July 21, 2025 • 38 mins
🎙️ On this episode of the W.W.A.A. Podcast, host Kristy Mickelsen and co-host Billy Dees welcome special guest Bruce Sudano — award-winning musician, songwriter, and creative force behind hits for legends like Dolly Parton, Michael Jackson, Reba McEntire, and his late wife, the iconic Donna Summer.
Bruce shares the story of his deep-rooted passion for music, his early days with the R&B trio Brooklyn Dreams, and some of his most rewarding—and challenging—experiences in the industry. He also opens up about the impact of losing Donna, his wife of 35 years, and how that shaped both his personal life and career.
📲 Follow Bruce Sudano on all social media platforms and visit brucesudano.com to learn more about his music and journey.
đź”— Connect with the hosts:Â Â Â
Kristy Mickelsen: x.com/kristybooks    Â
Billy Dees: x.com/billydees
Bruce shares the story of his deep-rooted passion for music, his early days with the R&B trio Brooklyn Dreams, and some of his most rewarding—and challenging—experiences in the industry. He also opens up about the impact of losing Donna, his wife of 35 years, and how that shaped both his personal life and career.
📲 Follow Bruce Sudano on all social media platforms and visit brucesudano.com to learn more about his music and journey.
đź”— Connect with the hosts:Â Â Â
Kristy Mickelsen: x.com/kristybooks    Â
Billy Dees: x.com/billydees
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Good evening, everyone, and welcome to another episode of WWWA Podcast.
I'm your host, Christy Nicholson, and for those of you
not familiar with me, I am a romance book author
and an advocate for causes such as cancer, autism, and
lupas awareness. You can find my books on Amazon dot
com and other online retailers, and you can follow me
(00:24):
on most social media platforms, including x dot com at
Christy Books. Tonight, I'm joined by two wonderful people, one
of them being my co host, Billy Dee's Billy, thank
you for being here with us today.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Absolutely my pleasure, thank you.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Thank you. And our special guest today is our well
known musician and award winning songwriter who has written songs
for some wonderful music icons such as Dolly Parton, Michael Jackson,
Reva Mcatyre and his late wife Donna Summers. Bruce Adono, Bruce,
thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
Happy to be here with you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Always a pleasure to have wonderful people on now. Bruce,
you have a very impressive career in music, from writing
with Tommy James and touring with Alive and Kicking to
being a part of the popular R and B trio
Brooklyn Dreams. How did you get a love for music?
Tell us a little bit more about your background.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, grew up in Brooklyn, New York.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
Started taking accordian lessons as a four year old.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
That was kind of my formative of understanding music theory, and.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Accordion is a very good interest and to learn music
on because on one hand you're learning the treble cleft,
on the left hand you're learning the bass cleft. So
it was a very good foundational tool for me just
to understand coode structure and melody and things like that.
And even though I was a young kid, you know,
(01:56):
I took according lessons for four years between the ages
of four ten eight, and but even at that young age,
I think because you know, when you're young, you assimilate
things very quickly and very differently and deeply, so so
that kind of knowledge was sort of embedded in me.
(02:19):
And then at the age of nine, I got taken
to the Brooklyn Fox Theater. I grew up in Brooklyn,
and Brooklyn Fox Theater they had these you know, rock
and roll review shows Alan Freed or Murray the Kay
would put on and as a nine year old I
saw all these acts, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, vocal
(02:41):
groups like a group called the Empowers, I remember, and
I was just taken by the whole concept of being
on stage and performing and you know, and also at
the same time, my father had a jukebox route for
those of you that remember what juke boxes are, and
so day he would.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Every every week he would come.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
Home, like on a Friday, with a box of records
to change out that he would be changing out of
the jukeboxes. And I got fascinated by.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
The names under the title of the songs.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
And I learned that the names in parentheses under the
title of the song were the songwriters.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
So all of these things.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
You know, were going on inside me, and you know,
it just at that point in time, I saw, I
saw my way into the music business. It was to
the world of music, was to be a songwriter. It
was it was just an initial spark that just struck me.
So from you know that early, you know, at the
(03:46):
age of thirteen, I started putting bands together in the
neighborhood and uh, you know, we would we would you know,
cover the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and songs by
the Animals, and all these groups that were happening then
and between I would try to write songs and have
my band do them. And then from then on I
(04:08):
went from you know a number of years playing clubs
in the Tri state area, New York and New Jersey
and Long Island and Connecticut, and basically worked my way
through high school and college playing clubs at night and
developing my songwriting ability until in nineteen sixty eight, Tommy
(04:29):
James came into this club in.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Manhattan that my band was the house band at.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
It was a club called Cheetah, and Tommy came into
the club and I got introduced to him, and you know,
this was at a time when he was a very successful.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Singer, songwriter, musician in America.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
He had hits like Akie Panky and Money Money, and
I think we're alone now. So for me, as you know,
a kid's you know, just barely out of my teens,
I think I was probably was nineteen years old, you know,
and to meet somebody with this.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Much success, I was very excited and very taken by him.
And he had an.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
Apartment right around the corner from the club is where
he was living. Coincidentally, so on breaks, I would have
run around to his apartment and sit with him and
really try to learn from him as you know, as
a songwriter. And this led to my co writing with
him a song called ball of Fire, which became the
(05:30):
first basic chart record that I ever had.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
It was a song that I co wrote with.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Tommy and another guy in my band, Tom Wilson, and
it was a song called ball of Fire, and it
became a top twenty record at the time.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
And you know, Tommy took me into.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
The studio I saw my first first time I was
in a real recording studio to see how a record
got made, and you know, to gain an understanding of
how you build the track and how the equipment works,
all of these things.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
So he was, you know, continues to be.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
A super talented performing artist and was a great friend
to me.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Very generous guy, very talented guy. And so he kind
of opened the door to the real world of music
for me.
Speaker 4 (06:28):
And the following year, nineteen seventy, he produced my band.
We had a big hit record. The band was called
Alive and Kicking. The song was called Tighter and Tighter.
For those of you who don't remember the song, the
chorus was hold on just a little bit tighter now baby,
I love you so much and I can't let go.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
No, no, no.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
So that was the hit song then, and so that's
basically how I got into the music business.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Absolutely fantastic. You have got a wonderful background there and
love your voice. By the way, thank you for giving
us a little clue on that. I'm always curious. I'm
curious to the how it happens. So you write songs,
how does the songwriting process go? Like do you just
get an idea in your head and then boom, you're
onto paper? I mean, how does the process go?
Speaker 4 (07:21):
Well, I mean there's different aspects of the process. I mean,
for me these days, I basically write by myself, you know,
and I like to start my day either with a
guitar or at the piano and with no preconceived notion
(07:41):
of anything and just pick up the instrument and vibe
and through you know. You know, it doesn't even have
to take long. It could be twenty minutes or something
like that, you know, And if I get a spark
of an idea, there'll be something that you know, it's
like a little light goes off inside me and says, oh,
that's that's that's a good thing there. So you know,
(08:02):
I'll record it into my phone, put it down, and uh,
you know, and over the process of time, I'll continue
to you know, develop it. So I like to work,
you know, My my preference.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Is I like to work from a spark of inspiration.
Speaker 4 (08:21):
Uh. Take that spark of inspiration as far as I
can go. And then when I when I reached that point,
is when I then begin to apply craft to where Okay,
what am I What is that I'm saying?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
What is my rhyme scheme?
Speaker 4 (08:34):
How do I say this in a more creative and
poetic and emotional way?
Speaker 3 (08:41):
How is my melody laying out? Where do I need
to go?
Speaker 2 (08:45):
You know?
Speaker 3 (08:46):
What are my options schord wise?
Speaker 4 (08:48):
You know? And I just work through it like that.
But but over the course of my career, I've co
written a lot of songs with many different people.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (08:59):
Some times, I uh many times I've functioned just as
a lyricist, you know.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
For a number of years I worked with a great
uh producer, songwriter, musician whose name is Michael Elmartian. Uh
and uh, you know I would work with him in
that he would he would just send me tracks sometimes
with melodies sometimes if not without melodies, and uh, I
(09:28):
would have to, uh, you know, come up with the
with the lyric for the song. And that's how most
of the time how I worked with him. Uh, this
was how I wounded up wound up co writing songs
with him for the Jacksons and for Jamaine Jackson and
for Michael Jackson. And in other times I've written with
(09:51):
lyricists where I had to be the one to provide
provide the music.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (09:59):
And the third way is, you know, you sit down
with another person with a guitar and a piano or
whatever the configuration is, and you just pound out the
song together.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
You know.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
For my relationship in my band Brooklyn Dreams, there were
three of us, and so you know, a bunch of
those songs I wrote by myself, but there were also
songs that I co wrote with Joe ban Esposito, who
is one of the other guys in the Brooklyn Dreams,
or with Joe and Eddie Hoguson, who was the third
(10:32):
person in the Brooklyn Dreams, and we would just you know, guitar,
you know, a bongo and a piano, work on a song,
work on the lyric together, work on the melody together.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
And so those are the three work ways that I
have worked.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
It sounds almost like because I'm a book writer. I
write books and you get that spark of inspiration and
you just kind of, you know, work with it, just
like you said you do a song sometimes for me.
For me, writing is sometimes therapeutic. Do you find that
it's therapeutic for you as a musician to just get
behind there and just write your your heart out, get
(11:13):
your aches and pay like, how do you feel about that?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Well, you know, I always say that it's when I'm
writing that I know who I am. You know, there
there are you know, times in life when you get
you know, distracted by the realities of life, you know,
whatever they could be. You know, you're building an extension
(11:39):
on your house, or are they're putting a pool in
or you know, you have you know, there are these
other realities in life that that you know, remove you
from that place. And you know, then I find after
a period of time, I start to get a little
you know, I'll.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Use the word woozy.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
That's not real the word, but you know, I kind
of like lose track of my center. I'm like, I
feel uncomfortable and I'm like, you know, and then I'll
sit down with it with you know, guitar and piano,
and it just immediately calms me down. It centers me,
and I'm like, okay, I'm home.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
You know.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
So there's that aspect of it, but as as it
applies to, you know, my personal emotions. You know, I
was married for thirty two years and so and my
wife passed away, and you know, being able to write
(12:36):
my way through that great tragedy.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
In my life was you know, completely therapeutic for me.
Speaker 4 (12:47):
It allowed me to process my feelings in a personal way,
but at the same time, it also made me. It
gave me a sense of purpose in writing these things
because I knew that I was translating emotions that many
(13:10):
people experience, and so at somewhere in my psyche, I
comforted myself with the fact that not only was I
helping myself work through this process, that as a result
of this, maybe it would be able to also help
other people who were dealing with these kinds of issues,
(13:34):
you know, so and you know, and throughout my songwriting career,
I basically have a history of using my personal emotional experiences.
First of all, as a songwriter you know, it's very
important to be a good listener because you know, I
(13:55):
trade on people's lives and their emotions, and their highs
and their lows, and their wins and their losses, you know,
and these are the elements that I pull from.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
You know.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
You know you mentioned that I wrote for Dolly Parton.
You know, so.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
When I was twenty nine years old, my parents were
getting divorced, and even though I was of that age,
it's still greatly affected me. And you know, so I
ended up writing a song called Starting Over Again, which
was about the divorce of my parents. And this is
a song that Dolly Parton picked up recorded and it
(14:38):
became a number one country song for Dolly Parton. But
it was a very personal story to me. But at
the same time, you know, lots of people go through
divorce and many people could relate to it.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
So absolutely I tipped my hat to you because you're
a lot like me in that aspect. For me, writing
was it was a way for me to escape my emotions.
My fuck there was a cancer patient and when he
was going through chemotherapy, and to me, my dad was
my hero. I would write out all of my emotions
because I had no one else to turn to at
(15:09):
the time, and then my children being autistic, I had
nowhere to go to vent and just you know, get
that out. So I turned to writing. And I really
tip my hat to you because book writing and music,
believe it or not, music got me through a lot
of hard times. So people like you, I tip my
hat to thank you for that.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
Oh, thank you, you know, you know, as it applies
to music, you know, I I've been on a little
bit of a soap box because you know, in this
culture today, music doesn't have the same place in the
culture that it had when I was coming up. And
(15:52):
you know, I think that the culture is missing the
benefit of being able to just sit down and listen
to music, you know, whether it's making you dance, whether
it's you know, making you cry, whatever, whether it's just
soothing your soul, helping you escape from you know, the
(16:15):
realities and the stress that.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
We all live with.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
You know, music is a beautiful gift, you know, and
I somehow feel that in the culture now it's not
really being taken full advantage of. So I always like
to mention that and maybe it'll make somebody say, yeah,
I remember I used to do that I'm going to
sit down and listen to some music.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Well, I guarantee you when I jump off here, I
will be listening to music. You're bringing a smile to
my face because you feel some of the things that
I feel about music. And I do know that Billy
D's he has a lot of great questions usually, and
he's got a lot of wonderful insight about music himself. Billy,
I'm gonna go ahead and let you ask a couple questions.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Go right ahead, Well, well, please allow me to pick
up where you left off. What I would most definitely
agree with is the social aspect of music is missing.
In the era that you're talking about, people would have
people come over to their living room and you would
listen to the latest greatest album, and then you would
(17:19):
all discuss what kind of an experience you had, what
you liked about it, what you didn't like about it.
Even the equipment itself was showcased. You know how big
your amps are, how big your speakers are, and a
lot of people would rule particular that the speakers had
to be equally spaced and all this and the listening
was part of the enjoyment of the music. Now everybody's
(17:42):
got a phone. They all sound the same. They got
the earbuds in, They're in their own little world. And
I don't know, like what you were saying that the
impact is there is as much as it once was,
would you. I mean, obviously you've started, you started on that.
I just kind of wanted to follow up with that.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Yeah, absolutely, you playing it exactly right, you know.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
You know, it's it's interesting because it even affects how
I how I create now, you know.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
I mean, you know, back in the day, you know.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
I would spend a lot of time, you know, making
it sure it was sonically right, and and uh, you know,
and and.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Adding all these subtleties, and.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
You know, and I've recently, you know, I'm I'm putting
out a new album this fall, and I'm calling it Sketchbook.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
And basically what I'm doing is is you.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Know, because a lot of how I work with the
producers that I work with is I do sketches of
the songs to show them the direction I wanted to
go in. You know, I do my guitar part, I'll
do some keyboard parts, you know, set the top, I'll
do my vocal harmonies, and then send them and to
the musicians and they'll all overdub it and then the
(19:06):
mixture will mix it and all all of this, you know,
and then it all boils down to then somebody is
listening to it on their phone, you know, And so
you know, taking dealing with all with you know, a
period of frustration because of that, but it's a reality,
(19:29):
you know. And I'm not somebody who likes to lament
the past, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
I'm very much about where are we right now and
where are we going?
Speaker 4 (19:39):
Because what is well, what was was.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
You know, it's no longer. It's not going to change,
it's not coming back. Be here now and go forward.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
So in that, you know, this new album that I'm
making is basically going to be my sketches. It's going
to be very stripped down. And what's interesting about it
is that what I'm discovering is that the minimalism, in
other words, the less uh instruments you put on the track,
(20:15):
the less vocals you put on the track, it allows
and with the compression of the phone and how it's
translating through, so a guitar vocal on your phone can
be very big and very present and can drive a
track in a similar way that a full production can
(20:41):
and on the on the other and this is something
that I'm just discovering as I'm going forward. I'm sure
you know, they can people that tell me I'm crazy,
but that this is my analysis at this point. And
the other reason for for my thinking on this is,
you know, there are times when you're reducing a song
(21:03):
that in the production, especially for my type of songwriter
who relies so much on the story of the song,
the emotion of the song, that in production I won't
say frequently, but I'll say sometimes the emotion and the
(21:27):
power of the song can be diminished by and by
the production, and it becomes a very tricky thing that
you know, I always have wrestled with, you know, where
do you draw that line? You know, when did I
take that one step over the line in production where
I just diminished the power?
Speaker 3 (21:49):
You know? And so this is.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
This is the experiment for my for my next album.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
And I just.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Released, uh last week, UH a song called Watching Darkness Paul.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:07):
The video was released on YouTube actually today.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
And UH it's basically.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
A kick drum, a snare drum, and acoustic guitar and
my voice.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
And UH it Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
You know, it drives well, you know you you you know,
and it's it's it's a very lyric conscious song and
and so the words come through loud and clear, and uh,
but yet you still feel the drive and the urgency
of the music.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
That is fantastic. You know, you said something there about
the emotion of the music, the story of the music,
and a moment ago we alluded to how much the
the technology is serving the artist versus the art is
serving the technology. And we're in a new we're in
a new era now with AI, and there's a lot
(23:07):
of artists of different kind. Actors, for one, are very
nervous about let's say, the role of you know, stand ins, uh,
extras and so on and so forth. You can take
one person and duplicate them, and to a degree, I
think that's going to happen to music. You know, you could,
for example, you know, just analyze the number one hit
(23:29):
songs over the last fifty years and what did they
have in common in terms of basslines, what did they
have in common of hooks and snaps, and what did
they have in common of this and that and the
other thing? And how are we in any danger of music?
And artistry in general becoming something that's manufactured as much
as it is created.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (23:51):
Well, I definitely think so, you know, and I think
the technology is going to keep getting better.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You know. You know, I sit with my grant. I
have nine grandchildren, you know.
Speaker 5 (24:07):
And uh, you know, so I try to spend a
little bit of time with each of them, and you know,
part of the time of what they like to do
is is we go to uh it's called Suno and
and you know it's you just say, I want the
song to be about this.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
I wanted to be a country song. I wanted to
be a rock song. I wanted to be an armit whatever.
You just tell what it is and within seconds it
creates something.
Speaker 6 (24:36):
You know that that's uh, you know, that's a viable
Let's let's let's use the word viable, viable viable in
a way that if you're in an elevator, uh, and
there's some music playing and it's.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Not you're not really you know, zero in on the
music in that kind of way, it definitely will so
of its purpose. If you're in a restaurant and there's
you know, fifty people sitting eating lunch and there's music
playing in the background. It will serve that purpose, you know,
and you know the tracks are powerful. There's I mean seconds.
(25:17):
You know, there's a part of me that every time
I do this with what my grandchildren, I get depressed.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
I'm like, oh my gosh. I mean, if I try
to do that track, you.
Speaker 4 (25:26):
Know, it would take me hours and hours, you know,
and this is seconds, you know.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
So you know, so.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
You know it, and it's getting better and better, and
so I don't know what the end result is. But
this also goes to you know, there's part of this
psychology that is also playing with me with what I'm
telling you, how I'm producing what I'm doing now, you know,
because of that, there's a part of me that is saying.
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Less it's going to become more. Yeah, you know. And
so you know where it all goes and howard all goes.
I don't know what I will say.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
And what I've experienced throughout all my years in the
music music business is that you know, they will figure
out a way how to not monetize this and get
people paid.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
This is what I believe ultimately will happen one way
or another.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
I don't know how it will happen, but that's that's
my guess, and you know, things will continue to evolve
and go on and be what they'll be.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Well, one of the things I would say about you
and before I turn it over to Christy, is especially
with something that's vocal driven and guitar driven, is that
for the most part, a guitar is always going to
sound like a guitar, and human voice is always going
to sound like a human voice. One of the most
risky things you can do as as a producer is
rely on the technology of the time. It really dates
(26:59):
your song. For example, eighties music, the synthesizers, the drums
instantly identifies it as an eighties song. So when you
rely on the technology of the time, you really have
run the risk of dating and material singer songwriters, they're
always going to sound like they did the day they
recorded them. And I don't know if you want to
comment on that, but that's that's what I would say
before I turned it over to Christy.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Yeah, no, I concur completely. I think that.
Speaker 4 (27:26):
And it's funny because I always tell people that the
eighties we were, you know, the worst years for my
songwriting because it was the you know, it was the
beginning of the drum machine and the synthesizers and all
this stuff, and you know, you start experimenting with these things,
and you you know, you fall in love with the
(27:48):
groove that you created and the sonic and all this.
But what I came to find out was that, you know,
my songwriting suffered because my focus was not on the song.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
It was more on the overall package, so to speak.
And you know.
Speaker 4 (28:10):
Obviously there were people who thrived in that environment, and
you know, it's it just.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Wasn't It wasn't my strength, you know.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
So understood. Well, thank you so much for long an
opportunity to talk to you. I'll give it back to Christy.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Thank you, Billy, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Thank you Bill. You know you had mentioned a few
minutes ago your late wife, Donna Summers. I mean, was
that I always like to know the artist struggles during
their career. Would you say that was one of the
biggest struggles you had was dealing with the loss of
your wife during your career or would you say that
you had something that was even worse than that that
(28:51):
really pushed you to keep going. What would you say
has been your biggest struggle in your career?
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Well? I think I think I said earlier that.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
You know, my wife passing away was the biggest tragedy
I ever encountered.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
And so other.
Speaker 4 (29:08):
Than that, you know, I really haven't had any struggles.
You know, I've kind of had, you know, the way
I view my life, you know, I've kind of had
a charmed life in a way, you know. I you know,
of course, I've experienced the ups and downs and the
anguish and the stress that every normal person has within
(29:32):
their own life of you know, their expectations not being met,
or the frustration of not this or not that or whatever,
those kind of small things, you know. You know, when
I was younger, there was you know, times of frustration.
Speaker 7 (29:46):
You know.
Speaker 4 (29:48):
You know, being in the music business is definitely a
roller coaster, you know, I mean, everybody's life is a
roller coaster, but you know, it can be amplified in
the in the music business because you know, you have
some success and and you think everything's wonderful, and then
you know there could be long periods with nothing going
(30:08):
on and nothing clicking, and uh you have to learn
to manage, uh, the ups and downs of that, you know.
So when I was younger, I had I had a
hard time wrestling with that and uh, you know, over time,
I understood that, you know, I learned to manage my
emotions and not to get too high or too low
(30:29):
and to you know, kind of try to stay even keeled.
But when I was you know, young and impulsive and
you know, uh, you know, highly driven, egoistical.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Uh I don't know what.
Speaker 4 (30:46):
I was, but but uh, uh you know, so I
had some lessons to learn along the way, you know,
especially when I started having success rather young. Uh you know,
uh you know, thinking like, oh, this is kind of easy,
you know, and it just came so easy to me
that that uh you know, so when I hit that
(31:08):
first valley, I went pretty deep into the valley, into
that hole, and uh, you know, kind of had to
really reassess my approach and my expectations and understood.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
The reality of what the music business really was.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Absolutely, I love everything you're saying, and I'm gonna turn
it to the opposite. What has been your most rewarding
part of your career and what are you working on now?
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Well?
Speaker 7 (31:38):
I think, you know, I think the most rewarding part
of my career, you know, I would say was working
with with my late wife down a summer.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
I think that uh, you know we had you when
we met. Uh.
Speaker 4 (31:57):
We met in a situation where we immediately we started
writing songs together. We uh, our relationship was founded in
that kind of environment and uh our you know love
for similar kinds of music and and uh uh so
(32:19):
you know, and we you know, I got to you know,
my the biggest song that I ever co wrote was
Bad Girls, uh, which was you know, one of the
was the title of her biggest album, probably it was
the Bad Girls album. Got to co write four songs
on that album. And you know, being together for we
(32:41):
basically marriage for thirty two years, but together for thirty
five years, you know, so you know, lots of songs,
lots of uh touring, lots of shows, uh, meeting lots
of interesting people, and uh so those were kind of
the highlights, you know, playing you know stadiums and feeling
(33:02):
that the thrill of that kind of energy and.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
You know, so so you know it was it was a.
Speaker 4 (33:10):
Very beautifully long, beautiful, blessed time. We raised three beautiful daughters. Uh.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
You know, not that it was always easy.
Speaker 4 (33:22):
He was challenging, you know, uh at times when you
were in in you know, two uh musicians in one
relationship and and uh, you know, coming from different cultural backgrounds.
I was an Italian American, you know, a boy from Brooklyn.
She she was an African American girl from Boston, you know,
(33:43):
completely different cultural backgrounds, you know, learning to understand each
other's you know, backgrounds, and and uh, understanding the dudes
and the don'ts of that, you know.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
And uh. So I don't know if that answers your question,
but that's my answer.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
It certainly does. And you know, it sounds like you
had a beautiful relationship, and I applaud you. My husband
and I have been married going on thirty years this year,
and that's really hard to do in today's world. So
I always tip my hat to people who have who
have had a long lasting marriage. So congratulations on that.
As we're winding down, if you could give our listeners
(34:24):
one important message from yourself, what would it be? What
would what would you tell them about getting into the
music business and in life in general?
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Well, I think that I, you know, foundationally is I
think you have to be true to yourself.
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Uh. And you know, I think life is about refining
who you are.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
You know, that never ends.
Speaker 4 (34:52):
So you know, understand your strengths, understand your shortcomings and
your weaknesses, try to you know, proven those areas. And uh,
you know, I I think that that's kind of what
I would say. Uh, you know, I think, uh, you know,
(35:12):
going back to the marriage situation, I think commitment is important.
I think that, you know, if you honor your commitments, uh,
you know, it will give you.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
The strength to survive the rough patches.
Speaker 4 (35:34):
Because once you get you know, what I found out
is you know, for me anyway, once I want once
you get through a rough patch, you know, you come
out on the other side better for it, you know,
and you'll learn something and the relationship itself has grown,
it gets deeper and somewhat stronger, and and so yeah,
(35:59):
and the other thing I want to mention is that,
you know, when Donna passed away, I found myself in
this position of you know, could I love again?
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Would I love again? Should I love again? How does
that work? You know? I was a guy, you know,
in my early.
Speaker 4 (36:22):
Sixties when this happened, you know, and so here I
am asking myself these questions, and you know, come to
find out, I fell in love again. I met somebody,
I fell in love and remarried and The surprising thing
is that about love is that you know, when you
(36:44):
fall in love, it doesn't matter if you're thirteen or
sixty three. You know, it's like you're still that same giddy,
stupid person, you know.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
So that's the beauty of love.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
So and I've been lucky, you know, blessed in a
way to have it and to find it again.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Absolutely, and congratulations on that, because sometimes that is hard
for people to do. Some people have a hard time
after losing the you know, a loss of a loved one,
of finding love again. So congratulations on that. And I
took my hat to you again for your career. You
have had a wonderful, wonderful music career. And again I
really look at you as inspiration to myself. I'm a
(37:27):
writer for books, you're a writer for music. But we
go through the same things, we do the same thing.
So thank you very much for coming on and talking
to our guests, you know, as our you know, talking
to our listeners today. Sorry about that, and thank you
for giving your insight into the music world. I forgot
to ask you where we can find you online.
Speaker 4 (37:47):
It's all all the typical places, you know, Spotify, Apple Music.
Speaker 3 (37:53):
Instagram, TikTok.
Speaker 4 (37:56):
You know, all all the Facebook, all the obvious points
of reference these days, and my website brussudono dot com.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
So thank you, happy to do it, nice to meet
you both. Thanks and keep the faith. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
And I'm going to go ahead and close out the
show like I would on a lot of other shows.
And that is if you can dream it, ladies and gentlemen,
you can achieve it. Until next week, everybody, we'll be
talking to you again real soon. Good Night everyone,
Good evening, everyone, and welcome to another episode of WWWA Podcast.
I'm your host, Christy Nicholson, and for those of you
not familiar with me, I am a romance book author
and an advocate for causes such as cancer, autism, and
lupas awareness. You can find my books on Amazon dot
com and other online retailers, and you can follow me
(00:24):
on most social media platforms, including x dot com at
Christy Books. Tonight, I'm joined by two wonderful people, one
of them being my co host, Billy Dee's Billy, thank
you for being here with us today.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Absolutely my pleasure, thank you.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Thank you. And our special guest today is our well
known musician and award winning songwriter who has written songs
for some wonderful music icons such as Dolly Parton, Michael Jackson,
Reva Mcatyre and his late wife Donna Summers. Bruce Adono, Bruce,
thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
Happy to be here with you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Always a pleasure to have wonderful people on now. Bruce,
you have a very impressive career in music, from writing
with Tommy James and touring with Alive and Kicking to
being a part of the popular R and B trio
Brooklyn Dreams. How did you get a love for music?
Tell us a little bit more about your background.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, grew up in Brooklyn, New York.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
Started taking accordian lessons as a four year old.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
That was kind of my formative of understanding music theory, and.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Accordion is a very good interest and to learn music
on because on one hand you're learning the treble cleft,
on the left hand you're learning the bass cleft. So
it was a very good foundational tool for me just
to understand coode structure and melody and things like that.
And even though I was a young kid, you know,
(01:56):
I took according lessons for four years between the ages
of four ten eight, and but even at that young age,
I think because you know, when you're young, you assimilate
things very quickly and very differently and deeply, so so
that kind of knowledge was sort of embedded in me.
(02:19):
And then at the age of nine, I got taken
to the Brooklyn Fox Theater. I grew up in Brooklyn,
and Brooklyn Fox Theater they had these you know, rock
and roll review shows Alan Freed or Murray the Kay
would put on and as a nine year old I
saw all these acts, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, vocal
(02:41):
groups like a group called the Empowers, I remember, and
I was just taken by the whole concept of being
on stage and performing and you know, and also at
the same time, my father had a jukebox route for
those of you that remember what juke boxes are, and
so day he would.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Every every week he would come.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
Home, like on a Friday, with a box of records
to change out that he would be changing out of
the jukeboxes. And I got fascinated by.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
The names under the title of the songs.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
And I learned that the names in parentheses under the
title of the song were the songwriters.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
So all of these things.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
You know, were going on inside me, and you know,
it just at that point in time, I saw, I
saw my way into the music business. It was to
the world of music, was to be a songwriter. It
was it was just an initial spark that just struck me.
So from you know that early, you know, at the
(03:46):
age of thirteen, I started putting bands together in the
neighborhood and uh, you know, we would we would you know,
cover the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and songs by
the Animals, and all these groups that were happening then
and between I would try to write songs and have
my band do them. And then from then on I
(04:08):
went from you know a number of years playing clubs
in the Tri state area, New York and New Jersey
and Long Island and Connecticut, and basically worked my way
through high school and college playing clubs at night and
developing my songwriting ability until in nineteen sixty eight, Tommy
(04:29):
James came into this club in.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Manhattan that my band was the house band at.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
It was a club called Cheetah, and Tommy came into
the club and I got introduced to him, and you know,
this was at a time when he was a very successful.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Singer, songwriter, musician in America.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
He had hits like Akie Panky and Money Money, and
I think we're alone now. So for me, as you know,
a kid's you know, just barely out of my teens,
I think I was probably was nineteen years old, you know,
and to meet somebody with this.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Much success, I was very excited and very taken by him.
And he had an.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
Apartment right around the corner from the club is where
he was living. Coincidentally, so on breaks, I would have
run around to his apartment and sit with him and
really try to learn from him as you know, as
a songwriter. And this led to my co writing with
him a song called ball of Fire, which became the
(05:30):
first basic chart record that I ever had.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
It was a song that I co wrote with.
Speaker 4 (05:37):
Tommy and another guy in my band, Tom Wilson, and
it was a song called ball of Fire, and it
became a top twenty record at the time.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
And you know, Tommy took me into.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
The studio I saw my first first time I was
in a real recording studio to see how a record
got made, and you know, to gain an understanding of
how you build the track and how the equipment works,
all of these things.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
So he was, you know, continues to be.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
A super talented performing artist and was a great friend
to me.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Very generous guy, very talented guy. And so he kind
of opened the door to the real world of music
for me.
Speaker 4 (06:28):
And the following year, nineteen seventy, he produced my band.
We had a big hit record. The band was called
Alive and Kicking. The song was called Tighter and Tighter.
For those of you who don't remember the song, the
chorus was hold on just a little bit tighter now baby,
I love you so much and I can't let go.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
No, no, no.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
So that was the hit song then, and so that's
basically how I got into the music business.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Absolutely fantastic. You have got a wonderful background there and
love your voice. By the way, thank you for giving
us a little clue on that. I'm always curious. I'm
curious to the how it happens. So you write songs,
how does the songwriting process go? Like do you just
get an idea in your head and then boom, you're
onto paper? I mean, how does the process go?
Speaker 4 (07:21):
Well, I mean there's different aspects of the process. I mean,
for me these days, I basically write by myself, you know,
and I like to start my day either with a
guitar or at the piano and with no preconceived notion
(07:41):
of anything and just pick up the instrument and vibe
and through you know. You know, it doesn't even have
to take long. It could be twenty minutes or something
like that, you know, And if I get a spark
of an idea, there'll be something that you know, it's
like a little light goes off inside me and says, oh,
that's that's that's a good thing there. So you know,
(08:02):
I'll record it into my phone, put it down, and uh,
you know, and over the process of time, I'll continue
to you know, develop it. So I like to work,
you know, My my preference.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Is I like to work from a spark of inspiration.
Speaker 4 (08:21):
Uh. Take that spark of inspiration as far as I
can go. And then when I when I reached that point,
is when I then begin to apply craft to where Okay,
what am I What is that I'm saying?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
What is my rhyme scheme?
Speaker 4 (08:34):
How do I say this in a more creative and
poetic and emotional way?
Speaker 3 (08:41):
How is my melody laying out? Where do I need
to go?
Speaker 2 (08:45):
You know?
Speaker 3 (08:46):
What are my options schord wise?
Speaker 4 (08:48):
You know? And I just work through it like that.
But but over the course of my career, I've co
written a lot of songs with many different people.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (08:59):
Some times, I uh many times I've functioned just as
a lyricist, you know.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
For a number of years I worked with a great
uh producer, songwriter, musician whose name is Michael Elmartian. Uh
and uh, you know I would work with him in
that he would he would just send me tracks sometimes
with melodies sometimes if not without melodies, and uh, I
(09:28):
would have to, uh, you know, come up with the
with the lyric for the song. And that's how most
of the time how I worked with him. Uh, this
was how I wounded up wound up co writing songs
with him for the Jacksons and for Jamaine Jackson and
for Michael Jackson. And in other times I've written with
(09:51):
lyricists where I had to be the one to provide
provide the music.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (09:59):
And the third way is, you know, you sit down
with another person with a guitar and a piano or
whatever the configuration is, and you just pound out the
song together.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
You know.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
For my relationship in my band Brooklyn Dreams, there were
three of us, and so you know, a bunch of
those songs I wrote by myself, but there were also
songs that I co wrote with Joe ban Esposito, who
is one of the other guys in the Brooklyn Dreams,
or with Joe and Eddie Hoguson, who was the third
(10:32):
person in the Brooklyn Dreams, and we would just you know, guitar,
you know, a bongo and a piano, work on a song,
work on the lyric together, work on the melody together.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
And so those are the three work ways that I
have worked.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
It sounds almost like because I'm a book writer. I
write books and you get that spark of inspiration and
you just kind of, you know, work with it, just
like you said you do a song sometimes for me.
For me, writing is sometimes therapeutic. Do you find that
it's therapeutic for you as a musician to just get
behind there and just write your your heart out, get
(11:13):
your aches and pay like, how do you feel about that?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Well, you know, I always say that it's when I'm
writing that I know who I am. You know, there
there are you know, times in life when you get
you know, distracted by the realities of life, you know,
whatever they could be. You know, you're building an extension
(11:39):
on your house, or are they're putting a pool in
or you know, you have you know, there are these
other realities in life that that you know, remove you
from that place. And you know, then I find after
a period of time, I start to get a little
you know, I'll.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Use the word woozy.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
That's not real the word, but you know, I kind
of like lose track of my center. I'm like, I
feel uncomfortable and I'm like, you know, and then I'll
sit down with it with you know, guitar and piano,
and it just immediately calms me down. It centers me,
and I'm like, okay, I'm home.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
You know.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
So there's that aspect of it, but as as it
applies to, you know, my personal emotions. You know, I
was married for thirty two years and so and my
wife passed away, and you know, being able to write
(12:36):
my way through that great tragedy.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
In my life was you know, completely therapeutic for me.
Speaker 4 (12:47):
It allowed me to process my feelings in a personal way,
but at the same time, it also made me. It
gave me a sense of purpose in writing these things
because I knew that I was translating emotions that many
(13:10):
people experience, and so at somewhere in my psyche, I
comforted myself with the fact that not only was I
helping myself work through this process, that as a result
of this, maybe it would be able to also help
other people who were dealing with these kinds of issues,
(13:34):
you know, so and you know, and throughout my songwriting career,
I basically have a history of using my personal emotional experiences.
First of all, as a songwriter you know, it's very
important to be a good listener because you know, I
(13:55):
trade on people's lives and their emotions, and their highs
and their lows, and their wins and their losses, you know,
and these are the elements that I pull from.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
You know.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
You know you mentioned that I wrote for Dolly Parton.
You know, so.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
When I was twenty nine years old, my parents were
getting divorced, and even though I was of that age,
it's still greatly affected me. And you know, so I
ended up writing a song called Starting Over Again, which
was about the divorce of my parents. And this is
a song that Dolly Parton picked up recorded and it
(14:38):
became a number one country song for Dolly Parton. But
it was a very personal story to me. But at
the same time, you know, lots of people go through
divorce and many people could relate to it.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
So absolutely I tipped my hat to you because you're
a lot like me in that aspect. For me, writing
was it was a way for me to escape my emotions.
My fuck there was a cancer patient and when he
was going through chemotherapy, and to me, my dad was
my hero. I would write out all of my emotions
because I had no one else to turn to at
(15:09):
the time, and then my children being autistic, I had
nowhere to go to vent and just you know, get
that out. So I turned to writing. And I really
tip my hat to you because book writing and music,
believe it or not, music got me through a lot
of hard times. So people like you, I tip my
hat to thank you for that.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
Oh, thank you, you know, you know, as it applies
to music, you know, I I've been on a little
bit of a soap box because you know, in this
culture today, music doesn't have the same place in the
culture that it had when I was coming up. And
(15:52):
you know, I think that the culture is missing the
benefit of being able to just sit down and listen
to music, you know, whether it's making you dance, whether
it's you know, making you cry, whatever, whether it's just
soothing your soul, helping you escape from you know, the
(16:15):
realities and the stress that.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
We all live with.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
You know, music is a beautiful gift, you know, and
I somehow feel that in the culture now it's not
really being taken full advantage of. So I always like
to mention that and maybe it'll make somebody say, yeah,
I remember I used to do that I'm going to
sit down and listen to some music.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Well, I guarantee you when I jump off here, I
will be listening to music. You're bringing a smile to
my face because you feel some of the things that
I feel about music. And I do know that Billy
D's he has a lot of great questions usually, and
he's got a lot of wonderful insight about music himself. Billy,
I'm gonna go ahead and let you ask a couple questions.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Go right ahead, Well, well, please allow me to pick
up where you left off. What I would most definitely
agree with is the social aspect of music is missing.
In the era that you're talking about, people would have
people come over to their living room and you would
listen to the latest greatest album, and then you would
(17:19):
all discuss what kind of an experience you had, what
you liked about it, what you didn't like about it.
Even the equipment itself was showcased. You know how big
your amps are, how big your speakers are, and a
lot of people would rule particular that the speakers had
to be equally spaced and all this and the listening
was part of the enjoyment of the music. Now everybody's
(17:42):
got a phone. They all sound the same. They got
the earbuds in, They're in their own little world. And
I don't know, like what you were saying that the
impact is there is as much as it once was,
would you. I mean, obviously you've started, you started on that.
I just kind of wanted to follow up with that.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Yeah, absolutely, you playing it exactly right, you know.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
You know, it's it's interesting because it even affects how
I how I create now, you know.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
I mean, you know, back in the day, you know.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
I would spend a lot of time, you know, making
it sure it was sonically right, and and uh, you know,
and and.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Adding all these subtleties, and.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
You know, and I've recently, you know, I'm I'm putting
out a new album this fall, and I'm calling it Sketchbook.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
And basically what I'm doing is is you.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Know, because a lot of how I work with the
producers that I work with is I do sketches of
the songs to show them the direction I wanted to
go in. You know, I do my guitar part, I'll
do some keyboard parts, you know, set the top, I'll
do my vocal harmonies, and then send them and to
the musicians and they'll all overdub it and then the
(19:06):
mixture will mix it and all all of this, you know,
and then it all boils down to then somebody is
listening to it on their phone, you know, And so
you know, taking dealing with all with you know, a
period of frustration because of that, but it's a reality,
(19:29):
you know. And I'm not somebody who likes to lament
the past, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
I'm very much about where are we right now and
where are we going?
Speaker 4 (19:39):
Because what is well, what was was.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
You know, it's no longer. It's not going to change,
it's not coming back. Be here now and go forward.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
So in that, you know, this new album that I'm
making is basically going to be my sketches. It's going
to be very stripped down. And what's interesting about it
is that what I'm discovering is that the minimalism, in
other words, the less uh instruments you put on the track,
(20:15):
the less vocals you put on the track, it allows
and with the compression of the phone and how it's
translating through, so a guitar vocal on your phone can
be very big and very present and can drive a
track in a similar way that a full production can
(20:41):
and on the on the other and this is something
that I'm just discovering as I'm going forward. I'm sure
you know, they can people that tell me I'm crazy,
but that this is my analysis at this point. And
the other reason for for my thinking on this is,
you know, there are times when you're reducing a song
(21:03):
that in the production, especially for my type of songwriter
who relies so much on the story of the song,
the emotion of the song, that in production I won't
say frequently, but I'll say sometimes the emotion and the
(21:27):
power of the song can be diminished by and by
the production, and it becomes a very tricky thing that
you know, I always have wrestled with, you know, where
do you draw that line? You know, when did I
take that one step over the line in production where
I just diminished the power?
Speaker 3 (21:49):
You know? And so this is.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
This is the experiment for my for my next album.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
And I just.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Released, uh last week, UH a song called Watching Darkness Paul.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:07):
The video was released on YouTube actually today.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
And UH it's basically.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
A kick drum, a snare drum, and acoustic guitar and
my voice.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
And UH it Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
You know, it drives well, you know you you you know,
and it's it's it's a very lyric conscious song and
and so the words come through loud and clear, and uh,
but yet you still feel the drive and the urgency
of the music.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
That is fantastic. You know, you said something there about
the emotion of the music, the story of the music,
and a moment ago we alluded to how much the
the technology is serving the artist versus the art is
serving the technology. And we're in a new we're in
a new era now with AI, and there's a lot
(23:07):
of artists of different kind. Actors, for one, are very
nervous about let's say, the role of you know, stand ins, uh,
extras and so on and so forth. You can take
one person and duplicate them, and to a degree, I
think that's going to happen to music. You know, you could,
for example, you know, just analyze the number one hit
(23:29):
songs over the last fifty years and what did they
have in common in terms of basslines, what did they
have in common of hooks and snaps, and what did
they have in common of this and that and the
other thing? And how are we in any danger of music?
And artistry in general becoming something that's manufactured as much
as it is created.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (23:51):
Well, I definitely think so, you know, and I think
the technology is going to keep getting better.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You know. You know, I sit with my grant. I
have nine grandchildren, you know.
Speaker 5 (24:07):
And uh, you know, so I try to spend a
little bit of time with each of them, and you know,
part of the time of what they like to do
is is we go to uh it's called Suno and
and you know it's you just say, I want the
song to be about this.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
I wanted to be a country song. I wanted to
be a rock song. I wanted to be an armit whatever.
You just tell what it is and within seconds it
creates something.
Speaker 6 (24:36):
You know that that's uh, you know, that's a viable
Let's let's let's use the word viable, viable viable in
a way that if you're in an elevator, uh, and
there's some music playing and it's.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Not you're not really you know, zero in on the
music in that kind of way, it definitely will so
of its purpose. If you're in a restaurant and there's
you know, fifty people sitting eating lunch and there's music
playing in the background. It will serve that purpose, you know,
and you know the tracks are powerful. There's I mean seconds.
(25:17):
You know, there's a part of me that every time
I do this with what my grandchildren, I get depressed.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
I'm like, oh my gosh. I mean, if I try
to do that track, you.
Speaker 4 (25:26):
Know, it would take me hours and hours, you know,
and this is seconds, you know.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
So you know, so.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
You know it, and it's getting better and better, and
so I don't know what the end result is. But
this also goes to you know, there's part of this
psychology that is also playing with me with what I'm
telling you, how I'm producing what I'm doing now, you know,
because of that, there's a part of me that is saying.
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Less it's going to become more. Yeah, you know. And
so you know where it all goes and howard all goes.
I don't know what I will say.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
And what I've experienced throughout all my years in the
music music business is that you know, they will figure
out a way how to not monetize this and get
people paid.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
This is what I believe ultimately will happen one way
or another.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
I don't know how it will happen, but that's that's
my guess, and you know, things will continue to evolve
and go on and be what they'll be.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Well, one of the things I would say about you
and before I turn it over to Christy, is especially
with something that's vocal driven and guitar driven, is that
for the most part, a guitar is always going to
sound like a guitar, and human voice is always going
to sound like a human voice. One of the most
risky things you can do as as a producer is
rely on the technology of the time. It really dates
(26:59):
your song. For example, eighties music, the synthesizers, the drums
instantly identifies it as an eighties song. So when you
rely on the technology of the time, you really have
run the risk of dating and material singer songwriters, they're
always going to sound like they did the day they
recorded them. And I don't know if you want to
comment on that, but that's that's what I would say
before I turned it over to Christy.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Yeah, no, I concur completely. I think that.
Speaker 4 (27:26):
And it's funny because I always tell people that the
eighties we were, you know, the worst years for my
songwriting because it was the you know, it was the
beginning of the drum machine and the synthesizers and all
this stuff, and you know, you start experimenting with these things,
and you you know, you fall in love with the
(27:48):
groove that you created and the sonic and all this.
But what I came to find out was that, you know,
my songwriting suffered because my focus was not on the song.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
It was more on the overall package, so to speak.
And you know.
Speaker 4 (28:10):
Obviously there were people who thrived in that environment, and
you know, it's it just.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Wasn't It wasn't my strength, you know.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
So understood. Well, thank you so much for long an
opportunity to talk to you. I'll give it back to Christy.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Thank you, Billy, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Thank you Bill. You know you had mentioned a few
minutes ago your late wife, Donna Summers. I mean, was
that I always like to know the artist struggles during
their career. Would you say that was one of the
biggest struggles you had was dealing with the loss of
your wife during your career or would you say that
you had something that was even worse than that that
(28:51):
really pushed you to keep going. What would you say
has been your biggest struggle in your career?
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Well? I think I think I said earlier that.
Speaker 4 (29:00):
You know, my wife passing away was the biggest tragedy
I ever encountered.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
And so other.
Speaker 4 (29:08):
Than that, you know, I really haven't had any struggles.
You know, I've kind of had, you know, the way
I view my life, you know, I've kind of had
a charmed life in a way, you know. I you know,
of course, I've experienced the ups and downs and the
anguish and the stress that every normal person has within
(29:32):
their own life of you know, their expectations not being met,
or the frustration of not this or not that or whatever,
those kind of small things, you know. You know, when
I was younger, there was you know, times of frustration.
Speaker 7 (29:46):
You know.
Speaker 4 (29:48):
You know, being in the music business is definitely a
roller coaster, you know, I mean, everybody's life is a
roller coaster, but you know, it can be amplified in
the in the music business because you know, you have
some success and and you think everything's wonderful, and then
you know there could be long periods with nothing going
(30:08):
on and nothing clicking, and uh you have to learn
to manage, uh, the ups and downs of that, you know.
So when I was younger, I had I had a
hard time wrestling with that and uh, you know, over time,
I understood that, you know, I learned to manage my
emotions and not to get too high or too low
(30:29):
and to you know, kind of try to stay even keeled.
But when I was you know, young and impulsive and
you know, uh, you know, highly driven, egoistical.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Uh I don't know what.
Speaker 4 (30:46):
I was, but but uh, uh you know, so I
had some lessons to learn along the way, you know,
especially when I started having success rather young. Uh you know,
uh you know, thinking like, oh, this is kind of easy,
you know, and it just came so easy to me
that that uh you know, so when I hit that
(31:08):
first valley, I went pretty deep into the valley, into
that hole, and uh, you know, kind of had to
really reassess my approach and my expectations and understood.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
The reality of what the music business really was.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Absolutely, I love everything you're saying, and I'm gonna turn
it to the opposite. What has been your most rewarding
part of your career and what are you working on now?
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Well?
Speaker 7 (31:38):
I think, you know, I think the most rewarding part
of my career, you know, I would say was working
with with my late wife down a summer.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
I think that uh, you know we had you when
we met. Uh.
Speaker 4 (31:57):
We met in a situation where we immediately we started
writing songs together. We uh, our relationship was founded in
that kind of environment and uh our you know love
for similar kinds of music and and uh uh so
(32:19):
you know, and we you know, I got to you know,
my the biggest song that I ever co wrote was
Bad Girls, uh, which was you know, one of the
was the title of her biggest album, probably it was
the Bad Girls album. Got to co write four songs
on that album. And you know, being together for we
(32:41):
basically marriage for thirty two years, but together for thirty
five years, you know, so you know, lots of songs,
lots of uh touring, lots of shows, uh, meeting lots
of interesting people, and uh so those were kind of
the highlights, you know, playing you know stadiums and feeling
(33:02):
that the thrill of that kind of energy and.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
You know, so so you know it was it was a.
Speaker 4 (33:10):
Very beautifully long, beautiful, blessed time. We raised three beautiful daughters. Uh.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
You know, not that it was always easy.
Speaker 4 (33:22):
He was challenging, you know, uh at times when you
were in in you know, two uh musicians in one
relationship and and uh, you know, coming from different cultural backgrounds.
I was an Italian American, you know, a boy from Brooklyn.
She she was an African American girl from Boston, you know,
(33:43):
completely different cultural backgrounds, you know, learning to understand each
other's you know, backgrounds, and and uh, understanding the dudes
and the don'ts of that, you know.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
And uh. So I don't know if that answers your question,
but that's my answer.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
It certainly does. And you know, it sounds like you
had a beautiful relationship, and I applaud you. My husband
and I have been married going on thirty years this year,
and that's really hard to do in today's world. So
I always tip my hat to people who have who
have had a long lasting marriage. So congratulations on that.
As we're winding down, if you could give our listeners
(34:24):
one important message from yourself, what would it be? What
would what would you tell them about getting into the
music business and in life in general?
Speaker 3 (34:34):
Well, I think that I, you know, foundationally is I
think you have to be true to yourself.
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Uh. And you know, I think life is about refining
who you are.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
You know, that never ends.
Speaker 4 (34:52):
So you know, understand your strengths, understand your shortcomings and
your weaknesses, try to you know, proven those areas. And uh,
you know, I I think that that's kind of what
I would say. Uh, you know, I think, uh, you know,
(35:12):
going back to the marriage situation, I think commitment is important.
I think that, you know, if you honor your commitments, uh,
you know, it will give you.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
The strength to survive the rough patches.
Speaker 4 (35:34):
Because once you get you know, what I found out
is you know, for me anyway, once I want once
you get through a rough patch, you know, you come
out on the other side better for it, you know,
and you'll learn something and the relationship itself has grown,
it gets deeper and somewhat stronger, and and so yeah,
(35:59):
and the other thing I want to mention is that,
you know, when Donna passed away, I found myself in
this position of you know, could I love again?
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Would I love again? Should I love again? How does
that work? You know? I was a guy, you know,
in my early.
Speaker 4 (36:22):
Sixties when this happened, you know, and so here I
am asking myself these questions, and you know, come to
find out, I fell in love again. I met somebody,
I fell in love and remarried and The surprising thing
is that about love is that you know, when you
(36:44):
fall in love, it doesn't matter if you're thirteen or
sixty three. You know, it's like you're still that same giddy,
stupid person, you know.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
So that's the beauty of love.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
So and I've been lucky, you know, blessed in a
way to have it and to find it again.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Absolutely, and congratulations on that, because sometimes that is hard
for people to do. Some people have a hard time
after losing the you know, a loss of a loved one,
of finding love again. So congratulations on that. And I
took my hat to you again for your career. You
have had a wonderful, wonderful music career. And again I
really look at you as inspiration to myself. I'm a
(37:27):
writer for books, you're a writer for music. But we
go through the same things, we do the same thing.
So thank you very much for coming on and talking
to our guests, you know, as our you know, talking
to our listeners today. Sorry about that, and thank you
for giving your insight into the music world. I forgot
to ask you where we can find you online.
Speaker 4 (37:47):
It's all all the typical places, you know, Spotify, Apple Music.
Speaker 3 (37:53):
Instagram, TikTok.
Speaker 4 (37:56):
You know, all all the Facebook, all the obvious points
of reference these days, and my website brussudono dot com.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
So thank you, happy to do it, nice to meet
you both. Thanks and keep the faith. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
And I'm going to go ahead and close out the
show like I would on a lot of other shows.
And that is if you can dream it, ladies and gentlemen,
you can achieve it. Until next week, everybody, we'll be
talking to you again real soon. Good Night everyone,
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