Falls band teacher goes solo for album

A new Christmas album has hit the electronic music market, and the artist/producer hails from Thompson Falls.

Many are familiar with the tunes of the Thompson Falls Pep Band at games, the brass and woodwind at school concerts and the swingin' sounds of the jazz band. All of those melodies come from the preparation and direction of band teacher Adam Craw. Craw has been teaching in the district publicly and gives music lessons with his spare time, but the instructor also has the musician's itch to create. "I've found that I am quite happy with a set of headphones, staring at a computer screen to edit and mix music for hours," Craw said, "sure, I'd love to get noticed and be a performing musician, but I get a lot of fulfillment from producing."

His latest endeavor began last year, on Christmas Day.

"I asked my wife if she would mind if I dedicated that day to recording songs for this album," Craw explained. "I just felt there would be something special and symbolic that would come through in the music if it was recorded on Christmas Day." He noted the graciousness of his wife and family (who saved Christmas festivities for the following day just for him), as he locked himself in his home studio from 8 a.m. until the stroke of midnight to lay down tracks.

As any artist, musician or craftsperson knows: when in 'the zone,' you are most at home. Craw felt he connected with his creative talents optimally that day to make the Christmas music. "A lot of the Christmas albums we hear were recorded in the summer to allow time for mixing, mastering and release just after Thanksgiving," he explained, "I wanted the authenticity of the holiday behind the songs, and everything around me cooperated to make that happen."

Craw shied away from the winter wonderlands and Santa-focused pieces to focus on the Christian-based traditional carols, "I wanted to focus on the real reason for the season," he added.

The recordings began with his base track: Craw playing acoustic guitar while singing. He then added additional tracks of his vocals to harmonize with himself intermittently but building to a climatic crescendo for the swell of the song in the third verse and last chorus. "That seems to be my formula these days," he said. He chose not to add drums to the tunes as he is admittedly not a drummer, although he did add congas to Little Drummer Boy – "The title of the song kind of calls for it," Craw joked. Over the next year he edited, mixed and mastered the tracks (he only wanted to make sure the tracks were recorded on the holiday, volume and equalization were not dependent on the authenticity of Christmas), and released the album on Thanksgiving this year.

Craw was able to find a distribution service that would put his album on multiple platforms on the internet for listening and purchase. The subscription service takes care of all licensing fees to appease the army of lawyers representing record companies and others who own the rights to licensed songs and collect royalties from that ownership. Musicians who cover songs that are owned by others are in danger of lawsuits or blackouts of their songs on the internet if this hurdle is not jumped through. "It is a really great service for lesser-known musicians, but they don't do any marketing for you – finding listeners is up to the musician," Craw explained, as he has been soliciting friends and family through social networking and in person to give a listen or purchase songs (depending on the music distribution platform's methods).

Craw also released another album earlier this year with student Tyler McGaughey. Adam and Tyler created a powerful duet of guitars and vocals and did a little bit of gigging through the summer. "We called ourselves 'The Nebulous' for the album," said Craw, "I'm really impressed with Tyler's voice, I think he can go anywhere he wants with those vocal cords." "Christmas – Adam Craw" can be found on any of the popular internet platforms where music is sold or provided.