a piece which (I think) was called sahki prana and it was the most alien thing I had ever heard up until then.  I've been trying to soak up as much of that music as possible since then.  When the youtube age came I thought I would try to find "Sahki prana" on the internet.  I failed at that search, but I did find a Malayalam tune called "Pranasaki" from a movie called "Pareeshka".  Someone was kind enough to have already written out the Malayalam words in the Latin alphabet, so I learned to sing them.  Although there is some chord-like accompaniment on the original the chords here are ones I came up with specifically for this guitar arrangement.

Pranasaki

Steely Dan cover, Jason Fellin: Tabla Gordon Assadi: Violin

Bodhisattva

I thought it would be fun to write a blues song  that went back and forth between bluesy and klezmer tonalities.  I also thought it might be a good idea to try to make  some cheap booze....from my band Tsunami Piñata featuring Luz Gaxiola on accordion.

The Just What I Deserve For Buying Anything At Walmart Blues

In 2013, at the tail end of a 2-week California busking tour, I was busted on Hollywood boulevard for misdemeanor milk crate possesion (my one-man-band rig, the Contrapparatus, is made of a milk crate, among other things).  They gave me a court date 3 weeks in the future, forcing me to return to my home in Washington and then travel back to LA to avoid a failure to appear in court charge and the automatic arrest warrant that goes with it. I wrote this song over the course of 3 days on the Amtrak Coast Starlight train from Olympia to LA and back to attend my court date (which the LAPD did not show up for). 

Thriftstore Courtsuit 1

This song describes the derangement I experienced when attempting to infiltrate the world of Christmas music.

Chrizmo The Christmas Leprechaun

An instrumental arrangement of three highly-altered public domain Christmas-ish tunes.

Ode To Merry Gentle Carol O'bells

All I Want For Christmas Is My Foreskin Back

Me playing banjo and sruti box (drone) simultaneously. Two Quebecois tunes; Talencourt and The 2nd March of Thomas Pomerleau.  

Talencourt:pomerleau

My playing pennywhistle and sruti box simultaneously, the tune is an improvisation based on the Celtic tune "Maritn Wynn's #2."

Martin Comes In Second Place

I play lots of musical instruments, (either simultaneously or otherwise)and lots of different styles of music.  The music on this page represents many different musical projects.  

onemanbandseattleFrancisB

Popular tracks