Stories with Sergio
He was gathering songs for what was to be the next album and suggested we write something together. I jumped at the chance to write with one of my heroes. In a matter of days I took my small writing setup to his house and setup both keyboards so we could face each other. I connected our keyboards to my laptop and put a GoPro in the corner of the room to capture everything the computer might’ve missed.
Once we started working I came up with a few chords of what became the verse. To my little sketch ideas, he added two chords that blew my mind because they were so damn cool. I made him play it over and over so I could figure out what he was doing as I would've NEVER played a harmonic progression like that in a thousand years. It was a series of really hip, highly sophisticated chords that I had "perceived" in my musical spirit but never heard with my ears. I know that sounds weird but some musical things make sense to you even if you've never heard them and his chords were those things. I knew this was about to be a special piece of music.
He started playing this beautiful melody to go along with those wonderful chords that I loved instantly. Once we settled on a verse he said, "This has to lift in some way." I said, "How bout we switch keys and go major here?" I played the chords I heard & he opened his arms like he was flying and said, "I LOVE IT! It sounds like the clouds just parted and the sun came out.”
We found a cool transition to get back to the original key of the verse and, in about an hour, that song was done! Some songs come to you quickly like that.
He thought it would be a good idea to title the song “Magic” because of how magical it all came together. He loved talking about the “Magic of the Encounter.” Writing this song was ALL about the encounter of the two of us sitting together and creating magic.
That song became the title track of his 2014 album and I included it on my 2023 Meu Brasil album project where he blessed me by playing piano on it.
Side note: If you listen to the version on my album, the very last chord on the piano, which is in a completely different key, is one he just threw in even though the track had finished. He actually laughed about it as he was just messing around! I kept it because it reminded me of his infectious laugh. It was also honest and a continuation of that original thread of magic that started the day we sat down to write.
It was and still is magic.
