P & J Records

Announcing Donna Sammarco’s new CD ‘Here I Am, Lord’ – December 2009!

The Kick-Off Concert was a great success. It was held at First United Methodist Church of Houma, Louisiana, December 5, 2009, and additional concerts are now being scheduled.

Welcome! P&J Records is not your average record company. We are based in the New Orleans area – the “Big Easy”. We specialize in “the standards of the future,” striving to provide fine music production in the tradition of the standard – timeless, easy-on-the-ear music – to be enjoyed and appreciated through generations. We do this because we feel that in the long run, P and J will have more to offer the listener and the world of music.

Enter and learn more about our Christian solo piano release – “On Eagles Wings” by Donna Sammarco, and our smooth rock, or soft rock, CDs – “Smooth Sailing” and “Hang On to Your Dreams”, by “Paul and Friends”.

Donna Sammarco is a well known and respected pianist in southern Louisiana. Her premier CD “On Eagles Wings” is a beautiful solo piano CD which has received tens to hundreds of thousands of streams and downloads in 9 different countries since its release! It offers some of the finest Christian music around, featuring arrangements by some of the best arrangers of Christian music in the US – Mark Hayes (Dove Award Winner), Carol Tornquist, and John Carter. The CD is warm and meditative in nature. It will melt your heart and mesmerize your soul. Please click here for more information on and sound clips from this release. If you like soothing, Christian music, you should not miss this recording.

Her second CD – “Here I Am, Lord“ – has now also been released internationally and is now also available from e-Retailers world-wide. The tunes range from contemporary Christian to new and beautiful arrangements of standard hymns. Again, the arrangers of the music are Mark Hayes, Coral Tornquist, Bill Wolaver, and Susan Callaway Naylor. The songs are gorgeous and spell-binding. Donna has once again done a masterful job on them. Listen to the sound clips on her page.

“Paul and Friends” is an adult contemporary/pop group that also does some jazz-rock and Christian music. Quite a mixture, ay? Very eclectic. Paul W. Sammarco (alias Paul Summers, his stage name in Australia) – a talented singer-songwriter – is the composer, arranger and producer of the group, and the “Friends” are the numerous musicians with whom he works.

“Paul and Friends’” most recent release is entitled “Smooth Sailing”. It was recorded primarily at Ultrasonic Studios in New Orleans, with additional recording and mixing at Dockside Studios in Maurice, LA; Sound Services, New Orleans; Hart-to-Hart Studios in Qld., Australia; North Australian Audio-Video, Australia; Hart-to-Hart Studios, Australia; and Tajarc Productions, Mississippi. It features some of the finest musicians in the region. P&J feels that this release is a benchmark. It was 7 years in the making, with excellent production, literally defining a new type of music – “smooth rock/smooth jazz-rock”. It is music to chill out by – and allow your soul to be warmed. The musicians on this CD are predominantly from southern Louisiana, with a few Aussies thrown in. They include Todd Adams, Des Anthony (“Three’s Company”), Kurt Brunus (“The Kurt Brunus Project”), Tracy Griffin (“Allen Toussaint and Friends”), Carol Hart, Martin Hart (“Three’s Company”, “Hart-to-Hart”), Roger Kimball (“Soul Survivors”), Mark Liuzza (“Benny Grunch”), Larry Martin, Ben Melancon (“Unmerited Favor”), Lindsay Melancon Ogle, Brian O’Neill (“Bonerama”), Clyde Pellegrin, Curtis Pierre (“Casa Samba”), Joe Raines (“Full FX”), Hank Randle (“Soul Survivors”), Donna Sammarco, Jerome Theriot (“Soul Survivors”), Steve Theriot (“The Kevin Koike Blues Band”), Mark Trennecosta (“Benny Grunch”), and June Yamagishi (“Papa Grows Funk”). Yes – that’s quite a line-up. The primary engineer on the project was Steve “The Wizard” Reynolds. The second engineer was Dave Farrell.

“ Paul and Friends’” first CD is entitled “Hang On to Your Dreams”. Paul’s co-Executive Producer on this one was G.J. Sammarco. This CD has been categorized as smooth rock, but it offers tracks which fall into the categories of R&B, country-rock, acoustic-rock, Christian, and blue-grass. A bit of a Waring Blender effect, but it all sounds good. That is the eclectic nature of Sammarco’s approach to songwriting and production. Once again, P&J has captured the magic of some of the finest musicians in this region, let alone from other regions of the country and the world, particularly Australia. Musicians on “Hang On to Your Dreams” include Des Anthony, Cedric Geia, Martin Hart, John Haupt, Dave Henry, Leigh James (Leigh Wilkinson), Roger Kimball, Larry Martin, Mark McLean, Lindsay Melancon Ogle, Bobby Petrie, Jimmy Pollard, Victor Purkiss, Jeff Raymond, Donna Sammarco, Dustin Sammarco, Sandy Siepen, Steve Theriot, and Kai Underwood.

Listen to the sound clips (available at this site and many other e-retailers) and judge for yourself. Then order a CD for yourself or a friend – to enjoy for a long time.

Downloads of individual songs or the entire CDs are available from this website. They are also available from such e-retailers as iTunes.com, Rhapsody.com, MSNMusic.com, MusicNet.com, MusicMatch.com, Napster.com, RealNetworks.com, and eMusic.com.

*All songs published by Endless Shores Music Publishing (ASCAP), unless otherwise noted.