IN THE KNOW

Guess who bought a Footjunkie! Stacy Widelitz, co-writer of "She's Like the Wind"; that's who... Check out his bio and then go over to the new testimonial and see what he has to say about Footjunkie... 

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Stacy Widelitz started composing professionally at nineteen, but came to prominence with the song "She's Like the Wind," co-written with Patrick Swayze and featured in Swayze's blockbuster Dirty Dancing. Featured on the movie's wildly successful soundtrack, it reached no. 3 on Billboard's top-40 chart (no. 1 among adult-contemporary radio listeners). He has scored features, more than twenty made-for-TV movies, written the end-title song for Disney’s Pocahontas II, and was nominated for an Emmy for ABC's World of Discovery. Stacy also wrote the title song and scored all the episodes of ABC's acclaimed animated series Cro, and scored and composed much of the dance music for the film One Last Dance, which garnered him a Best Music Award at the 2004 Nashville Film Festival. He subsequently joined the board of directors of the festival, serving as board president from 2007 – 2009. Stacy served as president of the board of Grammy-nominated ALIAS Chamber Ensemble, and he is currently the board president-elect of Nashville Opera and past president of Leadership Music.

my Brother Bobby Sparks II is in the studio mixing a life's work project and You can be a part of it happening... Check out his Pledge Music campaign . If You are a keyboardist and don't know who Bobby is, start here. You can even get Yourself a Footjunkie and help move Bobby's campaign along as he is offering both Footjunkie SPS-1 and Canvas along with many other killer rewards for Your contribution. It will be a dope soundtrack to add to Your life, i assure You...

We have another round of Footjunkie anniversaries. Congrats to these three men and thank You for being my test group: Joseph Wooten on 6-1-17; Kevin So and Warren Evans on 6-12-17 which was my third wedding anniversary ...

Well, now that we have an answer for creeping pedals, why not do it cost effectively also. Some of You folks need more surface area to do Your art because Your job is to add color to the band or You may be swapping roles during a gig. Ultimately, it's going to come down to more pedals on the floor. my answer for You is the Footjunkie Canvas. It is 612 square inches of landscape to work with. Set Your pedals where You want them and they will be there when You put Your foot back down. Hit me up if You like; there is a chat box on the bottom left corner. May the force be from You...

So we have some belated birthday shout outs to do and one as of today! Footjunkie Birthdays that is. On the "About Us" dropdown menu You will note there is an "Artist" selection. These are the folks that gave me reason to believe in and follow up with making Footjunkie available to serious keyboardist. Well, as of today, nine of those player have just reached the one year point of being in the "Peace of Mind Club". i want to thank them for being a very significant part of this journey. It starts with my wife, Rae Hering, who i made the very first one for. i'm not even sure what the date was. It was in April. The next person i have to mention is Rachel Banua, because she was the one who passionately shouted to me, "Make me one! I'll pay You for it! You need to mass produce these!" So, i designed and made a bunch of prototypes and started doing a lot of research pertaining to sustain pedal issues.The next thing was getting pro level players to try it out. So here is the first set of birthdays: Eric Barfield (5-12-17), Jon Ross (5-12-17), Heidi Burson (5-13-17), Tyrus Sass(5-15-17), Jeff Goodkind (5-15-17), Paul Horton (5-15-17), and Mike Hicks whose anniversary is today. Big thanks and much Love to all of You.

Hey... Here are three Brothers that recently became hip to the solution. i would like to welcome to the "Peace of Mind Club" Dave Robbins (Country), Bryan Popin (Christian/Gospel) and Bryan Culbertson (R&B/Jazz). Don't worry. i know everyone isn't an innovator or early adopter, but here is the thing; if You play keys, Your sustain pedal needs to be secured. But this has been an insanely underserved issue. Now, by the testimony of these performers, there is a solution that addresses all concerns of a professional level player.

Stage Tech Solutions not only sells online but does point of sales operations as well. i popup at events to do demonstrations and sales. When i’m on tour i have my traveling shop on the bus as well. As a matter of fact, on this last tour we got a few more people that are now hip to the solution. 

Eric Blue bought three right at the beginning of the tour. See the video here . Then Brian Culbertson came out to one of the shows to hang with Sinbad, and actually wound up playing trombone on one of the songs. Of course, by the end of the night he was an owner of a Footjunkie. 

Two alternative users joined the ranks as well. Bob Franceschini, saxophonist in the Victor Wooten Band, got tired of his volume pedal winding up a foot closer to his monitor half way through the show. Now this is his new look. 

At the very same show Brian Culbertson stopped in, i met a guitarist by the name Jacob Hare who was working the venue. He thinks Footjunkie would do a great job simplifying and stabilizing his guitar setup. i look forward to seeing his new rig.

So don’t forget, not only do i sell online but i do popup point of sales (POS). i call it STS POS and i do take it on tour with me. So check out my schedule.

    Normally in the Victor Wooten camp i’m the drum tech for the masterful Dennis Chambers, but because of a prior obligation he had to saxophonist Bill Evans in April, Vic had to come up with a cool cast of characters to help he and Bob Franceschini pump out 12 days and 14 shows of music. 

Eventually, it came to his Brothers Regi Wooten, Roy "Futureman" Wooten, a rotating cast of keyboardist including his Brother Joseph Wooten, Eric Blue and Julius Fisher. Then of course on percussion he had Sinbad… SKKRRRR!!! ¡who? ¡Sinbad? The comedian?! Yep… All six feet, five inches, and sixty-two years of him. 

This event will be one that other entertainers will want to repeat, but it was one of those perfect storm events. It wasn’t a concert; it wasn’t a comedy show. It was not a co-billed show. It was a highly unscripted, unrehearsed party hosted by six very improvisational entertainers, and they did an amazing job dissolving the stage between them and the audience. 

To me the most evident thing that made this possible was the chemistry of the entire camp. Everyone was conversational and humorous; this included the tour manager, girlfriends and wives, sons, the bus driver and the house crews we worked with. The only difference between on stage and off stage was instruments. The audience was getting the same conversations that we were having backstage, on the bus and at the hotels. 

We knew we were having a good time. We knew the audience was having a good time, but how much it mattered was punctuated during one of the meet and greets when one of the audience members who was living with PTSD told them he was about to “end it all”, but he decided to come to the show and said he had had the best day ever in a long time. Music and laughter heals. Get as much as You can.

So guess who has Footjunkies under their feet? Bobby Ray Sparks and Jordache Grant. i met them while out on tour with The Victor Wooten Trio where i drum tech for Dennis Chambers. So, Bobby and Dennis where backstage in a conversation and Jordache was about to go on stage with Medicine Man Revival when i decided to drop some Footjunkie knowledge on them like i'm dropping these names right now. So, i ran to the tour bus to grab my point of sales case (side note; i always take my POS case on the road with me so, if You would like to try a Footjunkie out in person check these news post to get my tour schedule). Long story shortened (This is an edit) i dropped a Fj off with Bobby while i quickly ran to the stage to set Jordache up before his performance. Meanwhile, while Jordache was on stage experiencing the truth i  delivered to him, i gave Bobby the message about the new disciple of stability that he would soon have underfoot. So check this out; here is what Mr. Sparks has to say about it; Tell 'em Bobby!