Wishing you all a prosperous, safe, and Happy 2021, from John Lee Sanders

Madrid December 2020 Puerta de Alcala
with Poster advertising my Gospel Concert in Madrid with 
John Lee Sanders and the Gospel Messengers.  

 

Here's wishing that 2021 will bring joy, 

love, peace, and happiness to you all.

We’ve all seen a struggle to get through 2020, with the Coronavirus, loss of loved ones, 

Jobs, close of businesses, and trying to understand the bigger meaning to all of us in terms of survival, our creator, and our inter-dependence of life on Earth, as we also take on climate change. 

 In 2003, I read "Demon in the Freezer" how the World Health Organization, with the cooperation of all on earth, wiped out the Smallpox deadly virus. I know if we work together we can make this happen, and wipe out the coronavirus.  There are still hurdles to overcome, with so much misinformation, but we must become reliable information and resist the anti-vaxxers, and conspiracy folks, and defeat this deadly plague.   In March of 2020, during the first stay at home order, I wrote, arranged and produced "Gone Viral", about the world response to the virus, the USA pathetic response as it became political, with denial of facts, and putting nations, states, and social classes against each other, instead of fighting a common enemy, and fighting the pandemic as if it were a war.   

In December of 2020, I was blessed and a bit overwhelmed,  to do a 9 Major city Gospel Christmas concert tour of Northern Spain, including the Capital city of Madrid, in the Fernán Gomez Teatro. 

I was often amazed at the level of respect and reception, especially as a recent immigrant to and almost unknown artist in Spain in the middle of a global pandemic. My band and I were required to take 2 Coronavirus tests, required to perform and some of the venues, and fly from Madrid to the Canary Islands, off the Coast of Africa.  #gospelmusic 

#gospelpiano #gospelmusicinspain

  Our tour was covered by many of the major news outlets, and press of Spain including Antenna 3, the top major network of Spain.  The beautiful state of the art performing concert halls with beautiful Yamaha and Steinway 9’ Grand pianos, and enthusiastic crowds welcomed a Gospel Christmas tour of my American Roots Gospel, after so much live music events had been canceled in 2020. 

 Seating was assigned with social distancing, mask mandates, huge stages, and distance between the band members, with private dressing rooms for me, the band, our two female vocalists, but unfortunately no meet and greets after the shows. 

 I had an amazing group of Musicians, and singers.  Astrid Jones and Deborah Ayo, well known performers, and vocal coaches in their own rite, from Madrid, of Nigerian decent, who were extremely well versed in American Black Gospel, Soul, Hip Hop and Pop Music, and gave an authenticity to our tour as experienced in some of the videos.  The rhythm section was Akin Onasanya, also of Nigerian Origin, a well known drummer, percussionist, singer and composer on the Spanish Roots jazz/Soul music scene.  Akin"s father was a Nigerian Minister, and grew up playing and singing in his father"s choir in Africa.  Also on the tour was Nick Sullivan on Bass, from Minneapolis, now in Madrid, and Gecko Turner on Vocals, Guitar, and percussion.  I have sincere gratitude to Gecko for introducing me to the Spanish Music scene, our booking agency and much more.  

John Lee Sanders and the Gospel Messengers

In December of 2019, my wife Maria and I took a bold step and moved from the Alabama Gulf Coast to the southern coast of Spain about an hour south of Seville.

We didn’t know what Plans God had for us, but we are still continually blessed with the roots and the fruits in this wonderful experience and protected at every turn.    

Our small village is named Palos de la Frontera, best known for the being the disembarkation of   legendary voyage of three ships of Christopher Columbus.  The Captains of the 2 other ships, the Niña, and Pinta, were the Pinzon Brothers are from our village.  

Replicas of the 3 Columbus Ships in our Village, Palos de la Frontera

Blessing of the Voyage of Columbus, below the church in our village of Palos de la frontera

 My neighborhood is very diverse, with African and Muslim immigrants, as well as Spanish born citizens.  Maria was born in Spain and immigrated with her parents to Germany in the late 60s.  I met her on a 1995 Long John Baldry tour, where I was a featured vocalist, piano player and saxophonist.  We reconnected in 2012 and have been together ever since.   

Marin Headlands, 2015

Grand Canyon, 2015

Our Wedding Reception, Oct 2015, Gulf Shores Alabama

In 2015, Maria and drove down from my home in Vancouver to do a 6-week gig on the Reno Snow Train, where I played piano and sang on the Royal Gorge Piano Lounge, From the Emeryville Oakland Amtrak Station, (home to Pixar Studios) through the beautiful and sometimes Snow Capped Sierra Madres.  

 I was in the process of recording my recent CD, Tweakin’ some Twang, my rather diverse take on Americana Music, with some of my Southern roots.  The 12 original  songs were well written, some great A list session players, from Nashville, California and Europe that I had worked with over the years, and some were great finds, such as  Brent Mason on guitar, CMA Musician of the year many times over

We recorded some great rhythm tracks at Red Rooster Studios in Berkeley with Garth Webber, The Track Shack in Sacramento, and later overdubs in Niagara Falls Studio in Fremont, CA a few miles from the Tesla Factory, with Bruce Kaphan, who played amazing Pedal Steel Guitar, and mixed the entire CD.  We recorded the String Section in St. Petersburg Russia, with Maria Grig and her mini orchestra, which gave some of the songs a cinematic quality that I love.  
 I wrote a song about my time on the train, called "Southbound Train" on my recent CD, "Tweakin Some Twang

The once thriving Vancouver music scene that I experienced over the years, seemed to be on its last legs, from gentrification, and younger audiences who no longer appreciated live music, in favor of Sports bars and discos.  

 I was touring,  playing great venues and festivals, and opening acts for well-known artists such as Bonnie Raitt, I felt it was time for a change. I had formed one of top bands in British Columbia, and rave reviews from the local press, but was often perceived as an outsider, when it came to the recording session player scene that I had been a huge part of in the San Francisco Bay Area.  I recorded this live CD/DVD in 2006 which still holds up as one of my best recordings of my 16 solo CD Catalog.  

  We took a  leap of faith, we headed down the  California Coast, stopping along the way for a show with my longtime friend and backing musician to legendary songwriter,  Paul Williams in Chandler AZ.  

We were blown away and took in the beauty Sedona, the Grand Canyon, then it was Eastbound and down, along Route 66, reminiscing at my old Alma Mater at the University of North Texas in Denton, 

We visited my former hometowns of Monroe Louisiana, Jackson Mississippi, old stomping grounds of Memphis,  New Orleans,  Clarksdale, Jackson, Birmingham, and other  places of my upbringing. 

I considered relocating to back to the Bay Area, or  New Orleans,  Memphis or Austin, but the live and Studio music scene had taken a nose dive, in light of streaming, and other trends.  

 My older Brother, Chip, also a piano player, lined up a 2 week visit to the Alabama Gulf Coast which led to a 4-year piano bar house gig at the Perdido Beach resort.  Maria and I were married in October 2015, and it’s been the happiest years of my life.  I’m not sure the day we came to the decision, but we both realized, in 2019, we wanted to relocate to Europe, where I had been touring since 1993.  We decided on Spain, where Maria has family, a brother, a daughter and son in law, who serves in the Spanish NATO Air Force, (recently stationed in Ukraine 2014, after the Putin Russian invasion), and 4 beautiful grandchildren.  

Moving to the Florida-Alabama Coast Panhandle

The timelines, places, events in our lives all have signs if we are open to seeing perceiving them. “Perdido” means “Lost” in Spanish, which was the name of the river and bay, that was discovered by the Spanish not long after the original voyage of Columbus, which led to the original settlement at Pensacola. The Perdido River, was the Florida-Alabama Panhandle border was also the border between the French and Spanish Territory, before the American Revolution.  

In November of 2019, we loaded up a 20’ Cargo shipping container of all of our possessions, guitars, saxes, keyboards,  studio gear, clothes, antiques, which could barely make it down our narrow one way street.  We had to cut a few branches off of a huge pine tree to get the container into the drive. 

The shipping container arrived at our home in Spain,  on Christmas Day, 2019, Across the Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic, from the Mobile Bay, I took all of these things as guideposts and tried to put them all in perspective, and make sense of all of the signs in my life as things seem to come full circle.  There are replicas of the 3 Columbus Ships here in our village, and a statue of him in the city square, as we re-examine our history, in light of the indigenous peoples of the earth, Cancel Culture, and the succession of  Conquistadores that would follow.  I remember living in the East bay of California, when the City Council of Berkeley, voted that  Columbus day, was renamed “Indigenous Peoples day.    

 

Thanks to meeting Michael Hossack of the Doobie Brothers, In Vail Colorado, and a record contract, I spent 38 years on the West Coast, Oakland, Berkeley as a Hammond Organist in an “Great Migration” Beebe Memorial AME Black Church.  I watched Silicon Valley explode and embraced the tech revolution, working with the prototype of the first Digital Recording platform, from the founders of Digidesign Protools.  

My years on the west coast were a constant work schedule, as a performing artist, session musician, Jingle Singer,  and film composer, with Blues Awards, and an Emmy Nomination.  I lived 9 years in Vancouver and Kelowna British Columbia,  before moving back to the south, and had much optimism that the country had changed.  With the election of Barrack Obama and so much more, I was hopeful that times had changed, but I was mistaken, as some of us retreated to our corners, as more division would follow,  as the echo chamber reaffirmed “Preachers to our own choirs”.    

Over those years, I  was honored to worked with some of the legends of soul music, and the writers, Percy Sledge from Alabama, my childhood superhero,  Stevie Wonder, Sam Moore, Dr. John, Tower of Power,  Chuck Berry, Lloyd Price,  Bill Withers, Ashford and Simpson,  Mary Wells, Martha Reeves, Newcomer to the scene,  Jon Batiste and so many more.  David Ritz, An old friend from the Texas Music scene and journalist reconnected with me, around 2007.  We co-wrote a few Gospel Songs together. David had become the definitive biographer to the legends of Blues and Soul Music, including Marvin Gaye, BB King, Aretha Franklin, and so many.  

Since 1988, off and on, I’ve been a backing musician for legendary composer, Paul Williams.  He became Chairman of ASCAP, and through my work with Paul, I performed many times at the Library of Congress.   In 2010, a few months after the passage of the Affordable Care Act AKA "Obamacare", the first person to offer congratulations after our show, was a big hug from my former Congresswoman, and Madame Speaker Nancy Pelosi,  enthusiastic, at my performance on  sax, keys, guitar and vocals at the ASCAP, We write the songs show, for the Senate and House of Representatives.  One of the most memorable times was when Bill Withers asked me to sing the closing song of the show at the Library of Congress, in his anthem “Lean On Me”.  Through the work of ASCAP lobbying congress, Trump signed into law, the Music Modernization Act, with the unanimous passage of both houses.  Since then, many of the big music streaming services such as Spotify have challenged the law in court, trying to take away the royalty increase for us songwriters.  

In July of 2020, I signed a management contract with Conciertos del Norte, One of the top Entertainment and booking agencies of Europe.  They book some of the top black blues, jazz and Gospel Artists of the USA, including many from Jackson MS, my hometown, from 1953-1960.  

In December of 2020, they booked me, and my band, John Lee Sanders and The Gospel Messengers on a 9 city concert tour of Northern Spain, in some of the most beautiful concert halls of Europe, including the Capital city, Madrid.  

My booking agent and Manager, Luis Manjarres has been in the music business for over 30 years.  He came to the deep south, New Orleans, Memphis and Jackson MS, and developed a relationship with some of the Malaco Gospel and blues recording artists, the Mississippi Mass Choir, The Jackson Southernaires, and the New Orleans Legendary Olympia Brass Band.  He brought them to Europe for many great tours, and now I am honored to carry on their legacy.    

While not on the road, I"m writing my memoirs, and working on a new CD called "Songs Have A Life of Their Own".  During my work with Paul Williams and backing musician to so many great songwriters, such as Hal David, Jimmy Webb, Stephen Schwartz, Ashford and Simpson,  Johnny Mandel, Alan and Marilyn Bergman, Willie Nelson, Randy Newman, I saw how the writers and their songs are a living sonic tapestry that weaves through time and generations.  The songs become larger than life,  and take on some mystical soul that can't be defined.  I came up with the title, during one of my piano bar gigs with my extensive repertoire , where I played everything from Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, Gershwin, Professor Longhair, Jellyroll Morton  to Elvis, Muddy Waters, Sinatra,  Andrew Lloyd Webber, where I tried to get somewhere inside the story that the writer tried to convey.  

Songs have a life of their Own

©2020 Swampmeister Music ASCAP

It must have been last call, last song

slipped me a twenty dollar bill

She said can you play one, that takes one

Where the memories stand still 

love lights faded, in the Autumn chill

She’d trade’em, for a summer thrill 

Like the soundtrack behind her story line

When that song was number one, back in her prime

Songs have a life, a life of their own

Unlock forgotten fragments, black and white to Kodachrome

Songs have a life, take on this life of their own

A melody rewinds us back, reminds us when we feel alone

we’re not alone 

The muse and the memories,

 fuse all these emotions to mind

In shades of the blues in reverie forever sublime  

somehow rhythm and rhyme intertwine

Make a valentine, sweeter than wine

make the world a bit less cold and unkind

and for a little while, leave all our worries behind.  

Songs have a life, a life of their own, 

Like legendary fairytales, the world has ever known

Songs have a life, take on this life of their own 

.and music how it never fails

 to melt a heart of ice and stone

when old friends desert you, hurt you

but the music will last

Old songs return you, stolen moments,

 a postcard from the past

If I had a dollar, for the nickels and dimes,  

I dropped in some jukebox, back in time

no money wasted, heavily rotated in my mind

Solid Gold plated,  I’ve  contemplated  and lately I find 

 

Songs have a life, a life of their own

Conceived in inspiration, solitary soul creation

Songs cool the strife, in this life I have known

From the discord there comes harmony

sweet music of the spheres.  

And always be a part of me, and ageless through the years

like ripples on the water, when we drop the tiniest little stone

They go on, even after we’re gone

Songs have a life of their own

As I try to adjust to life in Spain,  Europe, learning Spanish, Approaching my 70s, we battle for the soul of our nation, and seek the wisdom of our better angels. 

I also do remote recording from my home studio, with a large client list worldwide.  I play a wide variety of styles keyboards, full jazz, pop, soul, funk, backing tracks, Tenor, Alto and Soprano saxes, flute, guitar, and occasional lead vocals.  Many of my recording clients come from Airgigs, where one can work as a freelancer or hire great session players, engineers, or vocalists.  I rarely do lead vocal sessions, but  This song "Come on Down" was one of my favorite guest vocal tracks, I did in 2020,  from Stephen Clay, upright bass track from Viktor Krauss,

Come on Down from Steve Clay on Vimeo.

brother of Allison Krauss 
With the Coronavirus still mutating, and far from under control, some concerts have been postponed for Summer of 2021, we are hopeful that the vaccine can get us back to normal, if there ever was normal in these times.  

In 2019,  I started a Gofundme campaign, for dental implants.  I'm extremely grateful for all of the support from Friends and family,
I started the extraction process on  January 7, the day after the capitol riots in DC, a very stressful time for us all, as Europeans also watched in horror at the American temple of "Freedom and Democracy.    I"ve now have 6 posts in my lower gums, and am using dentures until the bones heal, and the implants can be attached in March.  The process has gone well so far, with adjusting to the dentures in eating, there is a bit of inflammation in my gums but everything is healing fine. 

Best wishes everyone.  I"ll keep you posted on the progress of new music.  

Please check out the the links of new videos of the last tour, and advance previews of my upcoming CD for 2021.