Coming Home

with Peter Dent and Peter Woods

Everybody comes home sometime! The homes we discover are not always in the places or with the people we expect. But there are times in our lives when we know with certainty that we belong exactly where we are.

Coming Home is our attempt to reflect in musical terms the many shades and moods that we experience as we find the place where we “fit.”

Listen to sample tracks:

Lament... (Track 5)
Someone ...(Track 11)

To purchase the CD:

Cost is $20 + $3 shipping.
Prices are in Canadian dollars.

Please email Peter Woods to order the CD >

Most of the songs evolved during a musical road trip Peter Dent and I played in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island in May and June of 2004. To those who welcomed us into their homes, churches, and communities, and to those who shared their musical talents with us, we thank you and dedicate this disc to you.

From “Goin’ Home To Lonesome Town” to “Go to Dark Gethsemane”, the CD has a spiritual theme running throughout. There is a musical story of a sacred presence on the paths we travel. Peter Dent and I have drawn on the traditions and sources that have defined us individually and as a duet: jazz standards, pop songs, original compositions, and the ever-powerful melodic world of hymns and spirituals.

In this our second CD, the duet setting allows us to have direct musical conversations (piano and saxophone) with each other as the various songs unfold. We owe a conceptual debt to the great Archie Shepp/Horace Parlan duet recordings, “Trouble in Mind” and “Goin’ Home” as benchmarks for the conversational jazz we strove to create on Coming Home.

Peter Woods

“The great home of the soul is the Open Road. Not heaven, not paradise. Not ‘above’. Not even ‘within’. It is a wayfarer down the road.” D.H. Lawrence

The Tunes (with notes from Peter Dent)

Goin’ Home to Lonesome Town – Peter Woods asked me to do an arrangement of Ricky Nelson’s 1950’s pop tune, Lonesome Town. I was intrigued with its similarity to the spiritual, “Goin’ Home” The result is a fusion of the two melodies with minimal change in the harmonic underlay.

1. Saved Paradise, Tore up a Parking Lot – An original composition obviously owing a debt to one of Canada’s greatest songwriters, this is a playful swing tune

2. Go Down Moses – Epitomizes the beauty of improvised music.

3. Dorothy – Written for my wife on her 55th birthday, the composition follows the musical “yellow brick road” of a more famous Dorothy song.

4. Lament for a Queen –The queen in the title is the Queen Elizabeth 2. The idea for the composition came to me during a memorable trans-Atlantic crossing with my wife and mother.

5. St. Agnes (Here O My Lord) – In our previous recording venture and our live performances, we include many “old standards” from the hymnal. This simple and powerful hymn is still a favourite during communion.

6. On Eagles Wings – Michael Joncas’s musical paraphrase of Psalm 91 has become one of the newer religious songs to find a place in the hymnbooks of many different denominations.

7. Jesus Loves Me - During the recording session, we each decided to do one solo. I chose this simple beloved hymn.

8. A Time for Every Purpose – Taking the title from the famous passage in Ecclesiastes, this was my attempt to write a gospel-flavoured song for the CD.

9. My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean – Peter Woods chose to present a simple and heartfelt rendering of his Mother’s favourite song. A musical gift.

10. Someone to Watch Over Me – We felt that we needed at least one “standard” on the disc. Peter Woods has had several recent requests for its inclusion in weddings and funerals as an instrumental song of inspiration. Listen to sample

11. Sweet Suzanne – Dedicated to our mutual friend, Rev. Suzanne Sykes in celebration of her recent ordination, the tune borrows from two “name” songs to create something new and fresh, like Suzanne’s new vocation.

12. Redhead No. 76 (Go to Dark Gethsemane) – Another of the traditional hymns which we like to play in a jazz style. Playing this tune in our live performances leading up to the recording was one of our more moving experiences on tour.

Production Info

Coming Home was recorded at Little Chicago Studies in Smiths Falls, ON, Canada, June 7 & 8 2004. Recorded, mixed & mastered by Tim Greencorn.

Producers: Peter Woods and Peter Dent

Photographers: Mark White, Simon Lunn

Graphic Designer: Mark White