When I graduated from high school, my godparents, Raymond and Pauline Brisson, gave me the gift of a check to spend as I wished. I don’t remember how much the check was for, but it was enough for me to go to the Tech Hi-Fi store in Cambridge, MA, (just off Harvard Square) and buy a Kenwood stereo amplifier and a Kenwood KW-4066, 3-Head Stereo Reel-To-Reel Tape Deck.
I used that tape deck for many years, making many hours of live recordings. Sometimes, I would also tape off the radio – WBCN, 104.1, Boston – especially if the station was broadcasting a live concert or playing a rare track from a favorite artist.
Once, I was lucky enough to capture a stunning recording of an incredible song called “The Fever” by Bruce Springsteen. The track was recorded on May 16, 1973 at the Record Plant in New York City. It was an outtake from the sessions for Bruce’s second album, The Wild, The Innocent & The E-Street Shuffle.
In 1999, I was very excited to find “The Fever” on a Bruce Springsteen rarities album called 18 Tracks.
Tonight, on Bruce Springsteen’s 64th birthday, I’d like to share that recording with you.
Or, at least, life reminded me of the first verse of a song I wrote a few years ago, inspired by a day that started much like today did.
The song is called “Some Grand Design.”
The recording (that you can listen to by clicking on the blue link below) (Wait for it!) is a live recording from a concert I gave in Phillips Church, Exeter, NH, on Tuesday evening, October 11, 2011. (The concert was the fourth in a series that I have titled: Six Strings, Ten Fingers and One Voice, with Words. The series began in November, 2003.)
I woke up this morning with an idea for a blog post.
I worked on the idea off and on in my head all day as I did chores, ate lunch, drove to and from Portsmouth and then mowed the lawn.
I had my topic, a title, the music I wanted to write about and how I was going to start the post.
Finally, with dinner eaten and the dishes done, I sat down at my desk.
While waiting for my computer to start up, something told me to check my September list of music history dates that I often reference for blog post ideas. I reached into the file drawer next to my desk, pulled out the manila file containing the carefully compiled and typed lists and opened the file on my lap.
The “September” page was right on top and there, for the 15th, was written the following entry: “‘Rising Sun Blues’ recorded by Georgia Turner for Alan Lomax, Library of Congress, in Middlesboro, KY.”
The idea that woke me up this morning would have to wait.
Now, I’ve already written a substantial post on this event and I’m hoping that you’ll take a few minutes right here and now to go into the blog archives for September 2010 and read the entry titled On This Day In Music History: “Rising Sun Blues” Again.
I’ll wait.
Hmm, hm hm, hmmm.
Tweedle-dee-dee…
OK. Welcome back. I hope you enjoyed that post.
When I wrote that, I’d not yet learned how to embed YouTube videos in my posts. But now, here in the wonderland of blogging in 2013, I’m very excited to be able to present to you: Miss Georgia Turner herself as recorded by Alan Lomax in Middlesboro, Kentucky on this day, September 15, in the year 1937.
P.S.: The first time I visited the American Folklife Reading Room at the Library of Congress, curator Todd Harvey showed me an archival storage binder containing the original heavy paper sleeves that once held and protected the original discs that Lomax recorded onto during his song collecting trip through the mountains of Kentucky in 1937.
On the paper sleeves, in Alan Lomax’s own handwriting, were the names of the musicians, titles of the songs and pieces of music contained on each disc. But also, Lomax had added personal observations about an individual performer or performance here and there among the listings.
After the listing for “Married Life Blues” (the song that Georgia sang with harmonica player Ed Hunter before she sang “Rising Sun Blues”), Alan Lomax had written: “She had a bad cold.”
If I were you, I’d go back and listen to that recording again.
Ok, followers and readers of sixstr stories, it’s quiz time.
What very well known song was given its first public performance at the Eagle Ice Cream Saloon in Pittsburgh, PA on this day, September 11, in the year of 1847?
Bonus question! Who wrote this song?
What American fingerstyle acoustic guitarist was born in Athens, GA, on this day, September 11, in the year of 1945?
What song did The Beatles record at Abbey Road Studios, London, England on this day, September 11, in the year of 1962? (Hint: this song was released as the A-side of their first single.)
On this day, August 27, in 1977, Andrew David Robertson was born to David and Mary (Seely) Robertson in Princeton, New Jersey.
Here’s wishing a very, very Happy Birthday!!! to my guitar-playing, Rolling-Stones-loving, brilliant (he married my daughter, didn’t he?), awesome and best son-in-law in the whole world!
I don’t think you were born in a cross-fire hurricane, Andy, but I do hope that your big day is a gas, gas, gas.
Turn it up, grab your partner and do the it’s-my-birthday! dance around the living room. Then have another piece of cheesecake.
When my daughter Kristin was a little girl, she frequently posed the question: “Hey, Daddy, do you know what?”
Being a fan of the old musician’s joke that starts with someone asking a question like: “Do you know the way to Kittery?” and the answer is: “No, but if you hum a few bars…,” I eventually decided that it would be fun to be able to give an alternative answer to my standard reply, “No, Kris, what?”
So, I put on my songwriter’s cap and went to work.
I decided to write what I refer to as a “list song.” The challenge I gave myself was to construct the lyrics – I ended up with four verses and two bridges – so that every line was an everyday, conversational phrase that started with the word “what” or a variation such as “what’s,” “what’re” or “what’ll.”
It was fun and of course, I called the finished song “What.”
Then, I waited.
The next time Kristin asked: “Hey, Daddy, do you know what?,” I answered, “Well, yes, Kris, I wrote it,” and I sang her the song… and much laughter and eye-rolling ensued.
If you click on the blue link below (wait for it!), you can listen to the song yourself. Then, the next time you’re asked, you, too, will be able to answer the proverbial question by saying: “Well, yes, I do. I heard it on that sixstr stories’ guy’s blog.”
That recording features the fabulous playing of Andy Inzenga, bass guitar; Charlie Jennison, alto saxophone; and Bob Thibodeau, percussion. It was skillfully recorded and mixed (I was going for a Nighthawks At The Diner sound) by Jim Tierney at Fishtraks Studios in Portsmouth, NH, sometime between October 24, 1994 and January 14, 1995. “What” was released on May 3, 1995 on my album There Are (Songs To Be Sung).
In September 1980, John Lennon told David Sheff, an interviewer for Playboy magazine, that “In My Life” was “the first song that I wrote that was really, consciously about my life.”
John elaborated: “‘In My Life’ started out as a bus journey from my house on 250 Menlove Avenue to town, mentioning every place that I could remember. And it was ridiculous. It was the most boring sort of ‘What I Did on My Holidays Bus Trip’ song and it wasn’t working at all.”
“But then I laid back and these lyrics started coming to me about the places I remember.”
John concluded “It was, I think, my first real major piece of work.”
Listen.
Verse 1 of “In My Life” begins: “There are places I’ll remember…” In the sixth line of the verse, Lennon mentions the “lovers and friends I still can recall.” He finishes the first verse stating: “In my life, I’ve loved them all.”
Verse 2 narrows the subject of Lennon’s attention: “But of all these friends and lovers, there is no one compares with you.” Though he again commemorates his past: “I know I’ll never lose affection, for people and things that went before,” he ends the second verse, and ultimately the song, by proclaiming to his present tense love: “In my life, I’ll love you more.”
This is not the perfect “Thank You” song or the perfect “Happy Anniversary” song, but as I once wrote: “There are songs that are more than melody and words.” This is one of those songs.
So, I offer Verse 1 to all of my family and friends who planned, conspired and gathered to give me a surprise 60th birthday party this past Thursday that went far beyond anything I had ever dreamed of. I have been and will continue to be marveling and thinking back over that once-in-a-lifetime evening for many, many days to come.
I offer Verse 2 to my dearest Andrea as we joyfully celebrate on this sun-drenched August day the 35th anniversary of our wedding.
In my life, I love you all.
P.S.: If you’d like to hear the song that I sang to my bride on this day 35 years ago, go to the blog archives for August 2011 and scroll down to the post entitled “33 Years.” Click on the blue link for “Tell You Very Simply (Wedding Song)” and wait for it.
P.S.S.: The Beatles began work on the recording of “In My Life” on the afternoon of Monday, October 18, 1965 in Studio Two of Abbey Road Studios in London, England. The third “take” of the song was deemed the best. (They’d spent the first part of the three hour and fifteen minute session recording George Harrison’s song “If I Needed Someone.”) The famous instrumental piano break was added on Friday, October 22. It was created and played by George Martin, The Beatles’ producer.
The final mono mix of “In My Life” was made on Monday, October 25 and the stereo mix was made on Tuesday, October 26. The Beatles themselves attended very few of these mixing sessions at this time.
“In My Life” was released as the fourth track on the second side of the LP Rubber Soul on Friday, December 5, 1965.
The sources for the information and quotes used in this post were: The Playboy Interviews with John Lennon & Yoko Ono: The Final Testament…, interviews by David Sheff, edited by G. Barry Golson, Berklee Books edition, 1982 and The Beatles: Recording Sessions by Mark Lewisohn, Harmony Books, 1988.
I started going to concerts not long after I became a teenager.
The first concert I attended was in the Field House at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. The performer was Judy Collins.
I don’t remember what songs she played that night, but I can still picture her, through the crowd ahead of me, standing on the stage in a bright, white spotlight, long hair framing her face, strumming a big acoustic guitar, singing and smiling at her band playing around her.
It seems appropriate that tonight, on the evening of the last day of my fifties, I again saw Judy Collins in concert, this time in Porstmouth, NH, on the stage of the Prescott Park Arts Festival.
And tonight, her still-gorgeous voice and her big acoustic guitar filled the cool night air with this song.
Thank you, Judy Collins, thank you very, very much.
In 1979, Woody Allen directed, co-wrote and starred in the film Manhattan, a romantic comedy-drama set in New York City. In the film, Isaac Davis, the character Allen plays, is asked the question: “Why is life worth living?” In his lengthy and now-famous answer he includes four people – Groucho Marx, Willie Mays, Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra – and two pieces of music: the 2nd movement of the Jupiter Symphony (by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) and Louis Armstrong’s recording of “Potato Head Blues.”
I saw that movie and the line about Louis Armstrong stuck with me. Several years later, following my brother-in-law David’s recommendation, I purchased The Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz (Revised Edition) and was quite pleased to see “Potato Head Blues” among the eleven tracks in the collection featuring Louis Armstrong.
“Potato Head Blues” was recorded by Louis Armstrong & His Hot Seven on May 10, 1927 in Chicago, Illinois for OKeh Records.
The musicians on the recording are: Louis Armstrong, trumpet; John Thomas, trombone; Johnny Dodds, clarinet; Lil Armstrong, piano; Johnny St. Cyr, banjo; Pete Briggs, tuba and Baby Dodds, drums.
I hope you listened to that.
The Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz (Revised Edition) was released in 1987. In the book that accompanies the recordings in this outstanding boxed set, author and Jazz historian Martin Williams quotes from author Richard Hadlock’s 1965 book, Jazz Masters of the Twenties in the entry for “Potato Head Blues.”
Mr. Hadlock described the performance by Louis Armstrong & His Hot Seven as: “a triumph of subtle syncopation and rhythmic enlightenment; strong accents on weak beats and whole phrases placed against rather than on the pulse create delightful tension. This tension is then suddenly released with an incisive on-the-beat figure, which in turn leads into more tension-building devices. Thus does Armstrong build the emotional pitch of the solo over a full chorus.”
On the indispensable website, AllMusic.com, in a Song Review of “Potato Head Blues,” Thomas Ward writes: “Armstrong’s trumpet begins rather sedately, but builds and culminates in perhaps the most remarkable solo in the history of Jazz.”
Mr. Ward concludes his review by saying that “Potato Head Blues” is “One of the most astonishing accomplishments in all of twentieth century music.”
What did you think of “Potato Head Blues?”
Louis Armstrong was born on this day, August 4, in 1901, in New Orleans, Louisiana. He passed away on July 6, 1971.
Louis Armstrong once said: “All music is folk music. I ain’t never heard a horse sing a song.”
If you’d like to read another post of mine celebrating Louis Armstrong’s birthday, go to the blog archives for August 2010 and scroll down until you find the one titled: “On This Day In Music History: Louis Armstrong.”
In the evening, on this day, August 1, in 1927, Alvin Pleasant Carter, his wife Sara Dougherty Carter and Sara’s younger cousin, Maybelle Addington Carter sat around a microphone in a make-shift recording studio on the second floor of an old furniture store at 408 State Street in Bristol, Tennessee.
Earlier in the day, they had auditioned for the man who had set up the recording studio, Mr. Ralph Peer, a traveling talent scout for Victor Records up in New York City. Ralph liked what he heard and invited The Carter Family, as they were known, to “come back that evening at 6:30, after supper, and they would try some recordings.”
With Sara playing the autoharp, Maybelle playing guitar and all three of them singing, the first song they recorded was “Bury Me Under The Weeping Willow.”
Give a listen.
On this day in 1931, Elliott Charles Adnopoz was born in Brooklyn, New York.
At a young age, Elliott developed a love of cowboy songs. Around 1948 or 1949, he learned to play guitar to accompany his singing. Not long after, Elliott moved to Greenwich Village in New York City and somewhere along the way, while performing in the Village’s many coffeehouses, he became known as Ramblin’ Jack Elliott.
My favorite song by Ramblin’ Jack is “912 Greens” from his 1968 LP Young Brigham.
Give this one a listen, too. It’s a bit long, but well worth your time.
Happy Birthday, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott. I hope you’re doing well.
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