The Makers

Richard Schletty

Role: Music Maker

Location: Minnesota, USA


BIOGRAPHY

I have a good voice for both singing and speaking. It is a baritone voice – not too high and not too low. I sometimes do public performances of Folk-Rock or Praise music. I song-lead at church almost every Sunday. I also do spoken voiceovers for TV, radio, films and video. The main things I do to make money are web design, illustration and photo retouching. I have also painted a few big murals around town.

I didn't get started in songwriting until I was age 52. It was the summer of 2004: I started using Apple GarageBand on my Macintosh G4. I signed up at MacJams.com and soon began to collaborate with dozens of musicians from the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Jack Miller was one of the first artists I met at MacJams and he has really helped me to become a better songwriter and performer. "Lighten Up Now" is just one of the many original songs we have created. Our songs are best described as Folk-Rock. We even done musical versions of some of Shakespeare's sonnets (poems). I haven't met Jack Miller in person. We create songs by sending MP3 music files to each other through the Internet. I hope to shake Jack's hand some day!

I am also working on a big project with a very good guitarist, David Gómez Sanz, who lives in Spain. I am learning orchestral composition by collaborating with André van Haren, an excellent Dutch composer who lives in Sweden. These are just a few examples of the many internet collaborations I have done over the past five years.


THE SECRET SIX

1. Some Favorite Childhood Music

Church music (especially Gregorian chant), Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Jimmie Rodgers, The Kingston Trio, The Beach Boys, The Doors, The Who, Dean Martin and Bing Crosby.

2. Favorite Childhood Games

Track and field (discus, shot put, javelin), basketball, checkers, Monopoly, Scrabble, Yahtzee, stilts, building my own chugs (go karts).

3. Favorite School Subjects

Ancient history, art, science, Latin, choir

4. Some Favorite Places from Youth

My yard, the alley, the street (where we played kickball and baseball), our old church (which burned down), my grade school, Excelsior Amusement Park, Como Park Zoo, and Cherokee Park bluffs (where there were caves and a cool sandpit).

5. Childhood Heroes

Jesus Christ, the saints, Sister Michael Marie, my Ma and Dad, my brothers and sisters, The Lone Ranger, Jet Jackson, Jim Bowie and Bud Mrozinski (a man with a deep, rich voice who sang in the adult choir at church when I was in grade school)

6. Dream Super Powers

I would like to be able to fly by flapping my arms. I wish I could play guitar like a Spanish Classical guitar master. I'd also like to be able to throw discus and javelin farther than anyone in the whole wide world. I would love to be able to sing and dance for a crowd of 100,000 people twice a week for the next 20 years. Now THAT would be super!