Welcome to the Chesapeake / Breakfast Jam Original Tunes Web site!

The following tunes were written, performed and/or recorded by John Scarborough, Pat Furness, Gary Feveryear, Laura Snodgrass, Abe Hollander, Kimberly Davis and me, Scott Davis.

It all started when....

Funny how things happen.  Nearly the last week of 10th grade, I was standing by Dave, leaning up against the wall.  Dave, about to graduate, was feeling cocky and made a comment to John Scarborough (who I knew a little, but not well) as he walked by.  John, thinking I made the comment, kicked my feet out from under me and down I went - hard.  A punch or two later, John and I found ourselves in the principal's office waiting for our punishment!

John (left) and Scott (approximately 1980 in my parent's basement)

Neither John or I are fighters, and we NEVER had been in that kind of trouble before.  It all happened so fast, we couldn't believe it!  We started laughing, probably out of fear, and realized we had better come up with a story fast.  We decided to tell the principal we were just horsing around, and the teacher who grabbed us misunderstood.  Since he had never seen us in trouble before, he believed us and from that moment on, John and I became very good friends.

John (left) and Scott 

To make a long story short, Dave, John and I started talking about getting a band going.  John didn't play yet, but I was bugging him to play bass.  Dave dropped out of the picture, and John decided he would rather play guitar, which was a great decision!

Laura, Gary, John & Scott practicing in my parent's basement

There was a fellow named Gary in my 12th grade science class that I became friends with.  For no real reason and never expecting anything, I kept bugging him about buying a bass.  One morning, about three quarters of the way through the school year, he told me he did!  At that point, Gary and I just hung at school and we had never even been to each other's houses yet!

Gary Feveryear (approximately 1980)

Working at Music Land the summer after 12th grade I met our drummer, Pat, and our friendship is strong to this day.

Pat Furness (approximately 1981)

Laura, 5 years younger than the rest of us (14 when this got started), who sang, played keyboards and who lived across the street completed the core of Chesapeake.  Amazingly, Laura and I STILL live across the street from each other, we just switched sides!  Laura went on to get a degree in vocal music and married an excellent bass player!

Laura, Gary & John

Our first real gig was at a local youth center:

Left to right - Laura, Gary, John and Scott (approximately 1980)

Look how high John is off the ground.  He jumped off the stage and almost hit his head on the ceiling!

We also played some church events:

Left to right - Gary, John and Scott
 

John, Gary, Laura, Pat & Scott

John, Gary, Scott & Laura

The Tollgate Towncenter:

Laura, Gary, Pat, John & Scott

We also played parties, John Carroll's pajama party (I REALLY wish I had shots of John on stage jamming in a towel), Fallston High School's ring dance and other miscellaneous events (still trying to track down more pictures).

Flirting with Muses:

Playing other folks music is a blast, but there is nothing like creating your own.  We started writing and began mixing our originals in with cover tunes when we played out.  Watching audiences groove to our originals was awesome!  With great feedback and after we had five originals nailed (more or less) we decided it was time for a demo tape.

Our first recording session by Chesapeake in Jarrettsville, Maryland!...
 

Once we entered that building we thought we hit the big time!

Abe, John, Pat and Scott

We had been playing parties, school and church events and scraped enough money together to buy 3 hours worth of recording time.  $100 / hour was a lot of money in 1983!  We weren't quite polished, and trying to crank out five originals in three hours was not very realistic.  These first tracks are rough.  There are a lot of holes and off key lines that with a little more time and experience would have been fixed, but here is what came out of that session.  By the way, I'm thankful my old 1983 cassette tape held out until 2009 for me to transfer these tunes.  That's more than a quarter of a century!  There are some better quality recordings farther down this page.

Another Look
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

You are only cheating yourself.

Hideaway
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

Enough distractions!

I Can't Let Go
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

I wonder what ever became of that girl?

Voices
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

It is just too easy to dismiss what's most important of all.

Competition
Words by Gary Feveryear.  Music by Gary Feveryear, John Scarborough and G. Scott Davis
Listen

Never give in, but know when to let go.

If I Could Give You the World:

Pat Furness (2001)

 That spawned the group Breakfast Jam.  We lost Gary and Laura, but Abe picked up the bass:

Abe Hollander

And my wife Kimberly filled in the female vocals and some instrumentation:

Kimberly Davis (approximately 2001)

We created a recording studio in my basement - Lighthouse Studio - and went to work:

 Scott & John working on the mix.

Here are the songs from Pat's debut CD - If I Could Give You the World.  Pat is singing lead on these, something he didn't do with Chesapeake or much with Breakfast jam.  You'll get a flavor of our more traditional sound farther down the page and above with the Chesapeake tunes.  I'd like to think the recording quality improved a bit from the 1983 tunes above:

Lucky Guy
Words and music by Pat Furness (Prelude by G. Scott Davis)
Listen

Don't let the prelude fool you!

Drift Apart
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

Time and tide wait for no man, or woman either.

Bovinity
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

And that's no bull!

What Happened Long Ago
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

A moment can change a lifetime.

Big Money
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

The green monster.

Listen to Me
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

Heartfelt and true.

Ri Ri Ri Ri
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

What was her name?

Lucky Guy Reprise
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

Back to the future.
 

Breakfast Jam:

Following the completion of Pat's album, we were stoked up on creativity!  John, who hadn't written very much during the Chesapeake days, uncorked his amazing talents, and we started writing songs faster than we could possibly record them!  If John had been writing like this during the Chesapeake days, who knows what might have happened.

Our process is a lot of fun.  One of us will bring words and the basic concept of a song to the group.  Then we all start adding parts and suggesting arrangements in a collaborative effort:

Left to right - Pat, John, Abe, Scott and John's wife Lisa behind John.

John, Abe and Scott

Once we nail down the song structure and can play our individual parts together live, then it is time to start recording.

John 

Our songs are recorded one track at time, so when you think about all the creation and practice time, recording basic tracks, vocals, leads, harmonies, mixdown, etc., you can imagine how many hours it takes to produce a single tune, but it is very rewarding and time well spent.

We have tons of songs in the works, many of which are really good, and it is a shame we haven't finished more of them.  Here are the songs that have made it far enough along for a listen.

Don't Stop
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

The marathon song.  (Keep young ears away from this one)

Fear of Flyin
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

Written while the twin towers were standing.

I Only Wanna Be With You
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

A great love song and yes, John's wife Lisa really does have beautiful long blond hair!

Keep Our Love Alive
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

A shot at some country flavor.

Love Beyond a Reason
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

This one is barely out of the scratch track stage and still needs lots of backing vocals / instrumentation.

Love's My Only Game
Words and music by Pat Furness
Listen

Lucky for Pat he found basketball!

Lip Syncing
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

We all have our passions!

Look at Us Now
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

Leading by example.

Summer Breeze at Midnight
Words and music by G. Scott Davis
Listen

I've always had a thing for weather, warm fronts and fireflies.

When Things Go Wrong
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

I guess we've all had days like this?

You'll Be Fine
Words and music by John Scarborough
Listen

Mandatory listening for every teenager and anyone with a heartache, and a great tune.

Thanks for visiting our music page.  Hopefully we will have more and better songs for you in the future, so please check back soon!

Questions, comments and feedback are welcome.  You can e-mail me at snkdavis@aol.com