The Orlando - Pittsburgh Trail leading to the "Road Home Tour"

Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t start making your dreams come true (especially yourself!).  Have you ever sat thinking about a goal you’d like to achieve, and then begin placing obstacles between yourself and that goal?  Yeah… me, too!  Last year I came to the conclusion that I wanted to perform live again, and I would be making the moves to make that happen.  Then the obstacles came.

Not long ago, I produced a video for Building Homes for Heroes, a national organization that builds custom homes for our combat-wounded veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.  The homes are built to address their injuries and then given to them, mortgage-free, in an effort to make life a little easier for them and their families.  I was so moved by the veterans and the folks who were there to help them, that I felt a compelling need to do something myself.

So I came up with an idea to do a series of concerts to benefit Building Homes for Heroes… and to call the series “The Road Home Tour”.  I spent a great deal of time thinking about how I would go about it… too much time!

Well now, it was time to stop creating obstacles!  I jumped up and out of my favorite “thinking” chair (which had the dangerous tendency of unexpectedly pulling me into Slumber-land) and started working on specific steps I needed to do to achieve that goal!  I had a mission with a purpose!

This decisive action took place in the summer of 2017 and since then I have made ten trips between Orlando and Pittsburgh in my trusty Mazda minivan.  It made sense to me that to get this project started I should get back to my roots and head to Pennsylvania.  And, something has happened that I didn’t account for when I had been only contemplating this new chapter in my “Book of Life”. 

I contacted a number of old friends (some of whom I haven’t spoken with in decades!) and made some new friends who have stepped forward and offered to help.  Slim Varhola (played lead guitar with me in The Haywire Band); Pete Hewlett (I worked with at benefits for “Toys for Tots” back in the day); David Granati (legendary guitarist/vocalist with G-Force—co-produced my 3rd album); John Vento and quite a few others have been terrific—getting me to the people and resources I need to make these concerts a reality.

I had a conversation the other day with Kim Valdyke, Southeast US Director for Building Homes for Heroes, and she is very excited about the project.  Kim had helped me organize my thoughts into a program that we would be able to repeat in colleges and other venues anytime, anywhere!  The organization is currently building homes in Pennsylvania and Florida where The Road Home Tour is currently planning a schedule.

I have a new band (The Arte Tedesco Band) featuring David Granati on lead guitar, Hermie Granati on keyboards and Greg McIltrot on percussion.

We just completed my 5th album, Lightning Strikes!, and released the first single—a love song to the City of Pittsburgh… aptly titled Pittsburgh!  Here is a link to the lyrics video of the song.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ghoZBWY7Q4

I hope you’ll consider adding Pittsburgh! to your Spotify playlist (please follow me while you’re there—you can find my 3rd and 4th albums there as well).  Here’s the link: https://open.spotify.com/album/4YkcAdXOzA3g4qprSqHJLt

I am very excited to be preparing for this concert series accompanied by other musicians.  I have found that playing music alone is like loving alone… it’s always much better If there is somebody else around J

To wrap it up, I want to say that it has occurred to me that one of the reasons I haven’t been writing more often is the fact that I haven’t really been doing much that would interest you (unless you want to hear about my daily practicing; cutting the grass; going to the store; drawing pictures… well, you get the idea.  Anyway, I think I will be writing more often now that I’m doing things that interest and excite me.  Let’s see…

‘Nuff said!

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