Helen Dance, George Avakian, Orrin Keepnews and Joel Dorn do their best to describe the role of a jazz producer, the person “behind the glass.”

Season 2: Episode 16 “The Producers”

For those that like to learn about the story behind a music track they may find enjoyable, I would love to share my story!

So… a most extraordinary experience happened to me sometime during the summer of 1980, in which I woke up out of a VIVID DREAM. Unlike most vivid dreams, which are rare by any measure, this particular dream literally had no visuals to speak of. Instead, I found myself enveloped in what I can only describe as an immense surround sound like experience, listening to, and 100% engaged in an amazing musical soundscape that lasted for several minutes.  The music went through several stages and was incredibly detailed, even regarding the sonic characteristics.  

Like all dreams, this experience could only be remembered upon waking up immediately afterwards.  Vivid dreams, tend to be even more impactful to our conscience memory. 

So upon wakening from this vivid dream musical, I was truly stunned. Somehow my subconscious, in a dream, literally created and arranged an entire piece of music in my sleep!  Knowing how something like this was indeed a very special and rare event, I was determined not to lose or forget any of it.  I immediately hopped out of bed, totally disregarding my usual coffee and breakfast, and headed directly to my simple equipment on hand to play and record everything that I had just heard in my dream. At the time, I used an Oberheim DX drum machine, and a Sequential Prophet 5 keyboard synth, to duplicate as best as I could the music and sounds of what I had just heard 10 minutes earlier in my sleep. I recorded it all within a couple hours onto a Teac 144 Cassette 4-track machine, in which I eventually mixed down onto another standard stereo cassette tape.  
I did not share that piece of music with too many people, because it was indeed conceived in such a remarkable way, and I felt it was oddly out of character with the type of music I was into at the time.

A couple decades later, for the purpose of preserving these old works, I transferred much of my older music from tape to digital, including this vivid dream creation, which for the lack of a better title I simply called “Dream Tune”.

Well, as many of you know, I’ve been pretty busy over the past couple decades creating and producing all sorts of original music.  But every once in a while I would come across and visit that old recording of “Dream Tune”, naturally recollecting the extraordinary birth of that piece.  In a way it haunted me… almost requesting me to resurrect it from the inherent poor sound quality it always possessed from recording originally on cassette tape.

I know this is a long read for many, so thank you for reading my story up to this point.
SO NOW… I’m happy to say I finally got around to redoing this piece of music in its entirety, but using today’s technology to produce a high quality sound. Also, my goal was to retain the original music, arrangement, and sonic details, just as I heard them in my vivid dream 43 years ago!
In full disclosure, regarding this updated version, I did a lot of extra detailed embellishments throughout to enhance the overall track. But, literally 95% of it is just like the original. 
The final adjustment made was to title it “Cloud Dreamer”,  reflecting on my interests in the skies and weather.

Thanks for listening and reading this! 
Audric

CLOUD DREAMER (Audric Jankauskas-2023)

GRATITUDE - It's all about the music!

It took me some time to finish this tune, as I composed this almost a decade ago. For some reason, many other musical projects kept distracting me from investing the kind of time this tune, “GRATITUDE”, required and I believe deserved. 
But, I decided to not let it remain on the back burner any longer. 
I’m happy to say I finally got it done.

This tune is all about the gratitude I have towards everything that encompasses music. There’s gratitude simply for music existing in the first place. It’s my heartfelt tribute towards the art of music in all its forms. It is also just as much a tribute to ALL the musicians, from all walks of life, famous and not so famous... with some of course being highly influential and motivational for me on a personal level, all of which have been a source of inspiration in one way or another over the course of my life.

The essence of music is one of those big unanswered mysteries in the human experience. Why is it that we humans perceive the sounds of music in the way we do? No one has ever really come up with a plausible explanation, yet music remains as a special art form that has existed throughout modern civilization and has been expressed in countless ways. It’s pretty incredible… isn’t it?!

So, I conclude with the hopes that you will give a good listen to my tune “GRATITUDE”. 
After all this is a tribute to every one out there... whether you are a fellow musician, or the non-musician that simply loves to listen to music and one that embraces this wonderful and diverse art form.

All music performed (guitars and keys) and sequenced (bass and drums) by Audric Jankauskas

GRATITUDE (Audric Jankauskas-2024)

The incredible Harry Jacobson joins me on this funky groove oriented fun jam, with a quirky intro and outro.
Harry is well known not only for his distinct masterful electric guitar blues-rock style, but also for his delightfully stinging guitar tones that sustain and blossom into beautiful overtones and harmonics.  
Enjoy the ride!

THICKETS and THORNS (Audric Jankauskas/Harry Jacobson-2025)

In the spirit of Weather Report and Pat Metheny, I created this unique instrumental fusion tune all based in the odd meter of 15/16 and the Lydian mode.
Jazz singer, CHRISTY BLUHM, joins in on this magical gathering of musical surprises, adding her wonderful voice here and there, finalizing this track in a joyous improvisation.

MAGICAL GATHERINGS (Audric Jankauskas/Christy Bluhm-2025)

"Unfolding Visions" all began with an unusual and intoxicating drum rhythm loop created in Garage Band.  Visions of cascading and descending jazzy chord harmonies bookend the heart of the tune, all complimented by the beautiful textures of vocal pads sung by Roger Whittlesey and Christy Bluhm.

UNFOLDING VISIONS (Audric Jankauskas-2025)

WELCOME ALL to my SoundCloud page!

It's always a pleasure to discover through SoundCloud the wealth of wonderfully talented and creative musicians out in the world... all sharing their own distinct and artistic creations.  I'm very happy to be a part of this amazing, creative, and supportive community.

My main instrument is the guitar (mainly electric... sometimes acoustic). I also play on occasion bass and keyboards (strictly for recording on my own compositions).  Most of my music tracks on SC are created, recorded, and produced in my home studio.  Recently, I've been making good use of midi sequencing to ultimately produce tracks that I otherwise would find almost impossible to do by other means. 

Fusion (my mix of jazz, rock, funk, soundtrack, etc.) is the best way to describe most of the music that I produce these days.  I've enjoyed playing and recording many styles/genres of music in the past, and all these past musical experiences influence me today in the way I compose and play.

You will find here on my SC page samplings of new and older works of mine.  The track picture icons more or less help identify what tracks belong to other associated tracks. And I will try to present some extra information for the individual tracks for those that are interested as well.

Thanks for reading... and I hope you enjoy listening! 
Audric Jankauskas

New tracks tagged #MILES_DAVIS