My first commissioned work, an orchestral suite for an independent dance company in Montréal, and I had no idea what I was doing. I composed it, sure, on a synthesizer keyboard, but with zero music training, I needed some help moving on to arrangements. Enter Jan Jarczyk, a brilliant musician, composer, pianist, and professor at McGill University. He came over and pretty much wrote all the arrangements and then played nearly every instrument into the computer. He often jokingly complained about having to play on a plastic keyboard and not a real piano! (Ok, maybe he wasn’t really joking ?!) Once completed, mixed and mastered, I whispered to Jan, ‘One day we’ll record this with a real orchestra!’

With the awesome support of Creative BC and the Province of British Columbia, the opportunity arrived. I began working to take the music out of the computer files and morph it into actual sheet music real musicians could read and play. As it began to happen, I wanted to let Jan know, thinking how happy he’ll be hearing this, and how great it will be to celebrate this together! The universe had a different need of Jan; he passed from cancer in 2014.

I was stunned, floored. I wanted to honour Jan and all his beauty with this recording and album. I found his old home number and called. Danielle, his sweet widow answered the phone. “Hi”, I said, “I’m not sure if you’ll remember me but…” “Of Course I remember you Mark Fenster!” she said, and we spent the next hour and change talking, reminiscing, crying, feeling the warmth Jan brought to us so many times before.

We recorded this piece at Monarch Studios, where they have great rooms for orchestral instruments, and they have a beautiful Yamaha C7 full concert grand piano - WITH MIDI! (To perhaps avoid a boring technical explanation of midi, just think of an electronic version of a player piano = computer reads the “player piano paper scroll”, and sends the information to the MIDI motor on the piano itself, causing the piano to play, acoustically, what was once played into the computer on a synthesizer. (Pretty cool huh?!?) [btw, MIDI = Musical Instrument Digital Interface].

So, here’s what we did to honour Jan: We re-created a recording session that was synced to Jan’s original piano track, and then recorded the strings, winds, horns, drums and guitar over it. Once done, we re-recorded the piano using Jan’s performance on a now mic’d concert grand piano, and recorded that on it’s own audio tracks. Jan finally got his wish to play the piece on a real piano, and we all can immerse ourselves in the magic he and I created together with love & light.

Endless Journey is the musical story of life: beginning with a birth, childhood is simple, playful, and grows with joy until the concerns and confusion of adolescence moves in. At this point, there is a softer motif, a pensive time… leading to an “Ok, let’s go!” moment. This is where things kick up a notch or 10, distorted rock guitar (Howard Redekopp) and awesome power rock drums (Pat “the axe” Steward, Bryan Adams’ drummer) kick up with the orchestra and move into the pursuit of life’s rapture! The calm after the storm follows, and a recap of finding the simple joys of youth and living the roller coaster of life rides on …. ending in, you guessed it, another birth. In this music as well as in life, things seem to happen in 3’s, and the “ending” as a new birth shows us how life truly is an Endless Journey, and as precious as it is endless.

There’s so much more I can say about this piece and the glorious experience of bringing it to life, but I’ll stop here and invite anyone who wishes to learn more to just reach out and ask me - I’ll happily share as much as you wish to know. It was an incredible time, and I hope you enjoy listening and feeling the result of all the love that was instilled in the music and burned into the tracks.

This piece is dedicated to Jan Jarczyk, his incredible family, and to all his colleagues, students and friends with whom I share Jan’s gifts and my gratitude for his presence {presents} in my life. I love you Jan. Thank you so much for You.