Congrats to the Virginia Sil’hooettes for having their album and song “Beautiful Child” selected as one of the Recorded A Cappella Review Board’s “Picks of the Year” for 2011. Check out the full list at www.rarb.org/picks/2011.html

Congrats to the University of Virginia Sil’hooettes, JMU Exit 245, JMU Low Key, and MIT Logarhythms for being selected to the annual 2012 Best Of College A cappella album, a compilation representing the best college a cappella in the country over the past year.

James composed the original classical music for the animated short “The Hero” by AV Kelly.  Check it out on YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Oh1V9kZqtI

Congratulations to the University of Virginia Academical Village People, Virginia Belles, Virginia Sil’hooettes, University of Georgia Noteworthy, James Madison University Low Key, University of Chicago Men in Drag, UCLA Scattertones, and UCLA Signature for having been selected to appear on the 2011 ‘Voices Only’ Compilation Album! These groups were chosen from more than 150 submissions from across the country, and they’re all pretty awesome. More info at http://www.voicesonlyacappella.com/

Talented Richmond-area Singer/Songwriter Will Rousseau has finished his first EP with James, entitled ‘Sojourn.’  Will sings and plays acoustic guitar, and James performed background instruments and mixed the tracks.  Listen below for samples, and be sure to check him out on iTunes in the next week or so to purchase the EP!

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Ok, all, here’s the deal:  I just got a bunch of new music production software, and I have to learn how to use it.  I can’t really be trying to learn new software while clients are here on the clock, so I’m just going to do a bunch of cover songs singing and playing the background tracks by myself.  What I need from my friends is a suggestion of any song (from any time period) that you’d like to hear, and then also any pop/rock artist from the past 20 years that this cover version should emulate .  Seriously, go to town.  I’m going to start things off with a cover of “Counting Blue Cars” by Dishwalla, for no reason other than just that I heard it on the radio earlier this week.

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James’ original song “Toxie the Toxic Asset,” with lyrics and concept by Andrew Breton, was featured on this week’s episode of NPR’s This American Life.  The episode can be found here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/418/toxie.  An mp3 of the full song (written and performed by James) is below.

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Congratulations to the University of Virginia Sil’hooettes and James Madison University Low Key for being selected for the 2011 Best of College A Cappella compilation track!

James’ original song “Toxie the Toxic Asset” was played on NPR’s Planet Money Podcast this week.

Congratulations to James Madison University’s Exit 245 and Overtones and to the Virginia Hullabahoos for being selected for Voices Only 2010.  Check out the whole album here: http://www.voicesonlyacappella.com/vo2010.html