Free Elisa Girlando downloads Sept

We are very pleased to offer free MP3 downloads of two Elisa Girlando songs for the month of September. The songs "another songbird" and Scheming" will be available to fans through the reverbnation/elisagirlando site. In order to get the free downloads fans will have to register their email account with Elisa. This will be used for elisa promotions only including future exclusives and will not be sold to any third party type folks. If interested click on the link above.

Maxwells thoughts part 2

Best solo bob's smoking keys solo on tell mama. Brian solid in pocket
all night. Barry as ussual not missing a note. Candy couldn't hear her
parts but vocals perfect. Fifth beetle Eric on sound maxwells sound
man gave Eric big cudos. Finally crowd into it thanks to all

Dave Bollard
Http://hitplayllc.blogspot.com
Http://Twitter.com/dbollard

Maxwells show

Despite our set being moved up a half hour we rammed through one of
the best shows of our careers. Band was solid drums had a j bohnam
drive. Phil was possed and elisa was terrific. Feedback from this one
should be legendary.

Dave Bollard
Http://hitplayllc.blogspot.com
Http://Twitter.com/dbollard

Some new Live video

Live clips of Elisa Girlando have been starting to surface all over the place so I made a link of them on youtube for you to check out. Also here's one from DYkstra park friday evening audience about 400 people. Its not the usual song for Elisa so I thought you might find it interesting. Leave me a comment what do you think?

Dave.hitplay

video widgit for Elisa Girlando

we've added a live video from the NYC showcase for you to see. It's the song "rise up".

dave.hitplay

A review of The Living ROom, NYC!

Oh yeah I was gonna tell you about the RED/SONY music showcase we had for Elisa Girlando at the Livingroom in NYC wasn't eye.

Well I took the day off from work to be well rested (cause I new if I made any mistakes playing Phil would kill me), so no mistakes here. We left for the city at 2:30 pm cause the traffic into the city can be at best unpredictable and at worst a nightmare. More on traffic later.

Getting to the club was uneventful (how we like it), so was setting up through our sound check. Getting to the club reasonably early lets you get the vibe for the place going. I was feeling very confident.

After our sound check we had about 1 hour to start getting ready.So folks started to pop in. That's always a good sign. During the check ELisa was hitting the songs perfect so our collective confidence was growing. I cant say enough to bands out there that you need to rehearse and rehearse so when the real thing comes you're not thinking and just grooven. Doing the dress rehearsal at the sound stage was a pain, but man did it pay dividends Thursday night at the Living room NYC.

I know record folks like these early (7pm) weeknight shows cause they get done with work, have something to eat, see the show and go home. But man they are a pain if you and your fans live in Jersey!

I new we had one chance to make a first impression and I wanted to make sure we had a large turnout, so I called in some BIG favors and got a bus to take people to the show!The bus trip is becoming legendary. Apparently a lot of these people don't get out much. Add to that no food, a lot of alcohol, and a few old time partying type instigators.Combine this with a ton of traffic and you have a "cougars gone wild" party bus with total mayhem and a side order of "girls gone wild".

We were into our set when the bus arrived but we all could feel the presence of the people staggering in. It was an energy boost like the Calvary arriving. We did not need it but boy it sure sealed the deal.

The band played flawlessly, Elisa Girlando sang like a star and the people in the audience new they had something special. After the show I talked briefly with Alan Becker VP at RED. He seemed blown away. Told me how good it was and how large the crowd was. He went out on a line to set this up and I think he was feeling pretty good about the results. We will meet with SONY/RED in the coming weeks to refine our game plan and I will keep you all posted.

Problems we did have a few:

1. Amanda Carl who co-wrote the original songs was not allowed into the show because she was under age! (bogus)

2. Doorman was a bit of an ASS harassing people a little; very unnecessary!

3. A bus member vomited on Bob the President of RED!!! I think it was either a near miss or a shoe slopper but that is gonna cost me some shoe polish next time I see him!

4. Elisa's mom ,Donna, was on the infamous bus and was upset at the carrying on and that the bus was 10-15 minutes late. She never was late for a show before and that upset her very much

5. We had to stop playing even though it was a sellout and people were going crazy cause another group was due on at 8pm. Club could have let us go on with the crowd we brought them.

recap. We sold the place out, played as good as we could took them all to school about how good players can be supporting a singer and had a real powerhouse vocalist who stole the show. The following quote from Andy Gesner of HIP video promotion sums it all up:

"Speaking of performances, I wanted to congratulate and applaud you on the outstanding performance you had last night in New York City. Realizing that Elisa is still a very young artist, I was concerned that the packed room and all the pressure might be visible. Boy, was I wrong! Her confidence and incredible voice stole the show, and the overall presentation was magnificent. The musicianship was stellar, and there was a palpable sense of love and positive energy just washing over the room. Now more than ever, I’m thrilled that you will be a part of our big event in just two weeks(maxwells show Hoboken NJ)!"

dave.hitplay

Ready For the Living Room NYC

We spent most of the past week getting ready for the Elisa Girlando showcase this Thursday August 6'th at the lvingroom nyc. The show will be well attended by SONY/RED music folks and will start promptly at 7pm.

Much of the work we did was getting the band ready for the show, coordinating the show with the Livingroom and RED music, and energizing the Elisa fan base for the show. I think we are ready on all levels.

The band set is very solid and it showcases Elisa's amazing voice and talents with her on Piano and straight vocal. We go from modern pop to ballads to blues rock and ELisa handles it all. Out of Truth is sounding great and although we had a small health scare everyone should be there. A founding member did go down but was released from the hospital in time for the dress rehearsal. You think Phil was nervous in the past you should have seen him when he heard Bob was in the hospital. Think Xanax BIG DOSES!!HAHA  Well it all worked out and everyone is ready to go.

Alan Becker over at RED is acting as ELisa's A&R man and was instrumental in getting the show together and getting the RED team fired up for the show. Its amazing how things can come together quickly and easily with the right people behind you. Thanks again Alan. 

Alan assured us and the club a strong RED turnout and asked me if we could bring some people over to the city to support the show. I guaranteed him a strong Elisa turnout. Because this was my first guarantee I have been working non-stop to make sure we have a great turnout for the show. I have a few tricks up my sleeve which I will tell you about if they work next week. Needless to say the fan base will be there in force.

We also had to coordinate with the club getting in and unloaded and getting a sound check and having our own sound man work with the living room sound people. Cu dos to Candy for making all that happen.

Well the band is ready, Elisa is ready, the club is ready, and RED is coming so here we go everybody...........

dave.hitplay

here is a sneak peek at rehersal this will only be here for a few days so check it out then its gone forever!!

I forgot to tell you "another songbird" held number one pop slot on singingfool this weekend and was up to number five on the California Music Channel this week!

In The RED; music that is

This past week we spent some time in the city working on the Elisa Girlando project.

Our first meeting was a lunch meeting with Tom Carrabba of SONY. He has been a fan of ELisa's and was instrumental in bringing hitplay and RED music together. He offers us guidance and other sagely advice and Phil and I appreciate his time and effort. Most of the meeting revolved around working with RED and the things we hope to accomplish with the livingroom show.

After lunch we caught a quick cab ride down to RED music for our strategic planning meeting. We met with ALan Becker and two of his staff Billie jean and Brandy. They work the RED Internet marketing department and a lot of our meeting was devoted to promoting ELisa Girlando over the Internet and how RED can assist us with this. The other half of the meeting revolved around promoting the livingroom gig and getting folks to the show. I found this to be a very comfortable group and the ideas they have are going to be very helpful to the cause. Everyone was psyched when I told them about the FUSE on demand add for September!

Phil and I then hopped down to the livingroom to get a feel for the room before heading home.

We had a long day but it really was a lot of FUN.

This week more video adds to report???

peace, 

dave.hitplay

Another Songbird Music Video

"Another Songbird" can be seen by millions of viewers!

When we finished our first round of recordings with Elisa Girlando we backed off and gave our ears and minds a little time to decompress. Then when we went back through the songs one song jumped out at all of us "another songbird". We were concerned about leading with a ballad, but the vocal was so good we felt we had to go with it.

About that time we were approached to make a video. After discussions we felt the visuals from another songbird with Elisa would make for a great video. We went with the performance and went with "another songbird" as the video. We were more than pleased with the results.

We then had this tremendous video with this tremendous vocal and we decided to push the video ahead of our RED release; get a little pre-show buzz going if possible.

After interviewing several people I came across an old friend Andy Gesner who runs HIP video promotion. I felt very comfortable that Andy and his team would give us a great effort in getting the video out to the tertiary, secondary, and if we got lucky primary video markets. Phil and I discussed and Phil gave me the go-ahead to hire Andy.

The results from our first two weeks with another songbird is VERY Positive. We received adds throughout the county with some very big adds including:

1) FUse On Demand: 18,000,000 households add for September

2) Powerplay Music TV: 17.8 million viewers

3) Sidewalks: 3.5 million viewers

4) Street Timez 190,000 viewers

5) VME media 5,000,000 viewers

6) Screenplay 25,000 retailers nationwide

7) multiple Internet sites including :billboard/tvguide/allmusic video, 9:30 club, singinfool and many others!!!

We have a great song, we have a great vocal, we have an awesome video and programmers are seeing it. Wait until they see Elsia live it will blow their collective socks off.

Live SHows:

1. Point Pleasant Thur July 30'th Jenkins on the boardwalk-huge

2. The Living Room: Our RED music showcase all should come to this one! Thur 8/6 @ 7PM sharp!!!

3. Sparta Dykstra Park acoustic set Elisa alone Fri 8/14

4. Maxwell's Hoboken NJ Fri 8/21

5. Krough's Open Mike every Thursday we are not performing 10pm

Kicking into High Gear

peace,

dave.hitplay

ps check out Elisa on Twitter : elisagirlando