Music is my one true passion. I play piano and guitar, as well as sing a little, and can also play the flute, trumpet, tin whistle, bass and harmonica to a lesser extent. Basically I'll play anything I can get my hands on.
I'm not a very technical player, my sight-reading is atrocious, but my strength lies in my ear and my ability to learn songs by listening. My composing skill is not great, my performing skill is not great, and my tools for recording are extremely limited. Mostly it's just my laptop and it's built-in microphone. But I've managed to come up with some compositions and performances I'm mostly happy with.
* All files are in AAC (.m4a) format.
The Tiger (Radio Edit) (Words, W. Blake | All Music, Acoustic Guitar, Vocals, J. Ward | Bass Guitar, D. Beazly | Drums, A. Keen)
-- This was a compostion I did for my HSC in Year 12, for the field of 'Popular Music'. I appropriated the lyrics from one of my favourite poems by William Blake, and recorded it in a small studio near to where I live.
Species Confused (J. Ward | Contains samples from Horsell Common And The Heat Ray - Jeff Wayne, Linger - The Cranberries, Plenty - Sarah McLachlan)
-- This was a composition I did at university, using ProTools. The name of the piece, and it's main inspiration comes from a friend of mine, who has so many different morphs on FurryMUCK it's almost impossible to know what he really is.
The Land & The Sky (J. Ward)
-- This was another composition from my high school days, this one was a direct assignment. We had to create a short, improvised composition based on a painting (the name of which escapes me, I'll post a link to it if I ever remember). This was recorded at home, in my lair, on my piano, so it's not professional quality.
I have recently started dabbling in Apple's GarageBand program. Using only the application and my laptop's crappy built-in microphone, I've managed to put together a few rough demos.
* These recordings are LOW quality
Throw Your Arms Around Me (Words & Music, Mark Seymour, Hunters & Collectors | Acoustic Guitar, Vocals, J. Ward)
-- This was my first demo, recorded in roughly 2 hours when my internet connection was down and I had nothing else to do. Very rough, but for 2 hours work, I'm very happy with the result. (26 Apr 2005)
Why (Words & Music, Peter Zizzo | Acoustic Guitar, Vocals, J. Ward)
-- Much the same as the first demo, done the next day, in an hour this time. Basically I was really bored and felt like playing guitar anyway, so I thought I may as well practice my skills in GarageBand while I was at it. (27 Apr 2005)
The Drugs Don't Work (Words & Music, Richard Ashcroft | Acoustic Guitar, Vocals, J. Ward)
-- Another demo created from boredom, and 2 hours of the net being down. Based on the original demo by the verve, rather than the commercial version that made it to radio play and the Urban Hymns album. (1 Jul 2005)
I Don't Want To Live On The Moon (Words & Music, Jeff Moss | Acoustic Guitar, Vocals, J. Ward)
-- My first demo in a while. Another quick one-take job, I was just bored and hadn't touched my guitar in far too long, or sung ... and it shows. This is bad quality stuff. (18 August 2005)
Such Great Heights (Words & Music, The Postal Service | Arrangement, Score, Vocals, J. Ward)
-- I had a massive urge to arrange a version of this song. I'm happy with how unique I managed to make my version, though I'm still not sure if I like it or not. (14 December 2005)
All design and content © J. Ward, 2006.