Brians Weblog

September 28, 2026

Dear Friends and Listeners alike,

I am excited to announce that starting in October, I will endeavor to record and release privately one song a month to my supporters who have joined my email list, at no charge. I will ask for a suggested monthly patronage of $1, as a gesture to support the Artist and my ongoing learning progress on the classical guitar, and melodic harmonica.

These tracks will be available in a member only page of my website, which I will soon set up. Most of these pieces will be up to 3 minutes in length, “In House” engineered, and mastered by SoundCloud. You will be able to download them and listen at your pleasure.

As is my practice, each piece will be recorded in stereo, submitted to my teacher, or other critics for review, engineered by Yours Truly, and mastered by SoundCloud. You will be able to add these quality recordings to your musical library. This will follow the same process that I have been doing for more than 5 years now. I am making them exclusively available to you, my fans. Membership in the email list is the only requirement.

I have been thinking for some time now about how to record and distribute music, what is the best way forward. Streaming is the contemporary “obvious” answer, but please understand, streaming has value primarily for “musical discovery”, artists are left out of the equation. When payments to artists reach the towering heights of fractions of a penny per stream, it is not your favorite musicians who are benefiting. Why should I release my music to the teeming faceless masses of people, when I would rather share it with those whom I know, and who have expressed interest and support for my efforts? The reality is that I will likely continue to widely distribute music, if I feel that is an important enough piece to do so, but I would rather focus on the people who matter most to me. Fun fact, when playing and performing, I find it helpful to imagine one person listening to my recital, and I hope they are pleased with the music presented. So now I am manifesting that idea, by sharing recordings with my most loyal fans.

The reason I am highlighting shorter pieces, is because my next album will contain only 12 songs. Yes, I just went ahead and decided this. Of course it is subject to change. My upcoming debut album, For Velma, holds a whopping 18 tracks. This means I will be looking for longer developing musical examples, thus the shorter pieces, many of them etudes, will be for your ears only. I grew up in the vinyl LP era, and I feel that 40 minutes, give or take, is an appropriate length of time for a musical album.

Regarding For Velma, my debut album, the audio files are finished and sent off to the distributor, so yes, the digital album is solidly scheduled for release on October 28. It will be available on internet stores, including Bandcamp, and of course my own website. The Compact Disc this week will be sent off to the discmaker, I am finalizing the jacket design. It too appears to be on schedule for October 28.

I had the honor of attending a concert given in haste by the Beijing Guitar Duo, consisting of Meng Sue, and Yamen Wang, at Baltimore’s Peabody Conservatory this past Saturday night. The announced performer, Junhong Kuang, had to bail out apparently at the last minute, figuratively speaking. Ms. Sue and Wang traveled 7 hours by car to reach the Conservatory in time for the concert, and despite this inconvenience they put on a wonderful, beautiful, expressive performance. Pictured below is the Griswold Hall. The concert was sponsored by the Baltimore Classical Guitar Society.

Venmo: @Brian-Higgins-104

Album Update

Recording almost finished

I feel like I have all my recording done for the album. I have sent it to a couple of excellent local guitarists, for their opinion and review. I need to keep finding people to send it to, for that social proof. I am also working on finding performance venues, especially an Album Release party, which may be at Maryland Meadworks, in Hyattsville, MD. I expect to have some more dates at Riverdale Park in October, as well as a Sunday Brunch at the aforementioned Meadworks. Sophie is working on the art and design for the jacket, but I gotta send her some more art. I think I have the concepts I wish to see, and I wrote out the Liner Notes.

We are still very much on track for October 28 release date.

Sunday February 15, 2026

Harmonica News

I am back to playing my chromatic harmonica, after months of only playing my diatonics–which are okay but limited. Since I play by sight-reading sheet music, not by ear, I need all the notes!

My main instrument is the guitar, but after some trouble with arthritis in my fingers, I decided to learn another instrument not so dependent on them. A pleasant surprise with this instrument is how much I’ve been able to learn in a short time–check out my harmonica recordings here!

A less pleasant surprise is how delicate harmonicas are. My harmonicas frequently need repair.Up to a point I can maintain them myself, purchasing toolkits and spare parts and spending a lot of time repairing them. When my Suzuki broke I spent three months trying to buy reeds, but could never get Suzuki customer service to follow through.

Finally, I found certified harmonica repairman Gary Lehman on a Reddit advice forum. Getting a certified expert to repair it made the difference!

Album Project News

I am moving forward with my album project, For Velma. I recently listened to my recordings for the album. They sound good! I’m biased, of course, but my teacher, Justin Heath, vets all my tunes before I release them publicly, and he has no qualms about pushing me to work as long as it takes to make each tune better, for which I thank him–if sometimes through gritted teeth!

About half of the pieces have already been professionally engineered, by Steve Steckler at Asparagus Media Studios in Takoma Park, MD. More engineering, followed by mastering, is yet to come in order to complete the project. Paying for these and other expenses associated with producing and launching my album will be the focus of my coming Kickstarter campaign.

The initial scope of the Campaign will be a digital album, which is a download link you can save to a CD-R if you choose, as well as save it to listen on your phone or computer. If my initial campaign is successful, the second stage will fund a physical compact disc recording. A CD album is more expensive to manufacture, but has the advantage of being a physical object in a case you can hold and open; you can view the cover art and song info–and info about me and my collaborators–in real time and space. And you can handle the disc itself (carefully!) and play it on your home audio equipment.

Help Fund For Velma!

I would like to ask each of you reading this to support me by joining my email list. In appreciation, I will send you a free download track. I will let you know when I make a blog post, and when I have new recordings.

In subsequent posts I’ll say more about how this project came about, tell you about Velma, and share what it’s like to do home recording and to record in a small local studio, as well as musical collaboration, and more.

Thanks for your friendship and for listening to my music! I look forward to your joining me on my musical explorations.

Wednesday October 8, 2025

This morning, I just went through and Geoblocked all of my musical tracks on Soundcloud. This is my own personal boycott against this roque Nazi/Zionist “State”, due to their now two years ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people.

I have been working with my neighbors since late October of 2023 to resist against this genocide, starting with our efforts to pressure our Congressional representative in Maryland’s District 4, the soaked in AIPAC BLOOD MONEY Mr. Glenn Ivey. Ivey has taken more than $7 million from AIPAC in the last two election cycles, in his successful bid to defeat Donna Edwards, a true progressive, social democrat who would never have taken such a corrupting contribution.

I really don’t know how much Zionists listen to classical guitar music, or solo harmonica music, which is what I have on Soundcloud. And I realize not all people in Israel are Zionists, and many people there are genuinely attempting to end the occupation and genocide, just as I am. Nevertheless, this is my tiny personal effort to help end the suffering of millions of people in Palestine. May it help bring about a just peace, and the downfall of the apartheid Israeli state.

Free Palestine!

Jewish-Led Protest Calls For A Permanent Ceasefire In Gaza — The Intersection Magazine

Prince George’s 4 Palestine (@princegeorges4palestine) • Instagram photos and videos