About John Fox

Dr. John M. Fox is a practicing surgeon in Lexington, Kentucky with an interest in music as an avocation. Born in 1942, he grew up in Louisville, Kentucky receiving both his undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Louisville. He spent three years in the United States Air Force as a flight surgeon stationed in Taiwan during the Viet Nam War following which he did his surgical training in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

He has three children, twin daughters and a son, with three grandchildren, all of whom he loves dearly. He attends the Church at Athens in Lexington, a non-denominational Christian church, where he plays the piano from time to time, and first became inspired by its people to record his music. His other interests have included football, fencing, racquetball, sailing and now flying radio-controlled model airplanes. He also enjoys reading war history.

Dr. Fox’s musical background consists primarily of private piano lessons beginning at age seven for about ten years. His mother, Geraldine Fox, was a professional musician who graduated from the University of Louisville Conservatory of Music and worked as a union pianist at WAVE radio station in Louisville; as an accompanist for vocalists; and later as the organist at Walnut Street and Deer Park Baptist churches in Louisville.

His mother was, as he says, “…a genius on the piano. She could sight-read, transpose, modulate and never make a mistake!” But Dr. Fox’s ability on the piano is to “speak” or communicate from his heart as we hope you will find out if you listen carefully to the recordings. His first album is dedicated to the memory of his mother. She never taught him, but as he says on the album fold-out, “Although my piano ability nowhere matched hers, she always understood what my musical heart was trying to say.”

The music of all his albums was recorded in Dr. Fox’s living room on his mother’s 1936 Baldwin grand piano using digital equipment, and then remastered by Kevin Johnson, who assisted Dr. Fox in setting up his home studio. The cover art graphics were done by Eric Copeland of Creative Soul Records, and the photography by Forrest Payne. Their efforts are greatly appreciated.

The initial premise of the project was to recreate the simple unplugged sound of the beautiful music played on his mother’s piano, but in fact the music has been enhanced somewhat in the mastering process with some compression to make it sound a little richer. Reverb was also applied here and there to add a slight echo effect as well as some fine touches by Kevin.

The elements that Dr. Fox uses to allow him to communicate musically without words are:

1. Simple expression without flourish.
2. Two and three-note harmonies.
3. The sustained, single, beautiful note.

The recording studio allows the musical environment to be brought inward electronically so that the smallest sound, or even a pause without a sound can become large. The simplicity and restraint of the music produces a close intimacy that sets it apart from much of the contemporary recordings on the market today.