John Sheldon is a consummate musician whose creative path has had an amazing trajectory among the then rising stars of the 1960s and 1970s.John bought his first guitar at around 15 from James Taylor, a close family friend and then suitor of his sister. He was notably inspired by the older JT’s just penned, self-revelatory compositions and distinctive playing style that was soon to rock the world in his debut album. Later in Sheldon's home turf of Cambridge, Massachusetts a soulful, tempestuous Irish minstrel named Van Morrison begins to use John’s basement as rehearsal studio and consequentially writes much of the material for his seminal album, "Astral Weeks" there.
At 17, jamming in the basement with Morrison, a melody and lyric evolved that entered the world as Domino.This eventually led to touring as Van Morrison’s lead guitarist. Immediately after high school graduation he became a session man in L.A. He soon developed a well-deserved reputation as a guitar whiz kid and toured with James Taylor, Danny Kortchmar and Linda Ronstandt. But after a decade of session work he decided to go back to school and hone his innate skills at the New England Conservatory of Music. It was here he was able to fully explore musical composition in many genres and become adept at all of them. On the East and West Coasts he was recognized mainly as a rocker and developed a loyal following. But in his heart of hearts he is a prolific storyteller and really a “painter with sound”. Ironically the early admiration of James Taylor’s songwriting came full circle a few years back when Taylor recorded John’s “September Grass” on the album, October Road and another song ,“Bittersweet”, on his most recent Greatest Hits collection.
Sheldon is a wonderful wordsmith but the instrumental tone poems and cinematic landscapes of sound that he is currently focusing on are deep and rich and transcendent.
We of the Eye to Eye Project were thrilled to have him consent to create a signature piece of instrumental music that reflects the exchange and juxtaposition of East and West that he called “Joined Horizons”. This was played over the fabulous sound system at the Zendai MOMA and charged the air of the outdoor plaza where we unveiled our project.
Recently developing atmospheric music for “Milosevic at the Hague” a play by Milan Dragicevich, John had been exploring folk music of the Balkans and the music it derived from. Some of the influences go back to the Ottoman Empire, where literally the East met the West. Intrigued with our idea of using images from art history to represent different points of view, he shared with me samples from vast sound catalogs he had created on his computer. Myriad passages of musical styles were used as points of departure,creating original music with historical inflections of tone and rhythm. They were carefully selected and artfully interwoven to create an aural conversation between East and West. The infectious beat that resulted had all passersby enthralled after the first clarion call of searing electric guitar. Young and old happily smiled and swayed to the music, instantly eliminating the language barrier and making it easy to give away our painted eyes.
We thank John Sheldon for generously creating and performing this wonderful music that added so much to our initial concept.
We invite all of you to check back for an audio clip that will be installed on this site soon.
To learn more about this exceptional musician and how to obtain his music please visit www.johnsheldon.com .
