LaurieZ was a pianist and recording artist who was a staple of the LA music scene for many years. In around 2001 she and her husband Michael moved to the San Juan islands (Camano Island specifically), and through the Keyboard Magazine user forum. We became friends and over the next few years got to know each other pretty well.
A few years later (2004 if I recall correctly) Laurie called me to tell me that she had lung cancer. She started treatment with Michael and Chloe her Wonderdog by her side. The following year (2005) she lost Michael suddenly to a heart attack, and she passed away in 2006.
As part of her will, I was asked to disassemble her studio by her friend Michael Handley. On the way home from packing up her studio, this tune came to me. I wrote it down as soon as I could and quickly over the next few days I fleshed out the chords, arrangement details and eventually orchestrated it. It was a very
While the song means a lot to me because of Laurie, it also made use of some of my newly acquired orchestration experience, being in the middle of a film scoring class at the time. I used both major and minor orchestration techniques, as well as many recording techniques to make it more like a live orchestral recording than a virtual, MIDI-based one.
Take a listen –
Pat