Mario’s Stuff

 Mario Parga - Lullaby For Skye (Portrait of the Artist’s Daughter) (2011), oil on canvas on panel 12″ x 16″. Private Collection.

I’ve been very busy with art and music over the past few weeks, it’s funny how things tend to happen all at once… Firstly, I’m very proud to announce that I’m now endorsed by the prestigious French oil paint manufacturer Charvin. Charvin have made paint for 181 years, and were introduced to me by Ira Goldstein, the President of my favorite art supply store  Jerry’s Artarama here in the US.

 Jerry’s are the sole US distributors for Charvin colors and Ira very kindly sent me a full palette’s worth of full tube samples to try (he actually sent me two palette’s worth - such was his generosity). Needless to say, I was very impressed with the paint and began a small demo painting using only the colors that were sent to me in order to test them thoroughly. The finished painting Lullaby for Skye is shown above; as I painted each layer, I photographed it and sent the results to the Goldstein and Charvin families who were very enthusiastic and encouraging. I loved the paint so much, I’ve since replaced my usual paints with mostly Charvin colors.

The above painting will be shipped out to North Carolina later this month where it be professionally photographed by Jerry’s Artarama, it will then be available to view on theirs and Charvin’s websites.

On a personal level, I can’t thank Ira enough for introducing me to Charvin paint. He’s very knowledgeable and passionate about art and its materials, and knew that the paint would be suited to my style and technique. His daughter Heather and brother David were also involved in the painting’s progress and between us and Laurence Charvin we kept a log of each painting session. If any of you are interested in the exact materials and colors used, please feel free to get in touch here.

Shadows & Light

The new album is still underway, I’ve recorded more guitars and keyboards and Mark has recorded some of the final drums in Mexico which sound unbelievably awesome! I can’t wait for you to hear this guy play! I have some of the album’s rough mixes on a CD that I listen to while driving, and so far it sounds great. I can’t wait to post some sound samples for you to hear! :-) The tracks will soon be on their way to Vancouver, Canada, where Paul will add his bass. Then I will add my final guitars and keyboards and begin mixing and mastering here in Las Vegas. I’ll keep the blog updated with news of the album.

Shadows & Light Update

All’s going well with the new album, Mark has already completed several of the final drum tracks and I’m on schedule with the guitars and keyboards. Paul works pretty quickly so I know we’ll have some sound samples for you soon! :-)

The album contains three bonus tracks, and it’s one of these that will probably become the free mp3 giveaway on my main website in the very near future. More on this will be posted on the main website’s ‘News & Events’ page.

Painting in Progress…

As I mentioned in my previous post, I’m going to post photos of some of my oil paintings in progress. To be honest, I haven’t done much painting since that post as I’ve been mostly recording bits and pieces of the new album. Nevertheless, I did manage to get some painting done; I worked on the portrait of my daughter that was previously shown in a mostly underpainted state.

Portrait of Skye (Painting in Progress)

Since the last post, I’ve worked on parts of the face and hair and added more white to parts of the blanket in the foreground.

Portrait of Skye - Detail (Painting in Progress)

The painting is still obviously unfinished, I have several areas of the face, hair, clothing and blanket to work on, but it shouldn’t be too long now. I have a beautiful Spanish ornate frame for this painting, and it will be placed on the north wall of our living room.

The new art website is already online, but only the main home page. The full site will be available soon.

I’ve never mentioned my artwork before as I used to keep my paintings and music separate. I’ve painted professionally for many years and have the same passion for art as I do for music. I’ve painted and drawn all my life simultaneously with music, so please don’t think I’m now abandoning the guitar! Nor am I trying to sell you my artwork; I just thought it would be cool to let you all know what I’m up to and to introduce you to my other side…

Some of my paintings have been sold in established art galleries around the world and a few of my paintings hang in several notable homes; I also painted all the murals in a famous historic Hall built in the year 1260 AD in England. One of my paintings was exhibited at the Pall Mall Gallery in London, and one of my Old Master copies (Bouguereau) was auctioned by world renowned fine art auctioneers Bonham’s of London in the mid ’90’s. Although I sign my artwork with my real name of ‘Mario Parga’, galleries and collectors have had until very recently little or no knowledge of my musical career.

Isle of Skye, Scotland (oil on canvas on panel, 30″ x 24″, 2010, in private collection)

I think that the time has come for me to show my music fans my artwork as I have an art-specific website coming soon and I hope you’ll visit it :-)

Rather than post a bunch of older paintings and drawings in the blog, I’m only going to focus on recent work, and will show works in progress for those of you interested in oil painting:

Castle Scene, England (work in progress, oil on canvas on panel, 32″ x 24″) This castle was just around the corner from where we used to live in England. The painting is still in its early stages, and parts of the underpainting are visible. The greenery to the right is pretty detailed, but I’m still working on the rest of it including the grassy areas. The castle, water and sky are still in early stages. The old keyboard in my ever-cramped studio serves as a great brush rest! :-D I’ll post more photos of this painting as it progresses.

I paint in the traditional way using paint in opaque and glazed layers and specialize in landscapes, portraits and figurative works. My style of art is known as ‘realism’, and I paint in both the classical and contemporary styles.  I use the finest commercially made paints, and I sometimes make my own paint when clients specifically request rare pigments such as lapis lazuli, malachite, etc.

I prepare my canvases and panels from scratch in the ancient and time-tested way using rabbit skin glue as a size, followed by a ground of earth pigments with a toned lead based oil primer on top for good paint adhesion. I never use acrylic primers. I use Belgian and Irish linen canvases and fine quality interlocking chungking bristle brushes and mongoose brushes for fine detail. I also make my own painting medium based on a 17th century recipe using venetian turpentine, stand oil, gum turpentine and dammar resin for an enameled jewel-like effect.

Portrait of Skye (work in progress, oil on canvas, 24″ x 18″ - not for sale). This contemporary painting of my daughter Skye in her car seat (yes, she was named after the island in Scotland, one of our favorite places :-) is still in a mostly underpainted state. I’ll begin to apply the final flesh tones soon and then finally bring the rest of the painting out. I’ll also post images of this painting as it progresses.

I know it’s not guitar related, but I hope you enjoyed this blog entry all the same. I’m not going to over-post my art on this blog, I’ll keep it to a minimum and use the art-specific website for that purpose. If you’d like more information about my artwork, please email contact@marioparga-art.com

Thanks for visiting :-)

This third lick in the ‘Lick of the Week’ series is a scale pattern in F major played with an alternate picking technique. Download the lick for performance notes and tablature.

Listen to Lick #3 here!

Download Lick #3 here!

Lick #2

This second lick is an arpeggio pattern that’s played over A7 at the end of one of the choruses on my song ‘Heatwave’. Originally written in the Summer of 1989, ‘Heatwave’ first appeared on the album The Magician (1991), and this lick is from the 2011 20th Anniversary version of the song to be released later this year. Hope you enjoy playing it! :-)

Listen to Lick #2 here!

Download Lick #2 here!

My new ‘Lick of the Week!’ series started today, and is available through my Twitter page and this Blog. Every Friday I’ll upload a new lick with an audio clip, tablature and playing tips. Over the coming weeks I’ll post some killer arpeggio stuff and alternate picking patterns :-)

Lick #1

The first lick is an E minor pentatonic lick that can be easily moved around the fingerboard and played in different keys. It’s played with a two handed tap/pull-off technique and when played at speed sounds a little like a computer!

Listen to Lick #1 here!

Download Lick #1 here!

‘Lick of the Week’

Starting from next Friday Feb 18th, I’m going to post a ‘lick of the week’ on Twitter and the Blog every Friday for an indefinite period. The lick will consist of an audio clip of me playing it, plus tablature and playing tips on how to play it. I get many requests for guitar tuition, so I’m hoping this will be of interest to those of you who have emailed me about it :-) The licks will be just that; short guitar licks with a brief explanation, playing tips and tab. So… check out my Twitter page and/or Blog every Friday!

Mount Charleston, NV

One of our favorite places near Las Vegas is Mount Charleston. In the height of the Summer when it’s around 120F here in the valley, we often go to the top of Mt. Charleston to chill out and cool down. The mountain is approximately 35 miles away from central Las Vegas and is a relatively short drive for such an amazing contrast between desert heat and cool mountain air. We went up there today as my daughter Skye wanted to play in the snow. The temperature in Vegas today was approx. 60F (it’s been 70F most days this week), but at the mountain it was 26F with a lot of snow.

Skye in the snow, Upper Lodge, Mt. Charleston, NV.

We always stop off at the Upper Lodge for hot food and drinks, then we had a wander around the mountain and watched Skye throw snowballs.

A slightly arm-stretched-out-and-shaky photo of me & Shawna at the mountain…

We had a great time up there then began the descent…

Shawna took this photo out of the truck’s window of the road from Mt. Charleston back to the Vegas Valley at sunset.

Once back at home it was time for a slightly warmed brandy… ;-)

The 2011 Superbowl

Today was Superbowl Sunday, so the perfect time to get out and about with minimal road traffic and human interaction! The majority of Las Vegas’ residents were probably sat at home watching a bunch of men run up and down a field for thirty seconds while clutching a ball. Then stopping play for five minutes, then running up and down the field for thirty seconds again. Then stopping for another five minutes… etc. etc… Yes, just in case you didn’t get my subtle hint; I don’t really care for football, or any other sport for that matter. The only sport I occasionally don’t mind watching is baseball.

The Movie

So… As Las Vegas was deserted, we took advantage of this and got Shawna’s Mom & Dad to babysit Skye. We then went to see The Rite, the ‘exorcism’ movie starring Anthony Hopkins. I had high hopes for this movie whereas Shawna was a little more cynical. Sadly, she was right; it was a ponderously bad and boring movie with a truly awful and cliched script. Anthony Hopkins was… well… Anthony Hopkins. He’s a great actor, but he just played himself. His character was a sort of cross between Hannibal Lecter and Captain Bligh. Considering the movie’s subject matter was the devil, demons and the dark side, it wasn’t scary in the slightest. The PG13 certificate alluded to that. Oh well… We hadn’t been to the movie theater in ages so it was a good reminder as to how annoying other theater goers can be with their incessant chatter, fidgeting, coughing (in all the wrong places) and getting up and down every 10 minutes to go to the restrooms due to their drinking of industrial sized fountain sodas. I think in future we’ll stick to our large HD flatscreen and surround system at home with all our other creature comforts…

The Laughs

After the movie we drove down to the Vegas Strip area, as just behind it and near to the Stratosphere is our favorite restaurant, the Lotus of Siam. As I parked the car, we realized we were early for dinner, so I drove around the little square area opposite the restaurant. This evening was dusky and warm, it was 70F today and there were a few people wandering around the shopping area. The square is made up of 95% Asian stores, from massage parlours and dry cleaners to general stores. As we drove around its perimeter checking out all the different premises, we came across two gems that made us laugh:

The ‘A Minus Mart’… Not quite an ‘A’ but at least they’re honest! :-D

As if to reiterate it’s A Minus status, as I photographed it, the ‘A’ in the ‘Mart’ suddenly went out! It then became the ‘B Plus Mart’ :-D

Right next to the ‘A Minus Mart’ is the ‘OK’ Tailors…! Seriously! Not great… Not even good… just ‘ok’… :-D

From the square, we could see the Las Vegas Hilton, once named the ‘International Hotel’. Elvis Presley lived at the Hotel from ‘69 to ‘76 in the Penthouse Suite (Room #3000 on the 30th floor) as he performed there. The Penthouse is where he shot several items, including the TV when he saw a Robert Goulet appearance on a show. The suite allegedly still has all the bullet holes from Elvis’ bizarre target practices.

Elvis’ Penthouse at the Las Vegas Hilton. The penthouse suite is clearly visible on top of the roof in this photo.

The Dinner

Dinner at the Lotus of Siam went perfectly well as always, the food and service was outstanding. My wife and I chatted and reminisced, and enjoyed each other’s company without a feisty three year old coming between us every other second…

Back at home, Skye had behaved well for her grandparents so it was a happy end to a nice day. We’ll do it again soon! :-)

It’s now 9pm as I type the ending to this blog entry… definitely time to chill out and pour a bourbon-on-the-rocks… ;-)

‘Electric Lounge’ Solo

I’ve had a few requests from MySpace friends to post the second solo in the MySpace player in a better quality format. As we know, MySpace compresses audio files into inferior sounding versions for webspace/bandwidth reasons I assume. The first and second solos in the player are actually taken from the new album Shadows & Light; the first solo is from the song ‘Ra’s Dream’ and the second is the main solo from ‘Electric Lounge’. The solo to ‘Ra’s Dream’ can be heard in better quality on the home page of my main website, so I’ve decided to post the ‘Electric Lounge’ solo here in the blog: Mario Parga - ‘Electric Lounge’ (solo) It just needs Paul’s bass and Mark’s drums, but it’s in a pretty cool post demo-state. I recorded the clean and main solos late one night… Play it loud! ;-)

Skyedolph Parga

It’s common knowledge amongst friends and family that my 3 year old daughter Skye loves the Scorpions. And quite rightly too - the Scorps fucking rock!! They were the best band I ever saw live by a long shot, and I always loved the twin guitar work of Rudolph Shenker and Matthias Jabs. I’d much rather listen to those guys than most non-musical ’shredders’ who can’t write a single memorable riff or melody…

So… Imagine our surprise a couple of nights ago after Skye had been listening to ‘Blackout’ (her favorite track)… She came over to our bedroom where we were watching a movie and began playing her little toy guitar in the style of Rudolph Shenker! She was riffin’ away and looked like she belonged in the ‘Blackout’ video from ‘82. She was dressed in her pajamas and had put on a headband for added effect… Kids are so funny, aren’t they? :-)

Skyedolph Parga!

My old friend and former band-mate Tony Martin was in town yesterday, he traveled up from Los Angeles via my friends Karpis & Sumie Maksudian. We all hooked up at the Aria Hotel on the Vegas Strip and had a great time catching up and reminiscing :-)

We realized that the last time we saw each other was 18 years ago…! It seemed kind of strange because despite the long time gap, he was still the same old Tony I knew back in the day.

Me & Tony sensibly drinking wine at one of the Aria Hotel’s Restaurants last night.

Me & Tony after more wine…! :-D

Our friends Karpis & Sumie Maksudian. Karpis is a top L.A. video director and will be shooting a video for my new album later this year.

We enjoyed a great dinner courtesy of the Maksudian’s and their wonderful hospitality, then later in the evening Tony and I went for a walk together and I showed him some of the sights of the Vegas Strip.

The Eiffel Tower at the Paris Casino.

We had a look inside the Paris Casino then the Bellagio and Caesar’s Palace. Tony got some great video of the dancing water show at the Bellagio, set to the tune of Henry Mancini’s ‘Pink Panther Theme’.

Tony outside Caesar’s Palace.

We walked through Caesar’s Palace and it’s amazing ‘The Forum’ shopping center then returned to the Aria. For those of you who don’t know Vegas, it’s hard work walking the Strip! There’s so much to see and do, with miles of walking…

Statues outside Caesar’s Palace.

We all had a great time and will hopefully do it again soon!

Viva Las Vegas!