From his Appalachian Roots In Harlan Kentucky, to his current home in the Mojave Desert, Shawn Brock brings his worldly experiences to contemporary jazz lovers across the globe.
Brock began playing guitar at the age of 9. He has appeared on hundreds of recordings for record labels such as Sony, Dream Works, Lonesome Day and Capital.
Shawn is influenced by sounds of all musical genres and has a long history before his smooth jazz debut in 2008.
"I have always been an instrumentalist and as a child I thrived on old Bluegrass fiddle tunes. Backing talented vocalists has always been enjoyable, but I love to focus on music without the interruption of words."
His 2009 release, Sketches of Love & Fury, is a collaboration of both old and new sounds.
"I got sick of a lot of things. Everyone I knew was making records and struggling to be creative. All the while you had the record companies talking about how the modern format of the business just wasn't working. Revenue had decreased and it seemed that everyone wanted a change. They all talked about how the music coming out just wasn't cutting it, yet they released the same old thing over and over again. It seemed that few people were making music simply for the fact that they love it and that they believe that is what they were put on this earth to do.
I had been itching to cut a record for a while and my last solo project was about 10 years old. I decided to just do it! Stop the talking and just cut what ever I wanted and make it sound and look a way that was suitable for me. Without a record company or a set release date I was able to do what I wanted when ever I wanted. In the end I'm proud of my effort and the thing is selling to people who love good instrumental music."
As a musician who is blind Shawn feels that he has a different approach in the way his music comes across to listeners.
"My objective is to communicate with people through sound. When someone puts on one of my tunes I want them to be able to shut out the world around them. A good song should be able to take you away from your surroundings for a while, or it should enhance your feelings and bring them to the surface. In some ways its more challenging to write ear catching instrumentals than it is to come up with good vocal lines. When I'm writing I see images in my mind of people or places and it becomes my job to display those images to the listener without using words.
I feel that instrumentals are to music what abstract is to painters. A person should be somewhat open to his or her own interpretation of what the song is about.
If you take a man who could see at one time but now he is blind, and you ask him what something in the sighted portion of his life looked like, He'll give you a detailed description like no other person could.
I try my best to convey a time, feeling or place with musical notation as a substitution of words."
With the release of Sight UnSeen in 2011, Brock continues to demand the attention of both listeners and Radio Programmers alike.
"We released Who Now Do You Love as the first single on January 31st, and the radio started going nuts! Interview requests and kind words about my record from programmers flooded the phone and email. I was a little shocked to be on the receiving end of all this attention! After all, I just do what I do. When my Radio Promoter started emailing me with the reports that had the number of spins and adds, I just couldn't believe it. The tune started out as the 2nd most
added song for Groove Jazz, and that was a week before it came out. The week the single was released it was the most added song in Groove Jazz.
I wanted to make a record that would stand the test of time, and I feel that I have accomplished that with Sight UnSeen."
Website :-
www.shawnbrockmusic.com
