I have a had very fortunate and productive career as an artist and have been blessed by working with some of my guitar heroes. I wrote Distant Light especially for Steve Morse to guest on and being a fellow composer, he appreciated the dramatic strings and emotional feeling the song holds. I also had my dear friend Hal Lindes from Dire Straits add beautiful acoustic and electric guitar parts on the song as well.
This song is part of an album I released in 2020 called Vegas Blue: Brian Tarquin Project, which I had many guest guitarists buddies record solos. I produced this album in remembrance of the shooting victims at the Las Vegas Mandalay Bay Hotel on October 1st, 2017. This was the site of a tragic and, all too familiar occurrence involving a deadly mass shooting at the hands of a deranged gunman. What began that evening as a peaceful and celebratory country music concert ended in bullet-riddled chaos and carnage for countless patrons and innocent by-standers.
I dedicated the album to the families and survivors of this horrific mass shooting. And, in doing so, I was hoping to shine the spotlight on the need for sensible, responsible and humane gun laws and safety. Unfortunately, our society has become numb to such horrible events, only to be repeated every year. I have done a number of remembrance albums through my music with the help of guest artists, to use music as a way to heal the emotional wounds that this country seems to continually inflict upon itself.
You can learn more about Brian Tarquin here
About the Curator: Brian Tarquin
Multi Emmy Award winning Brian Tarquin is an established top rate composer/guitarist. He has won 3 Emmy's for “Outstanding Achievement in Music Direction and Composition for a Drama Series” and has been nominated for an Emmy 6 times. In 2019 Tarquin received a Global Music Gold Award for his release Orlando In Heaven for “Best Album.” Three years in a row (2016-2019) Tarquin received “Best Album of the Year” nominations from the Independent Music Awards for his releases: Guitars for Wounded Warriors, Orlando in Heaven, and Guitars for Veterans. On which, Tarquin shows his guitar prowess alongside such world-class shredders as: Steve Morse, Larry Coryell, Billy Sheehan, Bumblefoot (Guns N’ Roses), Reb Beach (Whitesnake), Chuck Loeb (FourPlay) to name a few. In 2006 SESAC honored him with the Network Television Performance Award. Tarquin has graced the Top Billboard Charts with such commercial releases as: This is Acid Jazz, Vol. 2, Sweet Emotions, and Bossa Brava: Caliente on Instinct Records, followed by several solo jazz albums, which charted Top 10 at Smooth Jazz Radio R&R and Gavin charts. Brian has appeared on 38 releases, selling over 140,000 records in his career.