TO WHERE I AM NOW

Whenever I want to be reminded of beauty in a voice, absolute sensuous gorgeousness, warm, naturally talented, unique, breathy wonderment, then I listen to Colin Blunstone. I know Colin a bit, too, and he’s a lovely man. Today was a big session day for me so thanks to Tony, Rajan, Brian, Kevin, Joanne and Doug for listening, engaging, evolving and putting your unique skills into your own music and playing. It comes, you just have to believe it, oh yeah and do it as much as possible. I realize that I am in a privileged position being able to dedicate my life to creative pursuit, it comes with some risks, ha ha. But it’s probably worth it and with a little luck I’ve found a way. I’ve also found myself in another privileged position, that is sharing my musical experience with other people, teaching what I know and best of all doing it in my own way. When I was younger I was into languages and was really good at French at school. In the third year I won a prize in my class (do you remember that Deb, I think Julie, the shy one, won it for the girls). By the fifth year I was doing really badly at school, but the reason was at fourteen I got a guitar, everything changed. This was about the time they started asking you to think about a career. At nine years old it was zoologist, at fourteen years old it was language teacher, then that pesky music came along. My point, that teaching the language of music that I have learned to willing music lovers and having a German/Swedish wife who I often speak Swedish with makes my boyhood desires complete. All I need now is my own safari park – in France.

A long day ended today with the beginning of other things to do. I still have to listen to Tyler’s tracks for tomorrow’s sesh, Ed has sent Space Summit drum tracks to listen to and the day is not complete without listening to some albums. We sneaked in Mountain’s Nantucket Sleighride in between Kevin and Joanne. I’m loving the Felix Pappalardi songs from the album. Colin’s One Year and Ennismore are the first of the night, but I just heard that John Prine is ill with the virus and not in a good state. John is a rather special singer-songwriter, always with sensitive observation and a sense of humour, one of his songs, Illegal Smile is a case in point. Name-checked by Dylan, who called his songs Proustian Existentialism and Johnny Cash who referred to him as one of his ‘big four’. He seems to have made little impression here in England.

Today Brian asked me if I could show him how to play Say off Rhyme. It’s not as easy as you think to remember how you played songs you wrote 30 years ago. It took me a while, I was playing it all wrong, the guitar has to be tuned to E, the capo has to be on the 2nd fret and that chorus is way simpler than you think. Still some precise and consistent arpeggios are needed, a good one to learn if you are trying to improve that side of your guitar playing. Later I was thinking about this song and how I don’t really write that kind of song anymore, and should. So later, I was explaining to Doug how I learn so much from the sessioneers, just talking and answering the questions. Joanne told me there were four sizes of ukulele, who knew?

Getting into the archive tonight Olivia was looking for John Prine’s albums, not under US/UK, not under Country, but hiding in the Folky American singer-songwriter section. Some artists defy categorization or fit in more than one place, so you gotta make a choice. All these records, you have to separate them somehow otherwise the letter ‘S’ would have thousands of records under just that one letter. So, Canada is separate, Australia, New Zealand are separate, Germany and Switzerland, France and Belgium. Scandinavian countries are separated, there’s Japan, Italy, Eastern Bloc countries are together but separated into Poland, Hungary etc. Then there’s Easy Listening/Musicals, there’s a large Classical section, compilations, a thirties and a forties section, there’s Jazz, there’s Jazz Rock, ECM Jazz, there’s Blues and there’s a kind of contemporary Pop where FKA Twigs, LP, Solange, Lana del Rey and other mega R&B and Pop artists might live. There’s a Soul/Funk section, a section of eighties R&B and Pop where Madonna lives. Spanish language section, Brazilian section. What have I missed? Male and Female vocal sections, all kinds of box sets in a section and then I separate artists who I have a lot of albums by like The Beatles, The Beach Boys, CAN, Frank Zappa, Scott Walker, Elton, Moody Blues, Miles Davis, Rolling Stones, The Who. There’s Reggae, Africa, India and World Music, there’s even a small Hip Hop and Dance section. This is the vinyl. Then there’s the CDs, not so separated but more because of space, plus a CD singles section and then lurking in corners in alphabetical order there’s 7 inch singles. Behind the couch 78s. The cassettes are in storage. Plus there’s a large collection of music biographies and encyclopedias. I didn’t see the day today so I’ve told you about the archive instead and now…I’m going to go and enjoy it.

Today’s song is Say from Rhyme:

 

Say

I’m completely
Mesmerized
Fascinated
So sublime

I’m forgetting
I’m denied
Undernourished
Have to cry

Say hello, say goodbye
Say good morning, say goodnight
Say I love you, say you might

With my leaving
My supply
Is diminished
Undignified

Lonely, lonely
Satisfy
Disappearing
In the light

Say hello, say goodbye
Say good morning, say goodnight
Say I love you, say you might

To be certain
To be true
I insist I
Am with you

Words are flying
Through the sky
Catch them for me
With your eyes

Say hello, say goodbye
Say good morning, say goodnight
Say I love you, say you might

I’m completely
Mesmerized
Fascinated
So sublime

Hear the cello
Violin
I am dying
To begin

Say hello, say goodbye
Say good morning, say goodnight
Say I love you, say you might

(Willson-Piper)
Rhyme (1989)