A collection of “live in the studio” acoustic recordings, mainly representing the music I play at open mics on Thursday nights.

The original impetus for this collection came when one of my computer clients asked me for a recording of “A Colder Day.” My first attempt didn’t come out as well as I’d hoped: My recording setup was unable to record guitar and vocal on separate tracks, in one pass, without crosstalk and synchronization issues. So I purchased some updated recording equipment and tried again.

The result is a very personal performance, with the intimacy and immediacy of a living-room concert: the perfect companion piece to my later, more electric CD, A Function of Time. In effect, Renaissance Man serves three purposes: as a review of South of Dakota (Long Way, Misunderstanding You, It Happened One Night), a preview of A Function of Time (Leap of Faith, Eyes of a Common Man, Might as Well Be Rain, Yesterday a Long Time Ago), and as an overview of my older material.

All the songs on Renaissance Man were recorded using my Fender El Rio guitar and a single vocal microphone, live and in one or two takes, without overdubs. It’s so much easier to record a simplified guitar-and-vocal recording than to lay down track after track after track, like many of my previous recording projects. With my current focus on live, acoustic performances at venues like Ritual Café, Chocolaterie Stam and the Des Moines Social Club, this seemed like a good way to offer a CD that reflects my performances there.

The front cover, a parody of Leonardo DaVinci’s Vitruvian Man, was painted by my good friend Cynthia Lee, and the back and interior photos were done by Aaron Hudspeth of KagedCreek.com