Wow it's been such an amazing year, I haven't even had time to update this blog for many months. In my new company Groove-Phonic Mastering and MIxing, I've had the opportunity to work for so many wonderful artists, and continue to do so. Just this weekend I'm finished up work on an album release for RE.Clipz, just finishing up another record for rap group outta Santa Rita, California called Elevated Minds Crew. I'll be helping rap artist Kontoob release a special New Year's Day EP (free download details to come). Also to be finished this end-of-year is an album I've been working on for over a year now on well-known international Christian rock artist Sam Robinson Thalluri. Some other things are going on too, but I can't talk about everything at this point.

Over the last year I've had the pleasure of mastering or mixing some amazing artists: Kaveh Karandish, Cornelius MD, Thunder X, Mr. Me, MiLawd, Yesiah, Melodious Monk, the Gospel Shining Stars, Ross and Heather Parmley, Sporty-G, Brad Tatum, Jeffrey Ledger, Tom Seven, and too many more to mention.

We have some big projects coming up for the year of 2012. I'll try to keep this blog updated! One thing is, I'm going to be changing the formay of my website in the near future, just as soon as I can find the time. I'm getting a little tired of its current configuration, and it's getting a little too full of archived stuff... time for a purge and some all new stuff maybe...

Update for 7/11/2011 -- I just finished co-producing, mixing and mastering a new CD for EMI recording artist Jade check out Jade's website and hear one of the tracks.

I'm just finishing up an album for an unsigned artist named Sam Robinson Thalluri. Sam is an incredibly talented singer-songwriter who has sold thousands of records in India. We've been co-producing his new record since October of last year, and it's almost finished, and it sounds great. I'll update when it gets released, soon.

If anyone needs mixing or mastering or producing, please contact me at (305) 490-5338. We have the system worked out to transfer your project to me for mixing or producing, easily.

I'd like to say Hello to Carlos Mantilla in Bucaramanga Columbia -- he's the latest DJ to add my record FUNKMEISTER to the playlist over at Radio 96.9 Bucaramanga! Thanks Carlos. My second release "Mixed Messages" off the record has also been doing well in the international charts this year, so thanks everyone. Be sure to sign up for your free mp3 download right here on this website (check the sidebar for the free signup!)

I've posted a new video of a recent show I did with Ike and Val Woods here. I think it was a pariticularly good performance by the group that night over at the Van Dyke Cafe in South Beach, although you can't see me very well (or at all!) in the video because of the zoom factor of the automated camera. But you can hear the whole band really well, it was a great mix.

I've opened a new website for mastering over at http://www.groovephonic.com so if anyone needs any mastering done, please consider hiring us to do it. We've had a lot of years in this business and we know what we're doing when it comes to putting out a good radio quality master, so head on over to groovephonic to get your groove on. We are currently offering a special of $198 for an entire album mastered, and you can upload your files right on the website. Check us out!

more later.... h.

Hello World,

Just lettin' ya know, I've just released a second single from my album FUNKMEISTER, "Mixed Messages" which is now being played internationally. This is a song featuring the very talented Elisa Sintjago (www.elisasintjago.com) as well as Jesse Jones Jr. on saxophone (www.jessejonesjr.com), and presenting a very talented guitarist who happens to be a very

longtime friend (I've known him since I was 14 years old ) -- Mr. Derek Mason from Vancouver, who runs Derek Mason Music Productions (www.dmasonmusic.com) out of his 28th floor oceanview studio in that city. Derek does a smoking guitar solo on the tune. Please register on the sidebar for your free mp3 downloads of my two singles! Or click here => www.funkmeister.us

 In other news, I've released two more albums this last year. The first one is an amazing live recording of authentic Honduran folk music played by authentic Hondurans -- my wife's father, S. Benito Alonzo, is an amazing guitarist and requinto player. We visited him on his ranch in the mountains of Honduras this last summer, and I brought along a digital recorder, so when we sat down to play some tunes, I had the recorder turned on and we ended up with some really marvelous tracks, featuring also a great Bajista named Alejandro Galindo who plays a homemade Honduran "Bass banjo" or whatever you might call it. (See the picture). You can pick up copies of this CD at my e-commerce outlet at www.webdimensions.biz 

And the last but not least release of the year for me has been the long-awaited first CD of my "alma mater" group, or the group I really cut my musical teeth on way back in the 1970s, the Martian Entropy Band (www.martianentropyband.com). This group had three major influences: Frank Zappa, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and the Firesign Theatre. So you can imagine, the fare varies from the sublime to the absurd. I had some really old tapes to work with so I really took my time mastering this record, ironing out the bumps and inconsistencies in the time-warped recordings, and at the end of the day I believe the overall product came out really well and is a fine representation of the amazing talents in this band, including my dear friends, Mike Gould on bass and vocals (www.mondodyne.com), Tim Prosser on guitar and vocals (www.mandonlinmaniac.com), and the late, great Bill Gracie on drums. Added to this mix for selected performances was the fine professional talents of Mr. Douglas Brown on bass and trombone. I invite you to join the Martian Entropy Band Fan Club, just go to www.MartianEntropyBand.com and you will receive two free downloads from the album (and you can purchase copies there if you want!)

Also, we Martians were lucky enough to have some really great people around the band helping us, including a very talented video professional named Steve Wild, who produced an amazing music video on the band back in 1973, about ten years before MTV was a household term. I've published parts of the video, you can view part 1 and part 2 or just check the video links on this website.

Happy New Year, everyone!

On October 15th I was notified -- actually it came out of the blue and pretty much took me by surprise -- that my song "You Didn't Have to Be So Nice" from my record FUNKMEISTER had reached chart position #75 on the Top 100 international charts for Adult Contemporary songs. Wow! What a great honor.

The notification came from the I.A.I.R.A -- the International Association of Independent Recording Artists (http://www.iaira.com) which is a completely objective monitoring and reporting agency which keeps an eye on radio play around the world.

I am honored and thrilled to be able to unequivocally print this news on my various websites. Many thanks go out to Elisa Sintjago for doing such a fine job of rendering the tune, and of course to Jesse Jones Jr. for providing a very nice saxophone track for the song. And thanks to me for writing and arranging the music and lyrics, engineering the session, mixing (and re-mixing) and also to myself for playing all the guitars, basses and keyboards as well as programming the drum tracks! Kudos, self! And also a big shout-out to Kevin Nix of Ardent Studios in Memphis Tennessee for doing an awesome job mastering the record.

My promoter tells me she thinks this is just the beginning of many good things to come. I will be releasing another single off the album shortly. So stay tuned...

Hi Folks, here's the latest news... my record FUNKMEISTER has been featured two saturdays in a row on BBC Radio... songs from the album are receiving national airplay in UK, France, Italy, Germany, Austria, Russia, Sweden, Spain and Denmark, as well as Australia, and New Zealand and Canada. We've joined forces with a new promoter and distributor, so hopefully we'll see a whole new level of broadcast for FUNKMEISTER as the days and weeks go on.

FUNKMEISTER has been re-released as of August 15th, a completely re-mixed and re-mastered album and copies are available through CD Baby at http://www.cdbaby.com/hughjarvishitchcock. Why not pick up a copy or two!

Also we now have some copies of our beautiful, limited edition posters available, click here to check out the deal on those. We have both FUNKMEISTER posters and Father of Scat Hop posters available. These posters are really, really nice, very large, and prined on high quality heavy duty gloss backed poster paper, these are the real thing folks, I have spared no expense in getting these manufactured. I have framed copies in my home, and believe me they look quite classy, I have some photos of the framed copies in the promo section so just click on the link to get yours now.

We were hoping to put together a touring group for the Scat Hop stuff, but Jesse's been so busy with the whole Blues and Jazz scene that it looks like that's just not going to come together. We wish Jesse all the luck in the world with his career as a Jazz Legend.

Meanwhile, it looks like Father of Scat Hop is really turning out to be more my bag -- that is, the music part of it -- Jesse always said that, anyway. Even the DJs at Stanford University's radio station KZSU (who gave us a good review by the way) seem to feel that the focus is more on the music (mainly my contribution to this record) and not so much on the scat. Ain't that somethin'.

Big thanks goin' out to DJs MC Dizzy Jackson, Abra, and Eme O over at KZSU for givin' us a spin. Father of Scat Hop is also being played on Green Arrow Radio, KAOS DJMK Radio, WMBH Radio, Live365 Internet Radio, WXYC 89.3 FM, KALX 90.7 FM Berkeley, as well as some other stations around the US. Go Jesse!

Hi Folks,

Well, Jesse and I were on WLRN FM 93.1 FM in Miami this last monday night, May 17 and it was a blast! Tracy Fields is totally cool people, as Jesse says "what you see is what you get" and I edited that to "what you hear is what you get" as I have been listening to Tracy for quite a few years now, and she is totally cool people I can now testify for real. We had a great time talking about Scat Hop, and its father Jesse Jones Jr. I was asked if I was the "midwife" of Scat Hop LOL! I had never thought of it that way but I guess you could say that, but as I told Tracy, Scat Hop really fell out of the air one day when I asked Jesse to do a vocal on the first track we were working on for the album (song now called "Get On Up"). Truly a unique vocal concept, which I feel had never been heard before, at least in a funk setting, although Jesse gives lots of props to Clark Terry. ANYWAY -- if you missed the radio interview, you can check it out online as I have posted the entire interview here.

If anyone out there is a specialist in record marketing and distribution, please contact me as we are looking to hire someone to help us get this record in clubs and distribution deal. Everyone just loves this record the Father of Scat Hop, but since Jesse is so well known as a jazz artist it's a little weird to break over into the club/funk/dance market and we could use a little help. Get in touch if you specialise in this type of thing and we'll talk turkey.

Hey Folks,

My latest record has just been released... it's called Father of Scat Hop and the artist is Jesse Jones Jr. who is also my dear friend here in Miami. Jesse is a Jazz legend here in Miami and is also known internationally, so I feel very lucky that he allowed me to produce this latest album in my style of music... which is FUNK baby! This thing really smokes. You can have a listen over at www.scathop.com or -- better yet -- pick up a copy of the CD for yourself at http://www.CDBaby.com/scathop . You can also purchase a download of the record at CD Baby or you can get it on ITunes here.

About the record: it was a joint effort between myself and Jesse. Actually I had always wanted to produce a record on Jesse, more of a funk thing, as Jesse has always prided himself on being more of a mainstream jazz artist, and had never stepped outside that box too much, although I knew for a solid fact that he has the funk with him at all times. So, I really wanted to give him a vehicle to release some of that funk, and I think this album works on many levels. I wrote the grooves and beats and did all the drum, keyboard and bass work and some guitar parts as well. Jesse came in and did his thing, and Joe Collado provided conga and latin percussion, and the 'Legendary' Ike Woods provided some real solid rhythm guitar parts. His wife Val came in and put the icing on the cake with some sweet vocal work. Last but not least, Dennis Sierra, my longtime friend from KC and the Sunshine Band came in and laid on some solid rock guitar parts. And also my lifetime friend Derek Mason contributed a solo which rocked. Topping it off is a solid mastering job done by Kevin Nix at Ardent Studios in Memphis. I personally did all the photography and graphic design and I alone, for better or worse, am responsible for the look and feel of the CD. Jesse likes it! I think it's "da bomb"! So please if you have an extra $15 and you like some serious funk and jazz and you want to hear a great artist really get down, pick up a copy of Father of Scat Hop at CD Baby or get it on ITunes.

Jesse and I are going to be on the radio this coming monday May 17th at 10pm EDT on the local NPR radio station for Miami, WLRN. You can tune in live to the broadcast by pointing your web browser to live.friendsofwlrn.org . I will try to get an archival stream after the fact if possible if you can't make it live. This is going to be fun -- Tracy Fields is the local Jazz afficionado and announcer, I've listened to her for years here on WLRN and she has invited Jesse to come on and showcase the new record, and Jesse asked me to tag along, so it's going to be a blast. Don't miss it if you can!

next monday May 17, 10pm on the Tracy Fields show, talking about "Father of Scat Hop"! Listen Live at http://live.friendsofwlrn.org/  

Hi Folks! Well it seems people are really liking my record FUNKMEISTER... I was just a little surprised to learn that it has somehow ended up in the top ten on the Hip Hop chart on CBFX Radio, which is a big college radio station in British Columbia! Various DJs around the world have been getting word back to me that they like the CD, so I thought I'd proudly share some of the comments I've been getting... so here are a few for your edification. I know, this is ego-maniacal spewing forth of self-praise... but as I mentioned before, this is what this website is for <grin>...

this one comes from Graham Barclay of Soundwave FM in New Zealand:

Hi Hugh, Many Sincere Thanks for the CD" Funkmeister " that you sent us recently. BRILLIANT - EXCELLENT We have enjoyed it immensly, and have added tracks from it to our playlists. Your presentation of music, inside the style and personality reflected in the tracks is very refreshing. Keep it up. Many thanks again, and please stay in touch. Kind regards Graham J Barclay

thanks so much Graham, I aim to please and I'm glad I've hit the mark! I'll definitely stay in touch and I'll send you a copy of my next album "Father of Scat Hop" which will be releasing in March!

the next comment is from George Young from Country Club Radio in Australia:

Hi Hugh, We love the groove on this disc. Could be the most funky thing ever to come out of Memphis. It's all good. Cheers George Young

Hey George, thanks so much for your positive feedback. Actually, I'm in Miami (!) although we did get the CD mastered out of a famous studio in Memphis. Will stay in touch fer sher!

This one comes from the Netherlands, which happens to be the home country of the singer on my CD, Elisa Sintjago:

Hi Hugh, Loved your album. So did my listeners. Hope to hear more from your. Happy Holidays, Paul van Kuik The Country Express Radio 0162 - Dongen The Netherlands

Pierre Gerard from Planete Indie in France had this to say:

I have received the cd. I liked it a lot and have spinned it recently. You can check the playlists online at : www.pierregerard.be/planete

Thanks so much for your support at Planete Indie. Pierre you will also be receiving a copy of our next album, "Father of Scat Hop" due out this month.

Until next time, this is your chief funkatologist, signing out.

Hi folks, just wanted to let you know that all the tunes on my record are now available through ITunes. And...

The folks at WKUF-LP 94.3 in Flint Michigan have decided they really like the CD and they've put it on heavy airplay rotation! Whassup Kevin over at WKUF! www.wkuf.com

Also, a review has been done by Indy Radio. Not too bad, really...

more later, have a nice day :)