Jammin' with Jimmy Page live. The Saxoffender Stairways to Something Less Than Heaven.

This is a step in the journey of paying tribute to the legends of rock, in art, by painting them from continuous live footage on YouTube, as opposed to simply copying a photograph. To do justice to Jimmy Page in a portrait that tries to get as close to painting him from life as I'm going to get, I wanted to understand his famous guitar solo in Stairway to Heaven. Learning it on saxophone, not to compete with or try and outdo, but to gain a greater sense of empathy, confirmed for me why Stairway is such an iconic, timeless moment in rock history. The study you see in this footage is one I tried to complete in roughly the time you'd expect a Led Zeppelin concert would take, so that if I ever had the chance to see them live, I could paint Jimmy Page during the show and the painting could be auctioned at the end, with part proceeds going to prostate cancer research.

[sophiedowney]

Hmmm. In law this is called "a statement against interest." In music, it's called "Sophie Downey you suck!". But that's okay! I LIKE to suck, when I'm playing with Jimmy Page! That's the purpose of publishing such a clunky, lumpy, tuneless piece of saxophone suckery. It's to remind anyone who has forgotten, just what a fucking legend Jimmy Page is! And he's still shredding it! Want me to pay royalties for using, as the basis for this "fan cover", the audio of Led Zeppelin live at Madison Square Gardens in 1973?, the year I was born? By all means. I'll pay it off in paintings. Release the version of Stairway I wrote prostate cancer aware lyrics to. "If there is bleeding in your piss stream, don't just ignore it, go get some testeeeng by a gloved queen...Yes there are two paths you can go by, but if they find it (early), there's still time to change the road you're on.." It might not make a fortune, (without a really gritty film clip), but to put the proceeds into the hands of the legends that made this anthem, this soundtrack to my life, and the hands of the people whose lives get made into misery by prostate cancer, lest we forget Frank Zappa, well, that would make this crazy art/music journey worth it.