Chatting with the country group High Mountain Breezes

High Mountain Breezes. Photo Credit: Dustin Soper

The country group High Mountain Breezes chatted about their new music, and being a part of the digital age.

There are a lot of great musicians in town. How did you meet or choose the players for High Mountain Breezes?

Over the years, our lives in music have brought so many wonderful individuals with so much God given talents into our lives. True lifelong friendships have grown from our paths having crossed with them. We are all very honored and truly blessed to be able to call each of them friend.

Our friends have meant so much to the music that has been ingrained in our hearts and for that, it’s a gift that will last till the end of time. We love and admire each of them, as we are sure you do too through their music that has touched all our hearts and souls.

We are a collection of life long music friends who take time out of our professional careers to come together in the High Mountain Breezes to reconnect, share in our friendships and our god given talents to create our own style of music together.

When we are in the studio, it is a very heartfelt and spiritual experience shared among friends who love what they do as opposed to just a studio work session.

One HMB Player expressed who we are and what we do so very eloquently when he said, “The gift of being a worthy session player is two-fold, first; using one’s palette to augment something already beautiful, and second, being trusted and skilled enough to do it.”

As we come together as a team, we are doing the same for ourselves, together. In a way, we are leaving our own mark on music, our legacy so to speak. When we come together, it is truly a collaborative effort. Time seems to stand still as everyone shares in the creative process.

Everyone from the players, the vocalist, the songwriting team and producers contribute to a record. Like in years gone by, we make our records the old fashion way, right in the studio.

So, when you hear one of our songs, you will feel the chemistry of years of friendships, the love, skills and collaboration of experiences, ideas and individual feelings in our records and music.

We all are truly very honored and blessed to have the opportunity to make our kind of music together and spend a little time together, hopefully for years to come.

The High Mountain Breezes (HMB Players) is really not a band per say, but rather a place or experience.

We are a collection of “Contributing” Players, Artist, Songwriters, Producers and Engineers and friends that as mentioned previously, come together to create our own music.

In recent years, the “Contributing” players and artists have grown based on recommendations of the original “Contributing” High Mountain Breezes family will recommend for a particular project.

Our music is not genre specific, but rather more organic in origin. We like to showcase the artistry of everyone as they create across various genres.

What inspires your music and songwriting?

True creativity, that which withstands the test of time, requires a synergy of seemingly different viewpoints, talents and experiences joined together toward a unified heartfelt message.

What is the mission of High Mountain Breezes? What is the take-away that you want the public to know about the group?

High Mountain Breezes (HMB) is a collection of Nashville’s finest studio musicians who create music for other artists. But sometimes, these musicians want to make music for themselves, not just to accompany a famous lead singer. We are not a commercial entity trying to create the next hit song.

We want the public to embrace the experience that is the High Mountain Breezes and to appreciate our music and the artistry of the “Contributing” HMB Players have brought to the High Mountain Breezes.

The High Mountain Breezes is kind of our own “legacy” to contributions we have all made to music over the years.

You are in Nashville working on the new project (which includes cover songs). How did you choose these cover songs?

As part of our upcoming project, we were recently in the studio working a few cover songs that will be include in our next project along some of our own songs.

How we determined which cover songs we included were based on a couple of factors: Which songs were though of as a good idea by each of the “Contributing” members. Songs that had special memories for any of the “Contributing” members.

Also, songs that could showcase the artistry of everyone across various genres. (They all played on all songs). We wanted to respect and honor the original songs. We do not want to copy them or sound like the original version but rather add our own feel to the songs.

We wanted to select songs that had a long history and 2024 was a significant anniversary year for each of them.

As session players, how do you feel about the introduction of AI? Does AI offer any positive applications for your group? Do you ever use it yourself? If it something you fear or something you embrace?

I think it will be a wait and see what impact AI will have on the song writing process. I may serve as a tool to help with identifying a key word or tweaking of a line, but other than that it lacks the creative, heartfelt and spiritual essences that goes into writing and creating a song, at least from this songwriter’s perspective.

Which artists would you like to a dream duet with someday, and why?

Because we a “Music Family” in the High Mountain Breezes, I really don’t think about it. Any duets or group songs that we do is the “Dream Duet”.

Ron Wallace and Melissa DuVall are doing an off the chart version of “Meet Me in Montana” the Dan Seals & Marie Osmond original #1 hit. We don’t think anyone has released a cover of it since.

From time to time, we have special friends of the High Mountain Breezes join us on a project, as we did when Deborah Allen and Benita Hill joined us on our rendition of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” and Gwen

Sebastian joined us on our rendition of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” and our single “Daddy’s Margarita Rose”.

How do you want to be remembered?

That the High Mountain Breezes was a place where some greatest “Contributing” Players, Artist, Songwriters, Engineers, Marketing professionals in music and Friends created a place were their artistry and music will create a legacy that people will visit, embrace and come back time and time again our music and appreciate the talents of these awesome artist and individuals.

What does the word success mean to you?

Success to me is seeing your efforts in helping others being successful in securing their dreams.

That will insure your own success – as the Founder of the High Mountain Breezes, this is the cornerstone and foundation of the High Mountain Breezes.

To learn more about High Mountain Breezes, check out their official website.