David Ouellette

I grew up listening to American popular music, mostly singers, of the 50's and early 60's.

I was barely awakening as an adolescent when the cultural wave of the 60's came thundering through our small, saw-mill and University town. I first identified with the Beatles, the British Invasion, then on to Bossa Nova, Jobim and Gilberto, then to classical guitar and eventually to the European classical tradition where I learned to love music I once thought was banal and snooty.

I've loved the sound of Harry Belafonte's voice and his calypso album since dancing to it as a little kid. Blood, Sweat and Tears was my first jazz-inflected album, but then a friend started feeding me King Oliver, Louis Armstrong, and Bix Biederbecke. Those recordings and voicings started seeping through me.

I've loved a lot of other voices since. Even Bach has a "voice," and I love to imagine him humming while fitting his lines together...

But, in the end, current singer/songwriters interest me the most.

I love original songs that carry a writer's point of view and voice so well that the song comes alive in a catchy, and then unforgettable way inside me. That's big magic. That is what I hope my songs offer you.