Six Songs, One Long Day, and a Norwegian Thesis Project

A text from Clarke Schleicher turned into a full day at Curb 43 with some of Nashville’s best — and by the end of it, a Norwegian singer/songwriter had six tracks to carry home for his thesis.

The setup

Clarke texted me a while back to see if I’d be interested in working with an MTSU student, a Norwegian named Viljar Roysi, on a project for his thesis. Viljar is a singer/songwriter and producer, and the plan was to record six songs with Nashville A-team musicians.

We got together at my studio, Timekeeper, and did some pre-production — working out tempos and arrangements, then talking through who he wanted to play and where we’d record.

Locking in the band and the room

We landed on Curb 43 studio, with Craig White engineering and Carlos running Pro Tools. For the band, we brought in:

Chris McHugh on drums, Jimmy Carter on bass, Brent Mason on guitar, Dan Dugmore on steel guitar and lap slide, and Mike Rojas on keyboards.

I charted the tunes and made the calls to get everyone booked.

Session day

We went into the studio on September 3rd for 2 and 6 o’clock sessions. By the end of the day we had six great tracks in the can.

Viljar’s taking them back to Norway to add fiddle and vocals, plus a few other additions. It was a fantastic day — and a great experience for him.