Combination blues,soul,latin and smooth jazz

11 MP3 Songs in this album (46:32) !
Related styles: JAZZ: Smooth Jazz, LATIN: Cumbia

People who are interested in Steely Dan Van Morrison Santana should consider this download.


Details:
Solo Artist
Denny Falzon plays Guitar and Steel Drum and is a vocalist as well. Denny sings with his own style and plays guitar and steel drum as if they were all one instrument. The music is a blend of Soul, Smooth Jazz, Calypso, Latin and Soca Rhythm.

History:

I was born in Europe on the island of Malta in the Mediterranean Sea, south of Italy. When I was 3 1/2 years old, my parents moved to the United States and settled in Detroit, Michigan where my music roots began. My first band was the Baronâs. They started off playing sock hops and church and teen dances and did a lots of talent shows and won a USO tour, where I got to travel and fly to entertain the military in the mid west states and Canada. The Baronâs did a the Dick Clark Show, which feature the Yardbirds with Jimmy Page, Gary Lewis and the Playboys and Seals &Croft. I was hooked on show business. It became my passion.

Back in that day (the 60âs) the ballroom scene began. The Baronâs were a popular local band performing at such places like the Grandy Ballroom, East Town Theater and Cobo Hall. The band traveled throughout the state of Michigan and Ohio and got to do some shows with Motowns, Temptations, Smokie Robinson, Marveletts Marvin Gay and more, also Bob Seger, Brownville Station, Mc5, Mitch Rider and Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukeâs and many others. The band broke up and I join up with Rodney Knight and the Soul Sextet we did a local TV show, Swinging Time, which was very popular at that time. The band also opened up for name bands like Young Rascals, Amboy Dukeâs featuring Ted Nugent, Wilson Picket and Sam and Dave. The Soul Sextet was used to backup Motown artists. The Rooster Tail for one had dinner shows and artists like Marvin Gay, Temptations, Spinners, just to mention a few, would perform and the band would back them up.

In 1968, we took a turn to keep up with the latest music scene. We went from a soul band to a funkadilic band, dropped our three-piece suits to let our hair grow and wore mod clothing. We also changed our band name to the Tribal Sinfonia â which was also referred to as the Tribe. The Tribal Sinfonia was opening for national acts groups like Sly and the Family Stone, Neil Diamond, Bob Seger, Mitch Rider and many more from that era. We also did a lot of outdoor festivals. The group had a very large following and was managed by Cream Magazine, which opened a lot of doors. We had record companies interested, and w turned down a few major record contracts: one offer with Atlantic Records, another with Rare Earth Records and Capital Records, and other national labels. The contract didnât appeal to everybody. Like in every band, itâs hard to come together when egos get in the way. At the time, we had two songs out that were getting good airplay on the FM stations, âLove Will Turn You Aroundâ and âDo You Love Me?â

I decided to take a break from the band business and go to Europe and play and travel. After playing Europe as a solo artist, I wanted to check out Florida and play down in Key West during a spring break. It was fun and it gave me a taste of some tropical island sounds. Thatâs when I was influenced by Jimmy Buffett ,Bob Marley Harry Belafonte and Steel Drum music. Its influence is still with me today.

I decided to move out west and re-group I studied and taught music during that time. It was a time for growth. I wrote and recorded lot of songs.Also a guitar music book called The Practical Hand Book for Guitar which was published and sold nationally.

I formed a new band Home Grown which played locally for next ten years in the state of Washington. We were a county rock band, which was a big change from playing soul music. During that same time, I started working on my solo career. I was playing around the Seattle area with backup soundtracks that I recorded on my four track when the band wasnât playing. I was a pioneer of the true one-man bands of the time. As a one man band it was easy to find work compared to booking the whole band. After about ten years playing music out west I felt the need to expand my music. I had outgrown Washington State.

On a visit to Florida to see my folks, I found my new start I like the sound I heard on the beaches Island sounds. The bands I heard had steel drums and they were from the islands. I had one direction in mind -- to capture the sound of the islands. With an R&B background from Detroit, and my knowledge how the write and arrange and play my background tracks I was ready for a new challenge. I return back to Washington and packed up and move down to Florida.

When I arrived in Florida 1984, I had to hustle and find a gig, which was easy. I had my guitars and my background tracks ready to go and the work it just came my way. I worked on my new sound in Florida and targeted my music to a happy island feel. I hooked up with Sprocka from Island of Anguilla who helped me with the island sound. After that, I hooked up with a steel drum player, Jimmy Phillips, who taught me a few tricks playing steel drum.

I recorded my first solo album On Vacation, which was a tropical sound/Jimmy Buffet style with a jazz groove to it. It had steel drums recorded with Jimmy Phillip from Trinidad. I did quite a few gigs with the steel drum player, and the crowd loved it. Thatâs when I decided to learn to play the steel drum. I bought Jimmyâs steel drum for a plane ticket for him to fly back home and lessons on how to play the drum. I did a local TV show when my solo album On Vacation was released and it had good reviews. The rest is history. My career in Florida has been a real success. I decided to form a band around my solo career. Tropical Breeze started off as a duo and then developed into a full band. We did lot of convention work at all the large resorts and played the larger hotels. Tropical Breeze was a good local beach band. The band, for marketing purposes, had another name: New Vision. That is what I used as a night band to play the clubs and resorts. We played top forty and standards â a typical lounge band. My band Tropical Breeze Duo recorded a album, The Tropic, in which I had the pleasure of writing the song Beach Party with Howard Helm.

My fans gave me support for years and they encouraged me for more new material for my next album. I decided to record a new CD called Maltsa with Mario Guini, who also worked in the new Tropical Breeze band, he help me with my new sound. I called the new sound âMaltsa Musicâ, which is a blend of soul, smooth jazz, calypso, and Latin and Soca rhythm. Beach Party was originally recorded on the Tropic album with Howard Helm. I decided to re-record it and put it on the Maltsa album.

When my third album Maltsa was released, it had great reviews and opened an opportunity for me to work for a Caribbean restaurant chain: Bahama Breeze. Bahama Breeze was about to open new restaurants all around the United States, and I was offered the opportunity to be their opening act. I thought, how cool is that! My CD was in all the Bahama Breeze gift shops at the restaurants and was selling well. I posted some of my songs off the Maltsa CD on my mp3.com website on the Internet, where I made good royalties. A movie producer heard it and picked up my song Beach Party and offered me a deal. Now the song is the theme song of a new movie The Surfer King. It is going to be released in Europe this summer. You can now watch the trailer and hear the song Beach Party on my website.

Today Iâm still fulfilling my dreams playing music in Tampa Bay Florida at Bahama Breeze five nights a week. It has been 9 straight years and Iâm now planning to release my new CD "Changing Times" this year.