Peninsula Arts Assoc. funding fuels young artist...
Eli Mattson nears completion of his first CD |
EGG HARBOR, WI - "Eli is the man!" says one of his
fans at a recent concert. At 19 years of age, Eli Mattson from Jacksonport, Wisconsin has been busy - practicing,
writing songs, and struggling with the monsters that so many young people have to deal with. He does so by writing
powerful pop piano music and singing lyrics that are too old for his age.
"Monsters" is the title of Eli's first full album of original music. The recently completed music CD
is now at the press. Plans are to officially release it on Sunday,
June 30 at a CD release concert at 7
PM at Camp David in Fish Creek. The album will be available at
performances, and on www.musictoears.com website, where Eli's performance schedule is also posted.
| "I decided to try to make an album of Eli's powerful songs,"
says Eli's manager and sometimes co-writer Roger Kuhns, "because the music and the message was just bursting
from him... |
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At small coffee house performances I watched young people focus
on him and sing along with the lyrics - lyrics that relate to these people, and in many cases help them - just
like singing does for Eli."
Kuhns offered to help Eli start his career just a year and a half ago, paying for equipment, organizing music sets,
and encouraging him to complete many of his songs. Kuhns produced a 3-song demo for Eli last year to help start
his professional career.
"An album project is a time consuming, wonderful, stressful, demanding, creative, frustrating and very expensive
thing!" Kuhns says. "I wanted to help Eli make his first full professional album, and as his manager
we needed more money than I had in the bank, so we sought grant funds from the Peninsula Arts Association."
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Kuhns worked with Mattson to write a grant asking for matching funds. Half of the $30,000 invested in CD production would be come from Kuhns, and the
other half hopefully, from the PAA. |
"We knew it was a lot of money, but this is the launch of a very talented young person who might have otherwise
fallen through the cracks," Kuhns says.
The PAA honored the grant in November, 2001 with a stipulation that there would be three funding periods. Complete
funding was not guaranteed without a quality progress report presented to the PAA to justify further funding.
"We're very aware that there's a lot of competition for this grant money, so we were enormously pleased when
we were approved for the initial $5,000. That got us going!" says Roger Kuhns.
By May of this year the album was recorded, mixed and mastered at Studio Z in Milwaukee.
"We came in under budget, and ended up using only $11,000 of the PAA money," Kuhns explains. "And
now the album is being copied and packaged - we're very excited."
The album not only satisfies the PAA's goal of focusing on helping new and talented artistic individuals, but also
benefits the region's young people in several ways. It includes other local talent like Alex Sowinski (one of his
songs is on the album), and Jamie Sodd (who plays guitar on several tracks). But more importantly, the PAA funding
demonstrates to young people like Eli Mattson that there are local pathways for young emerging artists.
Roger Kuhns can be contacted through www.musictoears.com or PO Box 752, Sturgeon Bay, WI. |
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