thisrightbrain

Half a lifetime later one wonders. What is it that incites you to do a jig on the Acropolis by the light of the Athenian moon; or the Bailarico down an Istanbul street with a girl named Maria, while trying to beat the curfew in the middle of a military coup?

What excites conduct that runs from unconventional – passing round a bottle of single malt on the southbound Night Rider after a fortnight on the North Sea rigs; or cueing up a tape cassette to play The Weight while pulling into Nazareth, Israel; or arriving in England on a dark and cheerless night as a bona fide tax exile – to perilous – sweating over another gun at your throat, this time up by the Burmese border; or chasing a thief down an alleyway in Rio de Janeiro; or witnessing your own personal good cop/bad cop routine as a murder suspect in Scotland?

Perhaps it’s a  latter day response to the hushed story of your mother’s passing, or to a youth spent wheeling along like the cogs of your father’s career with your siblings and new stepmom, from Ashland, Mass. in ’61 – to Concord, NH in ’62 – to New Bedford, Mass. in ’63 – to Evansville, Indiana in 1965. That might put ants in your pants.

But suppose you unearthed some old report cards and suddenly realized the “ants” were there all along? What revelation a modern lens can bring:  Winslow’s work is very erratic. He becomes easily distracted and loses interest when being helped. He is noisy getting in and out of the room (hall, toilet, etc.) … needs to hear and obey the bell … needs improvement with neatness … puts off doing his seatwork and doesn’t complete it on time … has a “don’t care” attitude…

For the record I did care, truly I did, and for the most part I enjoyed school, especially when getting a laugh from my classmates by making up alternative lyrics to the songs we sang in music class, or by doing something offbeat like showing up with one brown shoe and one black shoe. Some will understand.

My teachers appreciated none of this of course, and though I maintained a positive outlook, the ride grew bumpier by the year. By the dawning of the ‘70s we were in upstate New York and I’d become so well acquainted with failure that I barely made it through the eighth grade. But then from out of the bubbling hormonal chowder of adolescence something WILD occurred when I entered high school back in Massachusetts.

The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to  be  saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue center light pop and everybody goes “Awww!”   ~ Jack Kerouac, On the Road

While much of who we are is formed at the crossroads of environment and upbringing, it’s our DNA – like a ladder twisting through the mists of time – that is bred into our very bones. And if you too are inclined to “burn like a fabulous yellow roman candle” chances are it was an anomaly to the dopamine receptor gene, DRD4 that ignited the spark.

Dopamine is responsible for sensory stimulation and most people receive a “normal dosage” throughout their daily lives. But about 20 percent of us have the DRD4-7R allele (or variation), which provides a lower, less-gratifying amount of dopamine and, with our tanks running near empty we’re genetically inclined to seek-out stimulation from the world around us.

Popularly referred to as the “explorer” or “restless” gene, various studies have linked the allele to an overabundance of physical and mental energy (i.e. hyperactivity), a willingness to take risks, and an urgent desire to explore new places, foods, libations, relationships, ideas, opportunities, you name it.

Although not everyone who carries it has ADHD – genes have a way of turning on and off, and not all attention deficit disorder is inherited – geneticists really only began to study DRD4-7R because half of those diagnosed with ADHD have the allele as well.

To a Dharma Bum like Kerouac being mad-to-live-mad-to-talk-and-desirous-of-everything-at-the-same-time was (in beatnik-speak) like “everything plus” but what do geneticists themselves think?

Well, a biological trait survives the natural selection process because it offers some sort of adaptive strength and when DRD4-7R first emerged about 40,000 years ago, humanity was in a state of flux.

While a noxious plague or rapid change in climate might wipe out those inclined to hunker down in one place, those with the explorer gene were ever-vigilant, ready to roll, ultra resilient, and willing to adapt come what may. By leading the way, sometimes to other continents, they and their tribe survived.

Thousands of generations later, I find a lineage of restless souls in at least one branch of the family tree. There was my dad, who traveled the globe and moved his family 15 times in a 44-year construction career; and an ancestor who ventured to California on the heels of the gold rush before joining the Kansas Militia and later serving as a ship’s engineer during the New Orleans Campaign of 1862 and … well, he led an interesting life.

So did another ancestor who, with her five children, found safety only after making her way over 200 miles on foot through the northern wilderness in the winter of 1777 after her husband’s brutal murder. Then there were those who spent years before the mast, and those who were first to join whenever there was a war. It was bred in the bone.

Not that the qualities found in so successful an adaptation are advantageous all the time. In the confines of a modern classroom or office cubicle they’re “symptomatic of a clinical disorder,” where an abundance of energy is viewed as an inability to sit still, while a facility for noticing everything is called distractibility, and an aptitude for multitasking and continual deliberation is regarded as lack of focus, and the propensity to act quickly is called impulsiveness. In a topsy-turvy, one-size-fits-all world, the hard-wired predelection for hitting the road makes more sense than ever.

Although neither term existed when I was 17, the DRD4-7R/ADHD tag team had me firmly in its grips. As the very image of restlessness (and a blurry one at that) I chafed against the ordinary and delighted in the rush that resulted from throwing caution to the wind and acting on a flash of insight. But I could also see the big picture (another one of those “tag team” traits) and eventually even managed to earn an advanced degree.

By then I was in the thick of my dustbowl jet setting years, yielding at times to my inner Meatloaf (“all revved up with no place to go”) by taking on low level jobs in hardship posts to allow for the other side of the coin, the Robert Service/Men That Don’t Fit In side, in which you break the hearts of kith and kin (or so I liked to believe) and roam the world at will. And roam I did, leaving a wake of madcap encounters in curious places:

A vodka den in Leningrad; an overnight Baltic ferry; a Belfast pub; a hidden Red Sea inlet; a Barcelona party; a Singapore backstreet; a Ukrainian taxicab; a Tel Aviv beach; a Nogales taco stand; a Shropshire shooting party; the moonless Mojave Desert; a Norwegian diving vessel; a Tangier nightclub; a Pentagon squash court; a corner of the Kremlin; an Amsterdam broom closet; a gasthaus near the Berlin wall; a Bangkok barbershop; a desk in the British Library; a Toronto boardroom; a Venetian café; a South London shed …

It’s a list that goes on and on. If I’d had a theme song (and you who remember can sing along) it would surely be this 1977 release by Jackson Browne:

Running on Empty

Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels

Looking back at the years gone by like so many summer fields

In ‘65 I was seventeen and running up 101

I don’t know where I’m running now; I’m just running on

Running on, running on empty

Running on, running blind

Running on, running into the sun

But I’m running behind

Gotta’ do what you can just to keep your love alive

Trying not to confuse it with what you do to survive

In ‘69 I was twenty-one and I called the road my own

I don’t know when that road turned into the road I’m on

Running on, running on empty

Running on, running blind

Running on, running into the sun

But I’m running behind

Everyone I know, everywhere I go

People need some reason to believe

I don’t know about anyone but me

If it takes all night, that’ll be all right

If I can get you to smile before I leave

Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels

I don’t know how to tell you all just how crazy this life feels

Look around for the friends that I used to turn to, to pull me through

Looking into their eyes I see them running too

Running on, running on empty

Running on, running blind

Running on, running into the sun

But I’m running behind

Honey you really tempt me

You know the way you look so kind

I’d love to stick around but I’m running behind

You know I don’t even know what I’m hoping to find

Running into the sun but I’m running behind

And so I roamed (sometimes on my own, sometimes with another) right into middle age. Now, still chafing against the ordinary, still in love with adventure – with heaven sent resilience to see me through – the restlessness has been quelled somewhat. But the DRD4-7R/ADHD tag team rages on.

With their energy and charisma; their warmth and infectious humor; and especially their passion for movement and adventure I see it in my kids. No apologies. The world may never quite be compatible but I know they’ll make it fit.

Now that I’ve figured it all out, I guess it’s time to write that book.

Entering through the tall, leather-clad doors you were instantly humbled. This was a sacred place, a citadel of world literature, a bulwark of British history constructed in an era when studious inquiry was less diverse and a Kingdom’s National Museum and Library were sensibly cloistered together … unlike the knowable world of today, which branches into uncountable disciplines. There will never be another place like it.

Pictured is my second Reader’s Ticket for the British Museum Reading Room, duly granted by the Principal Librarian in January of 1985. It is purposely non-descript, I suppose, because access was restricted only to registered researchers who’d received their credential through written request. In truth my serious research days were over, unlike a few years earlier when I was a proper habitué working on a dissertation.  By the time it expired I was living another life on another continent.

Still, it transports me back to the smell of ancient books and old leather; and the spectral drifting of aging academics entranced by the esoterica of their subject matter; and to shafts of daylight filtering down from the great windows encircling the room’s magnificent dome. And to the hushed murmur of the catalogers at the Centre Desk, where the occasional clap of a closing book softly echoed through the vast expanse above our heads. It especially takes me back to a bygone time of Victorian grace.

”It seems to me one cannot sit down in that place without a heart full of grateful reverence,” wrote William Thackeray. ”I own to have said my grace at the table, and to have thanked Heaven for this my English birthright.”

Inspired by the domed Pantheon in Rome, the circular Reading Room was a triumph of mid-19^th century technology with the latest in heating and ventilation systems, a gorgeous papier-mâché suspended ceiling, and nearly 25 miles of shelving for its cast iron stacks.

Those leather-clad doors were first opened in 1857 to all who could present a Reader’s Ticket, and for the next 140 years it served as workplace and refuge for an astonishing array of scholars, researchers, and such writers as: Kipling, Carlyle, Browning, Darwin, Dickens, Yeats, Shaw, and Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker, George Eliot, Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain, H. G. Wells, T.S. Elliot, George Orwell, Sylvia Plath, and Mohandas Gandhi.

Oh, and Virginia Woolf, whose A Room of One’s Own proclaimed, ”If truth is not to be found on the shelves of the British Museum, where I asked myself … is truth?”

There were also those bent on a specific kind of truth. ‘‘The fact of a man’s being a political exile does not exclude him from the Reading Room,” stated the Library’s 1866 Handbook for Readers … and the exiles appeared.

For 30 years Karl Marx toiled away at Das Kapital at Desk O7, which Sun Yat-sen would later read in the very same room, as would Vladimir Lenin at Desk J8, who obtained his ticket (with a reference from the General Secretary of the General Federation of Trade Unions) under the pseudonym, Jacob Richter. “It is a remarkable institution, especially that exceptional reference section,” he wrote, “Let me tell you, there is no better library than the British Museum.”

While desks could not be reserved, determined regulars, some of whom would be pacing in front of the Museum’s columned entrance, could gain admission with the flash of their ticket before the Museum’s official opening at 9:30 and claim their cherished spot.  Mine was G3.

Whereas most had a specific agenda, not everyone was able to retain focus – to put it charitably – and the Reading Room had its share of credentialed eccentrics. Stories abound of the middle aged Reader who’d submitted the same Master’s thesis for over a decade, merely rearranging the paragraphs with each submission; and of the Reader who’d use a rope to lower an anchor to the floor before beginning; and of the prominent occultist who claimed that while her astral body was in the Reading Room her material self was off lecturing in America.

Then there was the celebrated “Miss McDonald” who, for 50 years, bicycled in from Highgate wearing white Bermuda shorts and plimsolls (sneakers) before settling in at Lenin’s favored desk, where she’d hang some twine between the reading lamps from which she’d dangle anti-Papist tracts. While her work entailed translating Virgil into French no one actually knew what she was working on, nor did they really care.

In truth the place itself was rather eccentric. Rest assured that a book of regulations accompanied that Reader’s Ticket, with highly specific MUSTs – e.g. Readers MUST conduct themselves in an orderly manner at all times while on the library premises; and remain silent while at desks; and return all issued books to an assistant at the Centre Desk, where they must reclaim the application slips by which they obtained them before leaving the room.

And even more specific MUST NOTs – Readers MUST NOT eat sweets or any other kind of food, or drink anything, or chew gum; or remove any book or other property of the British Library from the room in which it was used; or allow any book to come into contact with writing materials, rubber bands, paper clips or pins; or bring in any materials or objects which could damage a book, including food, paste and glue, ink in bottles, adhesive tapes, scissors, and knives; or use cameras or electrostatic copying machines; or behave in any way likely to disturb other readers….

To request a book you’d consult the printed catalogue and fill out a form on carbon-triplicate paper. Next you’d “post” the form through a little wooden window at the Centre Desk and watch while it was placed in a small cylindrical capsule, which was whisked away (with a ghostly whoooooshhhh) through a pneumatic tube. In time your books were delivered to your numbered desk on an antique trolley, with a carbon tucked between the pages.

This was always an intoxicating moment. Although I didn’t need to, in addition to a latter-day edition with its useful foreword and essential footnotes, I’d always order up a first edition of whatever volume I was referencing, As a result I could sit at my prodigious desk with its padded blue leather and matching shelf (designed to fold-out and cradle a book while the reader took notes) and hold in my hands the first editions of Wordsworth’s Prelude, and Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, and Emerson’s Nature … and Thoreau’s Walden.

As with Miss McDonald, nobody knew or cared what I was doing, but beyond the random flight of fancy (at one point I was actually set on learning ancient Greek) I managed to avoid her fate, with a comfortable routine of working ’til noon, then breaking for tea and a sandwich, followed by a quick visit to the Rosetta Stone, or the Elgin Marbles, or (especially) the grand Clock Room, before returning to my desk until closing. Time flew in those days, just as it does now.

The British Museum Reading Room closed in 1997 when most of its resources were moved to the (now separate) British Library’s state-of-the-art repository near St. Pancras Station. It reopened to ALL visitors in 2000 and housed a modern information center reading material that focused on world cultures represented in the Museum.

Closing again in 2007,  this time the old desks were boarded over and the space used for temporary exhibitions. When the British Museum opened its World Conservation and Exhibitions Centre in 2014, the Reading Room lost even its temporary function and its future now remains undecided.

I brought my son for a visit in the summer of 2006, prior to that final closing, and was thoroughly amazed at the wondrous transformation. When it was built, the Reading Room (designed by Sydney Smirke) had displaced the British Museum’s original Great Court (designed by Sydney’s older brother, Robert).  But with the late 1990s renovation the Great Court was at last revived, and the Reading Room intriguingly encapsulated in its center.  At over two acres, it is now the largest covered public square in Europe and truly an architectural triumph.

And yet my sense of wonder was tinged with wistfulness. Here was still another piece of the past, my past, that was no longer there to be shown to my kids. At least I could still stand at that familiar columned entrance and relive this memory:

Upon stepping off the Northern Line and rising up into the hurly-burly of Tottenham Court Road, it was a 4-minute walk from Goodge Street Station – once a deep-level Word War II air raid shelter from which some would indeed come “smashing into neon streets in their stonedness,” – to this very spot in the heart of leafy Bloomsbury. And I never once failed to conjure up this song, albeit Judy Collin’s version.

Looking back I think Donovan Philips Leitch got a bum rap. Widely referred to as the “Poor Man’s Dylan,” partly because the two were influenced by many of the same folk sources but mostly as a result of their 1964 Dylan-centric meeting as seen in Don’t Look Back, Donovan’s distinctive style was actually far more eclectic, blending folk, jazz, psychedelia, pop, calypso, and world music. Released on his second album, Fairyland in 1965, Dylan never sounded like this.

Sunny Goodge Street

On the firefly platform on sunny Goodge Street

Violent hash-smoker shook a chocolate machine

Involved in an eating scene

Smashing into neon streets in their stonedness

Smearing their eyes on the crazy cult goddess

Listenin’ to sounds of Mingus mellow fantastic

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” they sigh

In doll house rooms with colored lights swingin’

Strange music boxes sadly tinklin’

Drinkin’ the sun shining all around you

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” they sigh

The magician, he sparkles in satin and velvet

You gaze at his splendor with eyes you’ve not used yet

I tell you, his name is Love, Love, Love

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” they sigh

“My, my,” sigh

As anyone who has ventured near a dance floor knows, the right kind of music makes for an emotionally charged social experience. Those who have watched a few Super Bowl commercials can well attest that big money advertisers have figured this out.

No surprise, then, that Madison Avenue has also come to understand the concept of “reminiscence bumps,” which (as studies have shown) are specific memories that remain vivid as we get older. Enduring throughout our lives, these autobiographical “spots of time” are forged during the raging hormonal soup of adolescence and slightly beyond, and are  generally based on the profound connection between our youthful quest for identity and aesthetic, and the music we listen to at the time.

After reading about this concept I thought I’d put it to the test with a song that harkens back to my own adolescence … and truly the reminiscence bumps abound. Perhaps the same holds true for you.

It was 1970, a year when Kent State, My Lai, and Apollo 13 made headline news, Solzhenitsyn won his Nobel Prize, Toffler published Future Shock, and Doonesbury made its first appearance. In New York the North Tower of the World Trade Center became the tallest building in the world (the South Tower would join it the following year) and Pan Am began the first commercial 747 service, between JFK and London Heathrow.

On the Isle of Wight 600,000+ people attended the largest rock festival of all time. Having played one of their finest performances there, The Who went on to become the first rock act to perform at the Metropolitan Opera House (Tommy yes we heard you). And while Jimi (in London) and Janis (in LA) OD’d in a purple haze that year, and the Beatles called it quits, the eponymous Elton John featured the rising star’s first top ten hit, Your Song.

Back in New York Monday Night Football debuted with Keith Jackson and Howard Cosell and in Boston the Big Bad Bruins won their first Stanley Cup since 1941, with Bobby Orr scoring a goal for the ages, 40 seconds into overtime. Are we there yet?

Recorded by Tampa-based Blues Image and featured on its 1970 album, Open, this song reached Number 4 on the Billboard Singles chart. Co-written by keyboardist Skip Konte and singer-guitarist Mike Pinera on his Rhodes electric piano, Pinera was looking for a way to start when it occurred to him that his piano had 73 keys. “I went, ’73 men sailed up, from the San Francisco Bay,’” he later said, “The song sort of just wrote itself from there.”  Let the bumps begin.

Ride Captain Ride

Seventy-three men sailed up

From the San Francisco Bay,

Rolled off of their ship

And here’s what they had to say.

“We’re callin’ everyone to ride along

To another shore,

We can laugh our lives away

and be free once more.”

But no one heard them callin’,

No one came at all,

‘Cause they were too busy watchin’

Those old raindrops fall.

As a storm was blowin’

Out on the peaceful sea,

Seventy-three men sailed off

To history.

Ride, captain ride

Upon your mystery ship,

Be amazed at the friends

You have here on your trip.

Ride captain ride

Upon your mystery ship,

On your way to a world

That others might have missed.

Seventy-three men sailed up

From the San Francisco Bay,

Got off their ship

And here’s what they had to say.

“We’re callin’ everyone to ride along

To another shore,

We can laugh our lives away

And be free once more.”

Ride, captain ride

Upon your mystery ship,

Be amazed at the friends

You have here on your trip.

Ride, captain ride

Upon your mystery ship,

On your way to a world

That others might have missed.

Ride, captain ride

Upon your mystery ship,

Be amazed at the friends

You have here on your trip.

Taken by a Globe photographer in the mid-70s, this is a picture of Boston’s annual Christmas tree lighting. Then held at the Prudential Center, the big draw was the presence of Arthur Fiedler who, with the help of a local chorus, was there to lead everyone in singing carols.  In 1976, having convinced my college buddy, Perry to join me, I was there too.

In the days of Hi Fi consoles, the Boston Pops were like musical guests in our house and when the Evening at Pops series began on PBS, they were like televised musical guests.  In fact, going to Symphony Hall to see Arthur Fiedler and the Pops was every bit as exciting as going to the Boston Garden to see Bobby Orr and the Bruins. A thrill indeed.

On this particular evening the plan was to see the Maestro up close and personal. Unfortunately it hadn’t occurred to us that half of Boston might have the same idea. Nor were we prepared for the cold, and while the final carol was being sung we inched our way into the Pru to find some warmth.

Huddled near a bank of elevators we were considering where to go next when in tramped the entire chorus, on their way – as we quickly learned – to an after-event for some cookies and hot chocolate. Well “Ho, Ho, Ho, Who Wouldn’t Go?” 

With just enough room on one of the elevators, Perry and I soon found ourselves in a partially crowded room filled with tables. On one end there was a stage, on the other was a welcoming spread of cocoa and cookies. Nobody seemed to mind so we helped ourselves and, finding it empty, sat at a table that abutted the stage.

We were feeling very pleased with ourselves until a man in a red, white and blue lumberman’s jacket brushed past and clambered onto the stage. It was Arthur Fiedler and he wanted everyone to get up and sing a few more carols!

And there we were, with everyone looking our way (so that’s why the table was empty) including the great man himself.  Down went the cookies and up we rose, while not five feet away Arthur Fiedler began to lead the room in a rousing rendition of Jingle Bells, followed by this song.

Conceived during a heat wave in July, Sleigh Ride was written by Fiedler’s good friend Leroy Anderson in the late 1940s. Anderson, as any Evening at Pops fan may recall,  occasionally appeared as a musical guest to conduct some of his own works, such as The Syncopated Clock, Bugler’s Holiday, and (my favorite) The Typewriter, in which Fiedler would roll up his sleeves and dawn a green eyeshade to “play” an old typewriter while the orchestra played behind him.

But it’s Sleigh Ride that has served as the Pops seasonal signature tune since its initial release (on red vinyl no less) as a single in 1949. With Fiedler conducting, it was the first orchestral piece ever to reach No. 1 on the Billboard Pop Music chart. Written by Mitchell Parish, the lyrics were published the following year.

Despite an “unusually modulated middle section” that’s difficult to sing (the section is omitted in many recordings, such as the Ronnettes’ version produced by Phil Spector), Sleigh Ride has been performed and recorded by a wider array of musical artists than any other piece in the history of Western music.

While Johnny Mathis’ version is the most popular, this track from (1961’s) Holiday Sing Along With Mitch was the version heard (and sung) in our house. In fact, after the Boston Pops, Mitch Miller (who occasionally conducted the Pops in Fiedler’s absence) and the Gang were easily the most prominently featured artists in the console.

Perhaps you remember Sing Along With Mitch, the television show which (“Please, don’t just sit there, come on and sing”), featured lyrics at the bottom of the screen. If so, you might be surprised to learn that contrary to popular memory, the show did NOT have a bouncing ball to keep time.

Only featured in movie theatre sing-alongs (and the occasional cartoon), Perry and I certainly could have used one of those. Instead we lip-sang with all the gusto we could muster and, with cookies in our pockets and nerves a-jingling more than any sleigh bell, made a beeline for the door as soon as Arthur Fiedler had left the stage.

Sleigh Ride

Just hear those sleigh bells jingling,

Ring-ting-tingling too,

Come on, it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you,

Outside the snow is falling

And friends are calling, “Yoo hoo”,

Come on, it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you.

Giddy up, giddy up, giddy up,

Let’s go…let’s look at the show,

We’re riding in a wonderland of snow.

Giddy up, giddy up, giddy up,

It’s grand… just holding your hand,

We’re riding along with a song

Of a wintry fairy land.

Our cheeks are nice and rosy,

And comfy cozy are we,

We’re snuggled up together

Like two birds of a feather would be,

Let’s take that road before us,

And sing a chorus or two,

Come on, it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you.

There’s a birthday party

At the home of Farmer Gray,

It’ll be the perfect ending of a perfect day,

We’ll be singing the songs

We love to sing without a single stop,

At the fireplace while we watch

The chestnuts pop; Pop! Pop! Pop!

There’s a happy feeling

Nothing in this world can buy,

When they pass around the coffee

And the pumpkin pie,

It’ll nearly be like a picture print

By Currier and Ives,

These wonderful things are the things

We remember all through our lives!

Just hear those sleigh bells jingling,

Ring-ting-tingling too,

Come on, it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you,

Outside the snow is falling

And friends are calling, “Yoo hoo”,

Come on, it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you.

Giddy up, giddy up, giddy up,

Let’s go…let’s look at the show,

We’re riding in a wonderland of snow.

Giddy up, giddy up, giddy up,

It’s grand…just holding your hand,

We’re riding along with a song

Of a wintry fairy land.

Our cheeks are nice and rosy,

And comfy cozy are we,

We’re snuggled up together

Like two birds of a feather would be,

Let’s take that road before us

And sing a chorus or two,

Come on it’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you.

It’s lovely weather

For a sleigh ride together with you.

As a festive occasion, the fourth Thursday of November remains a favorite holiday. We each have our special Thanksgiving memories and mine flow in abundance, but the most gleeful of these reach back to England in the early 1980s. No one observes tradition as intensely as an expatriate and I held a Thanksgiving gathering on the fourth Friday of November (to accommodate those unaccustomed to having the day off) for the six years I lived in London.

Using New England recipes from an old church cookbook for the puddings and pies (except that brandy was added to everything) preparation began on Wednesday. When key ingredients were unobtainable a worthy substitution would be found. For instance, West Indian pumpkin was used for the pie.  Or I’d start from scratch, grinding my own “maize” into meal, using a coffee grinder, for the Indian Pudding and corn bread.  Or I’d concoct something new, as with my “signature” oyster/chestnut/pita stuffing.

Then I’d look to Harrods’ great Food Hall for the finest turkey that would fit the dimensions of my meager oven, and even more meager budget … and set to work.

The other essential ingredient was wine of course and my guests would bring “buckets” of it, invariably of dubious vintage (as if it mattered). Carving commenced promptly at 19:00 and after dessert we’d crank the stereo and slowly get up to dance.

The gathering grew more popular with every year and by the sixth go-round, with attendance approaching that of a wedding reception, I was no longer able to manage all my own cooking and some of the charm, alas, was lost. The “middle years” had the best celebrations with guests in the mere dozens and my culinary skills at their humble peak.

Some who read this may especially recall a particular soiree at my girlfriend’s large Battersea flat. The autumn moon was nearly full, and we ate – and we drank – and we danced – and we drank – and we laughed … a lot, late, late into that clear Albion night. As some of us were going through an early jazz phase that’s what dominated the play list, including this lively number. I give thanks for the recollection.

Born in New Orleans in 1885, Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe, aka Jelly Roll Morton, was a pivotal pianist, bandleader, composer and arranger. His “Jelly Roll Blues” was the first jazz composition to be published, in 1915, proving that a genre rooted in improvisation could retain its essential spirit, even when notated.

With laughter provided by comedian “Laughing” Lew Lamar, who specialized in animal noises and provided the goat sound for Jelly’s “Billy Goat Stomp” in the same session, “The Hyena Stomp” was recorded with the Red Hot Peppers on the 4th of July 1927. What better way to wish you and yours a most JOVIAL Thanksgiving?

Rest assured, I waited until both my kids were 21 before candidly responding to their questions about this topic. In looking back I’m neither proud nor ashamed. I’m in no position to moralize, except to say that it made me a scofflaw (imagine the sniggers that have accompanied that statement) and I do my best not to rationalize, except to say that it was a different era.

And so I dabbled recreationally with: Phenylalanine, Benzoylmethylecgonine, Lysergic Acid Diethylamide, Tetrahydrocannabinol and other stimulants, which long before leaving college I also left behind, because they made me too self-conscious, or diminished my sense of control, or because the euphoric effect never outweighed the after effect, or – especially – because they didn’t help my grade point average.

Occasionally certain songs will bring me back to those callow, capricious days, such as this track from The Moody Blues’ first concept album, Days of Future Past, released in 1967. Written by Justin Hayward at a time when he was experimenting with LSD, it strikes me as an accurate depiction of what it was like. More baroque than cosmic in nature (at least for me), you find yourself being pulled along, while looking for an answer to some imponderable question or riddle. I even wrote about it once *as excerpted from an old copy of The Daily Free Press below.

Although I never experienced a “bad trip,” I did pay in other ways. It invariably took a couple of days to recover and more than once I ran into somebody I knew while in an embarrassingly inexplicable state. Then, some years later, there was the lost job opportunity with a certain government agency. The interview proceeded swimmingly until, with a polygraph in the offing, I answered truthfully when asked if I’d ever taken hallucinogens (they were very specific). Although it ended politely, the interview was over as quickly as you can say flashback.

Still flashback free, I’m now exceedingly grateful for the way things have gone. And I certainly don’t believe that I’d be a better man had I not (to steal a Nilsson line) “done what I did when I was a kid” … a brighter man perhaps, but not a better one.

 Forever Afternoon (Tuesday?)

 Tuesday, afternoon,

I’m just beginning to see,

Now I’m on my way,

It doesn’t matter to me,

Chasing the clouds away.

Something, calls to me,

The trees are drawing me near,

I’ve got to find out why

Those gentle voices I hear

Explain it all with a sigh.

I’m looking at myself, reflections of my mind,

It’s just the kind of day to leave myself behind,

So gently swaying thru the fairy-land of love,

If you’ll just come with me and see the beauty of

Tuesday afternoon.

Tuesday afternoon.

 Tuesday, afternoon,

I’m just beginning to see,

Now I’m on my way,

It doesn’t matter to me,

Chasing the clouds away.

Something, calls to me,

The trees are drawing me near,

I’ve got to find out why

Those gentle voices I hear

Explain it all with a sigh.

*January 1978 – The initial reaction comes about an hour after ingestion, when a squirrel on a tree starts to spin like a clock before scurrying on its way. It’s winter in Boston, and the Lysergic Acid Diethylamide that came across the river from MIT is said to be the best in the east. Meandering down Commonwealth Avenue the Prudential Building illuminates the gray sky at dusk. Like the Emerald City, it attracts.

And lo, an enormous green scuttle-bug with a big ‘T’ rumbles up. Perhaps the driver has pulled the reigns too tight because the great creature squeals as it slides to a stop. Then, much like Jonah and the Whale, one stumbles inside. Again the pained beast squeals and bucks with a vengeance, while those not seated tumble deeper into its bowels as it rumbles down the avenue. It’s actually kind of hilarious, but no one else laughs.

Eventually it descends into a murky catacomb and proceeds underground, stopping at well-lit caverns along the way with the words KENMORE then AUDITORIUM painted on their walls. By now a warm glow emanates from inside the skull and the metal handrail feels like running water ‘neath clutching fingers. Surrounded by voices that seem to be spoken through old-time megaphones, one wonders if this is all a movie.

The subterranean zoon rumbles through the darkness, stopping next at COPLEY, where spacemen bundled in survival jackets shuffle off and, amidst their verbal echoes, others shuffle on. It’s cramped and stuffy by the time ARLINGTON comes into view, and it’s now apparent that the stop for OZ must be on another line. Suddenly there’s an urge to walk … no … march … through the crowd, down the platform, up the stairs and out into the frigid night air.

Here looms the Public Gardens, where George Washington sits atop a sculpted horse. The horse wants a sugar cube but a snowball thrown into its open mouth is the best one can do before marching on to Beacon Hill. When the sidewalk begins to ripple there’s cause for alarm and people begin to stare. But there’s money for a cab … except that what appears to be a taxi is actually a police car, which thankfully doesn’t stop as the hand that hails is quickly shoved into a pocket.

Then visual forms become a blur, city sounds a whir, and passing cars become streaks that go whoosh. Green streaks, blue streaks, yellow streaks trail by, while leafless tree branches become oscillating genie fingers and sights, sounds, smells and sensations blend together. Total disorientation leads to aimless ambulation … until some time later when some semblance of familiarity arises on the Esplanade by river. In the distance the Citgo sign flashes over Kenmore Square. Beyond is the warmth and comfort of home. Drifting along, memories and plans sporadically throb through the mind, and problems work themselves out.

A rest at the BU boat dock offers an opportunity to look back at the “Hub of the Universe” brilliantly lit like a birthday cake. Tears well up with the notion that thousands are living their lives unaware that someone out here is watching.

Home at last. Greeted by friends. The rest of the night is spent listening for new symbolism in old rock songs on the turntable. Sleep comes at dawn.

New love will get you there. Then there are those phases in life when, living from moment to whimsical moment, you’re especially open to its embrace. Euphoria, without it the sporting life would hold meager reward. Without it there would be no vice.

But intense and transcendent joy can come to us in many ways, and for those in touch with their innermost selves it can come coupled with tremendous contentment. Many faiths are dedicated to such pursuit, some through prayer or meditation … some through spinning, as practiced by those Sufi mystics known as Dervishes.

When a Dervish is in a traditional whirl it’s to search for the source of all perfection, by symbolically imitating the planets orbiting the sun. With the left foot planted firmly on the ground and the right foot providing the momentum the “whirling Dervish” revolves round the heart, from right to left, his eyes affixed on his left hand, which is turned toward the earth, his right hand open to the sky. All the while his arms remain fully stretched and ready to embrace all of humanity with love.

Born in Pittsburgh in 1946, Syreeta Wright seems to have taken to the marvels of spinning naturally, with dreams of becoming a ballerina. After her father’s death in the Korean War, she and her sisters moved with their mother to Detroit where, as a talented dancer with no money for formal training, she chose to sing and, much as singer Martha Reeves had done, landed a secretarial position at Motown Records.

Soon she was stepping in as a background vocalist for Martha and the Vandellas, and for the Supremes, for whom she became a “demo” singer, recording potential Supremes songs on behalf of the label. By the time Berry Gordy had signed her as an artist in her own right, she had begun to date label mate, Stevie Wonder, who sought her collaboration as a songwriter. Reaching Number 14 on the Billboard charts, their first effort “It’s a Shame” was performed by … The Spinners.

Also co-writing and singing background on such hits as she “Signed Sealed, Delivered” and “If You Really Love Me,” she married Wonder in 1969. Divorced a few years later (Wonder’s album “Talking Book” largely features autobiographical detail about the rise and fall of their marriage), the two remained friends and would continue to collaborate for decades.

In addition to releasing a number of studio albums, Syreeta went on to work with Billy Preston and Smokey Robinson, and would eventually join the national touring cast of “Jesus Christ Superstar” in the role of Mary Magdalene, before succumbing to breast cancer in 2004.

Written by a woman who clearly knew how to spin, this is the second track from the 1974 album, “Stevie Wonder Presents: Syreeta”

Spinnin’ and Spinnin’

Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Painting the town, I’m never coming down

Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

I’m out on the town, I’m never coming down

God Almighty I wanna’ live

A man will shower me with expensive gifts

And of course there’s his love

I don’t want to be, I don’t want to be

Just another feather in a cap you see

So if you offer me, know that I want to be

Just Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Painting the town, I’m never coming down

Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Out on the town, I’m never coming down

 Not that I want everything

Just a few of those little precious things

That there’re smiles in my eyes

I don’t want to be, I don’t want to be

Just another toy that is put away

So I’m glad I am free, know that I’m on the wild

And I’ll be Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Give me one or two compliments

Tell me that my love is heaven sent

And that living is free

Free enough to go everywhere

Just to drop a dime and we’re in the air

Yes of course there is love

Wonder how much I’ll see…

And I’ll go Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Painting the town, I’m never coming down

Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ and Spinnin’ around

Out on the town, I’m never coming down….

Having secured a cheap room (thumbs up for Hollywood’s La Brea Motel) I had the opportunity to stroll down Hollywood Boulevard a while back.  A life-long ambition, there were no illusions that this was “Hollywood,” the metonym for the celluloid dream factory. I treated the adventure much as one would a visit to the battlefield at Gettysburg (thumbs up for Gettysburg’s Hickory Branch Guesthouse) and was in search of more tangible apparitions, such as an actual chariot wheel from DeMille’s The Ten Commandments at the Hollywood Heritage Museum.

I was also there to eat and drink, of course, and although the Brown Derby, Schwab’s Pharmacy and Sardi’s are long gone, I did have a nice meal (but lousy martini) at Musso and Frank Grill, a one-time haunt for the likes of William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Orson Welles. I also managed a few beers at the Pig ‘N Whistle (inspecting each and every star on the Walk of Fame can be thirsty work), favored by Shirley Temple, Clark Gable, Carry Grant, etc, which abuts the Egyptian Theatre, current home to the American Cinematheque and where the first-ever Hollywood premiere (for Robin Hood with Douglas Fairbanks) was held.

Yes, and I also enjoyed a quirky breakfast at the unkempt and wonderful Snow White Café, which first opened when Walt Disney was looking for a place to hold the after-party for the premiere of Snow White & The Seven Dwarves. Disney is said to have sent his animators over to paint murals of the film’s characters on its walls and ceilings. Hiding in plain sight on the boulevard, it has long since become an insider’s dive-bar (ignored by tourists) with a happy hour that runs from 1 to 7 p.m!

But there remained much else to gawk at, including the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, where the first – and shortest – Academy Award ceremony was held, and where Marilyn Monroe began her modeling career, posing by the pool whose lining was painted by David Hockney. Next door was the El Capitan Theatre, where Citizen Kane had its premiere and which is now owned and operated by… Disney. And down the street I had to see the designed-for-Vaudeville, Pantages Theatre, another past-venue for the Academy Awards. Once owned by RKO, Howard Hughes had his offices here.

Shuffling past hordes of tourists, tour guides, and costumed characters, I later spent a few harried moments at the sadly mundane Hollywood & Highland Center. Intriguingly topped with remnants from the set of D.W. Griffith’s 1916 classic, Intolerance, it remains a Gap/ California Pizza Kitchen/Victoria’s Secret kind of place (albeit one that employs thousands in a once-seedy neighborhood) and connects Ocar’s new home, the Kodak Theatre, with another of its old homes, the Chinese Theatre.

Built by Sid Grauman, who also built the Egyptian across the street, it was Grauman who came up with the idea of having stars place their footprints/handprints in cement, beginning with Mary Pickford.  The grand, old movie palace has since seen more movie premieres than any other venue anywhere.

A number of the actors in those premiered films now reside in the unrepentantly kitschy Hollywood Forever Cemetery, where you can buy a map in the flower shop to find the final resting places of John Huston, Adolphe Menjou, Douglas Fairbanks (and Fairbanks Jr.), Jayne Mansfield, Fay Wray, Mel Blanc, Peter Lorre, Tyrone Power, as well as Cecil B. DeMille, Don Adams, Dee-Dee and Johnny Ramone among other entertainment legends, not to mention (my favorite stop) Rudolph Valentino.

After sneaking into the nearby Hollywood Bowl and driving up to the Griffith Observatory (“You can wake up now, the universe has ended,” said James Dean to Natalie Wood), where I got as close as I could to the Hollywood sign, I looked out over the valley and thought of Sergeant Joe Friday “…this is the city.”  Still, there was one more sight to see before I wended my way back to the freeway.

Built in 1956 with a blinking light atop its tower that forever spells-out the word, “Hollywood” in Morse code, and featuring subterranean echo chambers designed by the great Les Paul, the Capitol Records Building houses studios that have recorded such luminaries as Sinatra, Streisand, Bacharach, Nat King Cole, the Beach Boys, Harry Nilsson, Bonnie Raitt, Crosby, Stills & Nash, and Mary McCaslin (who?).

Mentioned a few times in this blog, McCaslin toured regularly with her husband, Jim Ringer throughout the ’70s, including Passim in Harvard Square. Born near Indianapolis in 1946, her family moved to Los Angeles in the early ‘50s, where she became fascinated with television westerns and Native American lore. Having bought her first guitar at 15, she became a regular on the West Coast coffee house circuit while still a teen, cutting her first album for Capitol Records in 1968.

After meeting and marrying Ringer she cut her second album, Way Out West, for the newly formed Philo folk label in 1972.  Co-written by Bob Simpson, this nod to the fact that not every Hollywood cowboy finds redemption through a good woman is the album’s opening track.

 Music Strings/Oh Hollywood

I’ve played on the music strings of my life,

Their silver thread melodies take me away.

My life lies to cling to in stealth and strife,

Weaving my passage through starlight and day…

I dreamed I was a cowboy out on the western plains,

Yodle-ay-dee I’ve been lately feeling weirdly and quite strange.

Whoopi-ti I try to make it by on cornbread and spare change,

I think I’ve had enough of California and its ways.

I mosey down the streets at night and look at all the faces,

Trying to keep my mind on other times and other places.

I go down to the saloon on the chance that I might find,

Someone there to comfort me and give me peace of mind.

Oh I wander down the neon streets with no one else to blame,

Oh Hollywood my home away from home on the range.

I look up through the palm trees and I try to find the stars,

To guide me on my travels for I’ve strayed and wandered far.

The stars are in the sidewalks I walk I read the names,

Like never ending tombstones from some forgotten day.

Oh I wander down the neon streets with no one else to blame,

Oh Hollywood my home away from home on the range.

California lasses with their asses bound in leather,

Fancy vests upon their breasts and nothing on their minds.

Remind me of so long ago when I was very young,

I tried to be a cowboy but I could not hold a gun.

Oh I wander down the neon streets with no one else to blame,

Oh Hollywood my home away from home on the range

It took an autumn day in Concord to bring me back to this blog. Devoted to stories, some personal, most not, about popular songs, my stated goal is to post 365, one for each day of the year. I’m at #320 but since this is a re-posted song, alas, it doesn’t count. Surely I’ll get there in the end.

Perhaps my greatest joy is to watch my kids, now in their 20s, live their lives with a “fist full of gusto,” to steal a line from an old beer commercial. I was much the same at that age, which goes some way to explain this thankfully washed-out picture (considering the poor excuse for a beard), taken in Istanbul in the fall of 1980, not long after that year’s coup d’état.

That’s me, sixth from the left, on the deck of a fishing boat just-in from the Sea of Marmara. Jumping into scenes like this was the kind of thing I did back then and, as their friends may concur, the apples haven’t fallen far from the tree.

Since the enforcement of martial law, hotel rooms had become quite affordable that season, and despite a midnight curfew the supper clubs remained open. Though there was no coffee to be had due to an embargo, there was still plenty of high-test (absinthe-like) Turkish raki or “lion’s milk” as it was called, which leads us, hours later, to the dance floor of an old town establishment known for its belly dancing show.

Featuring a small orchestra, its musicians swaying back and forth in their fezzes, and a conjuror with magic orbs and rings of fire, between sets, and starring a marvel of a belly dancer, whose tummy moved in more directions than a three-cycle washing machine, it didn’t disappoint. Then, when the show was over we in the audience had the opportunity to grab a piece of the floor for ourselves while the music played on.

Somewhere along the way a Portuguese girl, named Maria, made it her mission to teach me the Bailarico, a folk dance where the girl backs up and the boy moves forward with little bouncing steps, then you raise your hands up high, before you embrace, and spin in place, then to one side, and then the other, and then…well, you get the picture. Everything was proceeding splendidly until the lights were thrown on and it was announced that 30 minutes remained before curfew.

The music may have stopped but with “lion’s milk” coursing through our veins the urge to dance had not. Maria and I, as it turned out, were staying at the same hotel; and so (I swear this is all true) we danced all the way home.

Perhaps you too have songs you like to sing to yourself from time to time. I know I do, and as an accompaniment to the Bailarico this one works perfectly … “I may go out tomorrow…” Hands in the air… “If I can borrow a coat to wear…” Embrace and spin … around a lamppost… “Oh I’d step out in style…” Step, step, step … down the street through an intersection with blinking traffic lights… “With my sincere smile and my dancing bear…”

When at last we spun through the hotel’s revolving door… “Making the grandest entrances it’s Sim-on Smith and the Ama-zing Dan-cing Bear….” at two minutes before midnight we’d been through the song at least half a dozen times. It’s funny how you suddenly remember these things.

Written by Randy Newman this song was first popularized by Alan Price in 1967, then Harry Nilsson in 1970. Newman finally released his own version on his 1972 album, “Sail Away”. It’s nearly half a century since he wrote it and I’ll bet he still doesn’t realize how nicely it accompanies the Bailarico.

Simon Smith and The Amazing Dancing Bear

I may go out tomorrow, if I can borrow a coat to wear,

Oh I’d step out in style with my sincere smile and my dancing bear,

Outrageous, alarming, courageous, charming

Oh who would think a boy and bear

Could be well accepted everywhere

It’s just amazing how fair people can be.

Seen at the nicest places where well-fed faces all stop to stare

Making the grandest entrance it’s Simon Smith and his dancing bear.

They’ll love us, won’t they?

They feed us, don’t they?

Oh, who would think a boy and bear

Could be well accepted everywhere

It’s just amazing how fair people can be.

Who needs money when you’re funny?

The big attraction everywhere

Will be Simon Smith and his dancing bear

It’s Simon Smith and the amazing dancing bear

While “Decoration Day” was observed to commemorate fallen soldiers after the Civil War, the practice of decorating soldiers’ graves with flowers stretches back into the mists of antiquity. By the end of the Second World War the preferred name was Memorial Day, which only became an official holiday after the passing of the Uniform Monday Holiday Act of 1968.

Now seen as an occasion to remember all who have departed, once again I remember in particular a man who overcame a few challenges to work his way into combat.

 READ: Like his brother he will be cool, thoughtful and devoted in any crisis.

After a battlefield commission the old boy survived the War in the Pacific and came home a First Lieutenant in the U.S. Army’s 594th Boat and Shore Regiment. Soon after he married his sweetheart and went on to father six children, of which I am proudly one.

This song, written and performed by Peter Skellern (backed up by the choral group, Libra) was composed to commemorate Remembrance Day, observed by British Commonwealth countries since the end of The Great War to remember those who died in the line of duty.

Though the imagery isn’t exactly Unitarian Universalist in sentiment, it’s rather splendid none-the-less … “for all who need comfort, for all those who mourn …”

LISTEN: Rest in Peace and Rise in Glory

For all who need comfort, for all those who mourn

All those whom we cherished will be reborn.

All those whom we love but see no more

They are not perished, but gone before,

And lie in the tender arms of he who died for us all to set us free

From hatred and anger and cruel tyranny.

May they Rest in Peace – and Rise in Glory.

All suffering and sorrow will be no more

They’ll vanish like shadows at heaven’s door.

All anguish and grieving will one day be healed

When all of God’s purpose will be revealed.

Though now for a season lost from sight

The innocent slain in the blindness of “Right”

Are now in the warmth of God’s glorious light

Where they Rest in Peace – and Rise in Glory

Lord give me wisdom to comprehend why I survive and not my friend

And teach me compassion so I may live, all my enemies to forgive.

For all who need comfort for all those who mourn

All those whom we cherished will be reborn.

All those whom we love but see no more

They are not perished but gone before.

Lord keep them safe in your embrace

And fill their souls with your good grace

For now they see you face to face

Where they Rest in Peace – and Rise in Glory.

Been away for a season or two and am still working on this fascinating book project, but as everyone knows, regardless of the spirit’s strength, the flesh remains weak.  So even if it means stealing time from my two remaining chapters, I…just..had…to…dash…this…off. And it’s all because I made the mistake of leaving the car radio on while picking up some takeaway Chinese.

Naturally it was tuned to my daughter’s station (why is it that every car I drive is tuned to my daughter’s station?) and I heard this song for the first time.  It’s kind of country but with an equal share of pop/rock too.  In fact my initial reaction was that Taylor Swift has finally grown up and found an extra cache of talent. Instead I am positively delighted to say that it’s actually the San Francisco-based group “Train” with Knoxville, Tennessee born Ashley Monroe singing along.

Of course it was released nearly a year ago (it’s still 2013 right?) and despite the fact that it didn’t break any records on anybody’s charts, you probably have already heard it.  But from the confines of this carpal tunnel racked cave of mine it resonates very nicely, with an upbeat tempo and clever lyrics…“Bruises” is credited to Train’s vocalist Pat Monahan along with Norwegian songwriting team Espen Lind and Amund Bjorklund, who also produced the group’s sixth studio album on which it was released, “California 37”.

Can’t say that I can concur with the line about gravity (at least from my end), but I can chime in with the one about how “you’re not alone in the way you’ve been.”Then again,  “everybody loses?”  This song (listen to it here) surely makes one feel precisely the opposite.

 Bruises

 Haven’t seen you since high school

Good to see you’re still beautiful

Gravity hasn’t started to pull

Quite yet, I bet you’re rich as hell

 One that’s five, and one that’s three

Been two years since he left me

Good to know that you got free

That town I know was keeping you down on your knees

 These bruises make for better conversation

Loses the vibe that separates

It’s good to let you in again

You’re not alone in how you’ve been

Everybody loses, we all got bruises

We all got bruises

Have you seen him? Not in years

How about her? No but I hear

She’s in Queens with the man of her dreams

Funny back then she said that about you

 Que sera you’ll never guess who I saw

Remember Johnny B, remember him we were best friends practically

Let’s do this soon again, ten years is that what it’s been?

Can’t believe how time flies by

Leaving you makes me wanna’ cry

 These bruises make for better conversation

Loses the vibe that separates

It’s good to let you in again

You’re not alone in how you’ve been

Everybody loses, we all got bruises

We all got bruises

 I would love to fix it all for you

I would love to fix you too

Please don’t fix a thing whatever you do

 These bruises make for better conversation

Loses the vibe that separates

It’s good to know you’ve got a friend

That you remember now and then

Everybody loses

These bruises make for better conversation

Loses the vibe that separates

It’s good to let you in again

You’re not alone in how you’ve been

Everybody loses, everybody loses, everybody loses

We all got bruises, We all got bruises, We all got bruises

“It’s hard to believe in coincidence, but it’s even harder to believe in anything else.” ~ John Green from “Will Grayson, Will Grayson”

It was about a year ago that my friend, Robert and I first grabbed a cup of coffee for the sake of networking.  Although I’d seen him around town for years we’d only recently been introduced and had the chance to discover that we share similar clientele.  But we never got around to discussing business that day because halfway through the first cup of coffee it suddenly occurred to me that I had met Robert once before…in 1981 at a party in Barcelona.

One wonders which is more amazing, the fact that here we were now or, ‘though he was a little more foggy about it at first, that I remembered him distinctly after more than 30 years.  I’m inclined to lean toward the latter although I was in a much better position for impressions as he’d been living and teaching there, while I was visiting some mutual friends of ours named Jim and Jeanne.  In fact, if I hadn’t broken my camera the next day I’m pretty sure I would have been able to show him a picture or two taken during the party…the one above, of Jim and Jeanne on Las Ramblas, is one of the few surviving photos from that visit.

The party was held at their commodious old apartment in a once “notorious” neighborhood known for its…uhm… lively nightlife. There were about 20 of us and the libation of choice was cheap red wine poured from jugs that everyone took turns refilling at a bodega on the corner.  Anyway I fondly recall that, thanks to a sensible siesta, we all managed to keep going until breakfast time (that bodega kept us supplied all night) and I clearly remember Robert merrily dancing (with his future wife) to this very song, exuding from the single speaker of one of those ‘70s era cassette players with the volume turned way up loud…

 Loathe to admit it but I enjoyed the Jackson Five’s “ABC” when it knocked the Beatles’ “Let it Be” off the Number 1 spot in 1970.  Not that you would have ever actually caught me listening to that “bubblegum stuff” in high school or even college.  But here and now, sometime before dawn in Catalonia, it was perfect music for the occasion. And doing my best imitation of the young Michael Jackson on American Bandstand I was dancing too.  What’s more, I’ve unabashedly danced to it at countless parties ever since.

ABC

You went to school to learn girl

Things you never, never knew before

Like “I” before “E” except after “C”

And why 2 plus 2 makes 4

Now, now, now

I’m gonna teach you

Teach you, teach you

All about love girl

All about love

Sit yourself down, take a seat

All you gotta’ do is repeat after me

 A B C

It’s easy as, 1 2 3

As simple as, do re mi

A B C, 1 2 3

Baby, you and me girl

A B C

It’s easy as, 1 2 3

As simple as, do re mi

A B C, 1 2 3

Baby, you and me girl

 Come on and love me just a little bit

Come on and love me just a little bit

I’m gonna teach you how to sing it out

Come on, come on, come on

Let me tell you what it’s all about

Reading, writing, arithmetic

Are the branches of the learning tree

But without the roots of love everyday girl

Your education ain’t complete

T-T-Teacher’s gonna’ show you

(She’s gonna show you)

How to get an “A” (na-na-na-naaaaaa)

How to spell “me”, “you”, add the two

Listen to me, baby

That’s all you got to do

Oh, A B C

It’s easy as, 1 2 3

As simple as, do re mi

A B C, 1 2 3

Baby, you and me girl

A B C it’s easy,

It’s like counting up to 3

Sing a simple melody

That’s how easy love can be

That’s how easy love can be

Sing a simple melody

1 2 3 baby

You and me

 Sit down girl,

I think I love ya’

No, get up girl

Show me what you can do

Shake it, shake it baby, come on now

Shake it, shake it baby, oooh, oooh

Shake it, shake it baby, yeah

1 2 3 baby, oooh oooh

A B C baby, ah, ah

Do re mi baby, wow

That’s how easy love can be

A B C it’s easy

It’s like counting up to 3

Sing a simple melody

That’s how easy love can be

I’m gonna teach you

How to sing it out

Come-a, come-a, come-a

Let me show you what’s it’s all about

A B C it’s easy

It’s like counting up to 3

Sing a simple melody

That’s how easy love can be

 I’m gonna teach you

How to sing it out

Sing it out, sing it out

Sing it, sing it

A B C it’s easy

It’s like counting up to 3

Sing a simple melody

That’s how easy love can be

My son’s turning 22. Birthday wishes aren’t supposed to come freighted with a dark cloud and although I already had something written up it got scrapped.  I’m keeping the same song though. Written and performed right here by John Sebastian for Francis Ford Coppola’s 1967 film of the same name, with the lyrics below, it’s “Your a Big Boy Now.”  And despite a strong urge to “go there” and use a picture of the kids when they were eight and six, I’m keeping the same picture too.  Not to get all bookish, but  in addition to making a political statement the goals of terrorism, according to Robert A, Schwarz in his “Tools for Transforming Trauma” are to “disconnect people from resourceful positive states of consciousness and to connect them instead to non-resourceful fearful states of consciousness.”  Nope not going there.

While most of us have been or will be exposed to life-threatening situations at some point in our lives, the carnage and destruction that comes with terrorism is truly traumatic, even when we’re not there.  We are wise to avoid the sensationalized pictures and sound bites that come rushing from certain sources, at least after we’ve seen them three or four times.  It’s far better to become educated on the situation by seeking factual information.

It’s also wise to realize that after the disbelief has passed, some semblance of disorientation and grief are sure to follow, as is the eventual need to reassess the world around us, along with our own beliefs, and re-establish life’s true priorities.  All sound familiar? While it’s not always easy to cope with the results of a terrorist act in all its misguided insanity, if we’re able to garner a little resilience we may even discover an opportunity for reflection and personal growth.

By now it’s probably obvious that a sagacious (rather preachy) tack doesn’t come all that naturally, although it’s the one I’ve decided to adopt in order to offer my son some fatherly advice. Of course none of it’s outlandishly new.  In fact it has been unashamedly pilfered from the WWW (I’m certain my sources don’t hold a copyright either)… but at least I’m not saying it was written by Kurt Vonnegut.

1. Remember that advice is seldom welcome and those who need it most, like it least
2. Watch a sunrise at least a few times a year
3. Never take action when you are angry
4. Make it a habit to say “Thank You”
5. Make it a habit to say “Please”
6. Over-tip breakfast waitresses
7. Look people in the eyes
8. Compliment three people each day
9. Live beneath your means
10. Buy whatever kids are selling on card tables in their front yards
11. Treat everyone you meet as you want to be treated
12. Donate two pints of blood every year
13. Make new friends but cherish the old ones
14. Keep secrets
15. Don’t waste time learning the tricks of the trade. Instead learn the trade
16. Admit your mistakes
17. Be brave. Even if you’re not, pretend to be. No one can tell the difference
18. Choose a charity in your community and support it generously with your time and money
19. Read this nation’s Bill of Rights
20. Use credit cards only for convenience, never for credit
21. Give yourself a year and read any great book you have always wanted to read cover to cover
22. Give yourself a year and read the Bible cover to cover
23. Learn to listen
24. Pray not for things but for wisdom and courage
25. Have good posture
26. Enter a room with purpose and confidence
27. Don’t discuss business in elevators
28. Never pay for work before it’s completed
29. Be willing to lose a battle in order to win the war
30. Don’t gossip
31. Beware of the person who has nothing to lose
32. When facing a difficult task act as though it is impossible to fail
33. Don’t spread yourself too thin
34. Never underestimate the power of forgiveness
35. Instead of using the word ‘Problem’, try substituting the word ‘Opportunity’
36. Never walk out on a quarrel with your mate
37. Regarding furniture and clothes, if you think you will be using them five years or longer, buy the best you can afford
38. When you look back on your life you’ll regret the things you didn’t do more than the ones you did
39. Forget committees. New, noble, world-changing ideas always come from one person working alone
40. Street musicians are a treasure. Stop for a moment and listen, then leave a small donation
41. When faced with a serious health problem, get at least three medical opinions
42. Wage war against littering
43. After encountering inferior service, food or products, bring it to the attention of the person in charge. Good managers will appreciate knowing
44. Learn to say ‘No’ politely and quickly
45. Park your car at the end of a row or under a light at the far end of a parking lot
46. Never get into your car without looking into it first
47. Never deprive someone of hope; it might be all he or she has
48. Be bold and courageous
49. Don’t expect life to be fair
50. Opportunity sometimes knocks very softly

You’re a Big Boy Now

I know there’s things you never thought before

That have to do with walkin’ out old doors

You’ve been prepared as long as time allowed

Well I don’t know how

But you’re a big boy now

Come on and take a bow

Cause you’re a big boy now

 You know the girls are taking notice of you

They say your hair is getting curly too

So shave today you’ll shave tomorrow as well

You’re run by you, and not a class-room bell

And I don’t know how

But you’re a big boy now

 And the great big world daddy threw before you

With the pretty faces and the claws that tore you

And it’s all so different when you get to sources

And love will make you strong
 as a team of wild horses

I know there’s things you never thought before

That have to do with walkin’ out old doors

You’ve been prepared as long as time allowed

Well I don’t know how

But you’re a big boy now

Come on and take a bow

Cause you’re a big boy now

Ah yes another Patriots Day, when the Marathoners run and the Red Sox play and here in Concord we pause to reflect…

From: “The British Grenadiers” ~ A Traditional Marching Song

“Some talk of Alexander, and some of Hercules

Of Hector and Lysander, and some of Miltiades

But of all the world’s brave heroes, there’s none that can compare

With a tow row row row row

To the British grenadiers…”

From: “Concord Hymn” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

“By the rude bridge that arched the flood

Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled


Here once the embattled farmers stood


And fired the shot heard round the world…”


From: “Lines suggested by the graves of the two English soldiers on Concord Battleground” ~ James Russell Lowell

“What brought them here they never knew, 


They fought as suits the English breed: 


They came three thousand miles, and died, 


To keep the Past upon its throne: 


Unheard, beyond the ocean tide, 


Their English mother made her moan…”

This song is a track from E.L. Kurtz’s 2007 album,  “A Soldier’s Journey” 

Here are all the lines in full:

“The British Grenadiers”

“Some talk of Alexander, and some of Hercules,

Of Hector and Lysander, and some of Meltiades.

But of all the world’s brave heros, there’s none that can compare

With a tow row row row row

To the British grenadiers.

 Now none of these ancient heros ever saw a cannon ball

Or knew the force of powder to slay their foes withal,

But our brave boys do now them and banish all their fears

With a tow row row row row

To the British grenadiers

 Whenever we are commanded to storm the palisades

Our leaders march with fusils and we with hand grenades

We hurl them from the glacis, about our enemies’ ears

With a tow row row row row

To the British grenadiers

 The God of War was pleased and great Bellona smiles

To see these noble heroes of our British Isles

And all the Gods celestial, descending from their spheres,

Beheld with adoration

The British grenadiers

 Now let us crown a bumper and drink a health to those,

Who carry caps and pouches and wear the loup’ed clothes

May they and their commanders live happy all their years

With a tow row row row row

To the British grenadiers

“Concord Hymn”

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,

Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,

Here once the embattled farmers stood,

And fired the shot heard round the world.

 The foe long since in silence slept;

Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;

And Time the ruined bridge has swept

Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

 On this green bank, by this soft stream,

We set to-day a votive stone;

That memory may their deed redeem,

When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

 Spirit, that made those spirits dare,

To die, and leave their children free,

Bid Time and Nature gently spare

The shaft we raise to them and thee.

“Lines suggested by the graves of the two English soldiers on Concord Battleground”

The same good blood that now refills

The dotard Orient’s shrunken veins,

The same whose vigor westward thrills,

Bursting Nevada’s silver chains,

Poured here upon the April grass,

Freckled with red the herbage new;

On reeled the battle’s trampling mass,

Back to the ash the bluebird flew.

Poured here in vain; — that sturdy blood

Was meant to make the earth more green,

But in a higher, gentler mood

Than broke this April noon serene;

Two graves are here: to mark the place,

At head and foot, an unhewn stone,

O’er which the herald lichens trace

The blazon of Oblivion.

These men were brave enough, and true,

To the hired soldier’s bull-dog creed;

What brought them here they never knew,

They fought as suits the English breed:

They came three thousand miles, and died,

To keep the Past upon its throne;

Unheard, beyond the ocean tide,

Their English mother made her moan.

The turf that covers them no thrill

Sends up to fire the heart and brain;

No stronger purpose nerves the will,

No hope renews its youth again:

From farm to farm the Concord glides,

And trails my fancy with its flow;

O’erheard the balanced hen-hawk slides,

Twinned in the river’s heaven below.

But go, whose Bay State bosom stirs,

Proud of thy birth and neighbor’s right,

Where sleep the heroic villagers

Borne red and stiff from Concord flight;

Thought Reuben, snatching down his gun,

Or Seth, as ebbed the life away,

What earthquake rifts would shoot and run

World-wide from that short April fray?

What then?

With heart and hand they wrought,

According to their village light:

‘T was for the Future that they fought,

Their rustic faith in what was right.

Upon earth’s tragic stage they burst

Unsummoned, in the humble sock;

Theirs the fifth act; the curtain first

Rose long ago on Charles’s block.

Their graves have voices; if they threw

Dice charged with fates beyond their ken,

Yet to their instincts they were true,

And had the genius to be men.

Fine privilege of Freedom’s host,

Of humblest soldiers for the Right! —

Age after age ye hold your post,

Your graves send courage forth, and might.

“Very often we write down a sentence too early, then another too late; what we have to do is write it down at the proper time, otherwise it’s lost, ”  says Thomas Bernhard.

Although Paul Simon first wrote this song in 1965, for his British released “Paul Simon Songbook, ” his “moment” was clearly on the rise and not only was “April Come She Will” released on Simon & Garfunkel’s breakthrough album, “The Sounds of Silence” in 1966, it was also memorably included in Mike Nichol’s 1967 film, “The Graduate”. 

So glad it took a while for Benjamin Braddock et al. to change their tune, during that legendary June.

THE SONG’S RIGHT HERE….

 April Come She Will

April come she will

When streams are ripe and swelled with rain;

May, she will stay,

Resting in my arms again

June, she´ll change her tune,

In restless walks she´ll prowl the night;

July, she will fly

And give no warning to her flight.

 August, die she must,

The autumn winds blow chilly and cold;

September I´ll remember.

A love once new has now grown old.

When William Goldman received $400,000 for the script, it was double what the 20^th Century Fox board had authorized.  Of course all was forgiven, until the next time, after (the originally named) “The Sundance Kid and Butch Cassidy” went on to win the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

With Paul Newman cast as the Sundance Kid, the role of Butch Cassidy was offered to Steve McQueen, who signed on but then left over a billing dispute.  Then it was offered to Jack Lemmon, but he didn’t like riding horses, next up was Warren Beatty, then Marlon Brando and Dustin Hoffman.

Although the 20^th Century Fox board disapproved, Newman ultimately switched to the Butch Cassidy role and at director Roy Hill’s insistence Robert Redford was hired to play Sundance.  Of course, after the 1969 production became the year’s top grossing film and Redford’s performance made him a bankable star all was forgiven by the members of the board, but to paraphrase Butch… who were those guys?

Also winning Academy Awards both for Best Original Score and Best Original Song were Burt Bacharach and Hal David, who wrote this song with Bob Dylan in mind but settled for BJ Thomas after Dylan turned it down. It took seven takes, but Thomas’ version topped the Billboard Charts for four weeks in 1970.

 LISTEN TO THIS RAINY DAY SONG – Wednesday 11 April 

Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head

And just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed

Nothin’ seems to fit

Those raindrops are fallin’ on my head

They keep fallin’

 So I just did me some talkin’ to the sun

And I said I didn’t like the way he got things done

Sleepin’ on the job

Those raindrops are fallin’ on my head

They keep fallin’

But there’s one thing I know

The blues they send to meet me won’t defeat me

It won’t be long till happiness steps up to greet me

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head

But that doesn’t mean my eyes will soon be turnin’ red

Cryin’s not for me

‘Cause I’m never gonna stop the rain by complainin’

Because I’m free

Nothin’s worryin’ me

 It won’t be long till happiness steps up to greet me

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head

But that doesn’t mean my eyes will soon be turnin’ red

Cryin’s not for me

‘Cause I’m never gonna stop the rain by complainin’

Because I’m free

Nothin’s worryin’ me

We never did make it to the Sunrise Service.  Truth be-known, we never have.  But we did make it out for a delightful morning walk in time to observe some jolly neighborhood Easter egg hunts-in-the-making, just waiting for the kids/grandkids to arrive.  Gotta’ admit, I miss those years.

Looking for the perfect melody for such a day, I figured there must have been a Vince Guaraldi-themed Peanuts Easter special, and I was right, “It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown” was first broadcast in 1974.  But the problem with Peanuts specials from the ‘70s is that none of Guaraldi’s music is readily available. The best I could come up with was a 2008 release, “Vince Guaraldi and the Lost Cues from Charlie Brown Television Specials, Volume 2” but the two Easter tracks just don’t fit the bill.

Born in (“zow”) San Francisco’s North Beach in 1928 and having served as an Army cook in the Korean War, Jazz pianist, guitarist, singer-song writer Vincent Anthony Guaraldi had already released a dozen albums when, in 1964, the producer of the upcoming (and very first) Peanuts special (“A Charlie Brown Christmas”) was riding over the Golden Gate Bridge in a taxicab and heard the Vince Guaraldi Trio on the radio …a few weeks later Guaraldi was performing his first “Peanuts” composition, “Linus and Lucy” over the telephone for that same producer, and the die was cast.

LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Easter Sunday 31 March

Guaraldi went on to compose the scores for 15 Peanuts television specials, including those for Valentine’s Day, Thanksgiving, Election Day, Summer and (of course) Halloween, and had just finished recording “It’s Arbor Day, Charlie Brown” in 1976 when he died at the age of 47 from an aortic aneurism.

If nothing else, this is a day about resurrection and surely Vince Guaraldi’s music will continue to do just that with our childhood memories for ages to come. Here’s wishing a Joyous Easter to “Linuses and Lucies” everywhere.

Globally there are 150 or so that are open to the public, with fully a third situated in the United States…including Elvis’ at Graceland and Jerry Falwell’s at Liberty University.   But as a long-held tradition in various cultures and religions, there are countless eternal flames throughout the world.

For example, it’s a Jewish tradition to have an eternal lamp set above the ark in many synagogues, while Hindu temples frequently feature them as well, some having burned for centuries. Eternal flames are also common in East Asia, carefully placed before a household’s spirit tablet in veneration of departed ancestors.

Often used to commemorate an event of national significance or to serve as a reminder of universal aspirations such as world peace, the first public eternal flame to honor a (known)  individual was the one consecrated in 1967 at the gravesite of JFK, a practice that has since become more customary.  Of course, many eternal flames were also lit in the decades following the Second World War, some to serve as a reminder of the Holocaust, others to commemorate a land’s unknown soldiers.

Which was the case in this picture, taken by the Kremlin Wall during the short Soviet premiership of Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko.  To be exact, it was Wednesday 31 October 1984 and it never even occurred to me that somewhere far away, people were celebrating Halloween.

I’d happened along having just shuffled through a winding line full of weeping people to (sigh) satisfy my morbid curiosity and check in with the waxen but amazingly well preserved Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. But with its eternal flame illuminating a bronze inscription that (translated) read, “Your name is unknown, your deed is immortal,” this was by far the more poignant tomb.

The remains of the unknown soldier within had once been interred in a mass grave at the 41st km marker on the Leningrad Highway, an infamous landmark representing the Nazi invaders’ closest proximity to Moscow (in 1941) during the worst days of the “Great Patriotic War” as it is referred to there.

These newlyweds were actually part of a veritable procession of such couples who had come to lay flowers before the flame on their wedding day, a tradition that began in the days of Stalin when church weddings were very rare and visiting an eternal flame (which many Russian cities still have) was a fitting way to satisfy a basic, spiritual urge on such a supernal occasion.

Nowadays, with that benighted era long relegated to “the ash heap of history,” the honor guard, which once stood vigil outside Lenin’s Tomb, now stands vigil outside the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  As for those wedding day visits to the eternal flame… they continue as one of the few Soviet-era customs to be embraced by Russians to this day.

Written by Billy Steinberg, Tom Kelly and Susanna Hoffs and topping the American charts when the Bangles released it in 1989, this song was very much inspired by an eternal flame.  According to Steinberg, Hofts had recently visited Graceland and seen the eternal flame there… “and as soon as those words were mentioned, I thought of the synagogue in the town of Palm Springs, where I grew up. I remember (how) they would walk us through the sanctuary. There was one little red light and they told us it was called the eternal flame.”

It also topped the British charts when Atomic Kitten released their version in 2001. First manufactured…I mean…established in 1997, the three-member girl-group was formed in Liverpool (where an eternal flame burns in remembrance of the 96 people who died in the stadium-related Hillsborough disaster in ‘89) and with a slightly shifting line-up through the years, Atomic Kitten had a number of hits throughout Europe, Asia and South Africa.

Here are two versions of the song.  The first was recorded live in 2004 at Atomic Kitten’s final concert. The second was the Bangles original release in 1989.

ATOMIC KITTEN LIVE VERSION – Thursday 28 March

BANGLES’ ORIGINAL VERSION – Thursday 28 March

Eternal Flame

 Call my name

Close your eyes, give me your hand, darling

Do you feel my heart beating, do you understand?

Do you feel the same or am I only dreaming?

Is this burning an eternal flame?

 I believe it’s meant to be, darling

I watch when you are sleeping, you belong with me

Do you feel the same or am I only dreaming

Is this burning an eternal flame?

 Say my name, sun shines through the rain

A whole life so lonely, and then you come and ease the pain

I don’t want to lose this feeling

 Call my name

Say my name, sun shines through the rain

A whole life so lonely, and then you come and ease the pain

I don’t want to lose this feeling

 Close your eyes and give me your hand

Do you feel my heart beating, do you understand?

Do you feel the same, am I only dreaming

Or is this burning an eternal flame?

 Is this burning an eternal flame?

An eternal flame?

 (Close your eyes and give me your hand

Do you feel my heart beating, do you understand?

Do you feel the same, am I only dreaming

Or is this burning an eternal flame?)

Here’s another one of those “Who Knew?” performers. A three-time National Science Foundation summer scholar, he skipped two grades and graduated from high school at age sixteen to study Physics at Notre Dame.  In later life he would become an internationally recognized environmental activist, who (from 2007 to 2011) served as U.S. Representative for New York’s 19th Congressional District.

Born in Baltimore in 1948 to a father with a PhD in Electrical Engineering and a mother with an MA in Divinity, John Joseph Hall, also took to music. Starting with piano at age 4, he went on to study French horn and taught himself guitar and bass. Along with creative writing it was an affinity that eventually derailed his future in Physics and after quitting college, Hall began to play in clubs in Georgetown and Greenwich Village.

He also composed music for a minor Broadway production and served as either songwriter or session musician for: Janis Joplin, Seals & Crofts, Taj Mahal and Bonnie Raitt.  In 1972, after moving to upstate New York, John Hall co-founded the group, Orleans.

Written with his first wife, Johanna this song was featured on Orleans fourth album, “Waking and Dreaming” in 1976.  Despite being featured on a record with one of the most dreadful album covers of all time (five unphotogenic ‘70s dudes posing up-close and rather too personal in their birthday suits) “Still the One” reached No. 5 on the Billboard Charts in the summer of that Bicentennial Year.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Tuesday 26 March 

Still the One

We’ve been together since way back when

Sometimes I never want to see you again

But I want you to know, after all these years

You’re still the one I want whisperin’ in my ear

You’re still the one — I want to talk to in bed

Still the one — that turns my head

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

I looked at your face every day

But I never saw it ’til I went away

When winter came, I just wanted to go (wanted to go)

Deep in the desert, I longed for the snow

You’re still the one — that makes me laugh

Still the one — that’s my better half

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

You’re still the one — that makes me strong

Still the one — I want to take along

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one (yes you are)

Changing, our love is going gold

Even though we grow old, it grows new

You’re still the one — that I love to touch

Still the one — and I can’t get enough

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

You’re still the one — who can scratch my itch

Still the one — and I wouldn’t switch

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

You are still the one — that makes me shout

Still the one — that I dream about

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

You’re still the one, yeah still the one

We’re still having fun, and you’re still the one

“He was the Third World’s first pop superstar. He was the man who introduced the world to the mystic power of reggae. He was a true rocker at heart, and as a songwriter, he brought the lyrical force of Bob Dylan, the personal charisma of John Lennon, and the essential vocal stylings of Smokey Robinson into one voice.” — Jann Werner at Bob Marley’s 1994 posthumous introduction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Born as Nesta Robert Marley in Saint Ann Parish, Jamaica in 1945, his white father, who would die from a heat attack when the boy was ten, was a 60-year-old plantation overseer from Sussex, England when he married the 18-year-old Afro-Jamaican woman who would become Marley’s mother.

Marley met “Bunny Wailer” Livingston a few years later after Bunny’s father had a daughter with Marley’s mother; and the two started to play music while still at school. When Marley was 12 he and his mother moved to Trench Town and there he again met up with Bunny who was accompanying him in a jam session when they met Peter Tosh. In 1963, the three rude buys formed the core of Bob Marley and the Wailers.

To this day, Marley remains the best-selling most popular Reggae performer ever. His messages of finding redemption and overcoming oppression still reverberate with indigenous communities around the world, including Australian Aborigines, Native Americans and citizens throughout the Indian subcontinent.

First recorded in a Ska style in 1966, and then included on the 1977 album “Exodus,” this song contains a “sampling” of Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready” and was finally published as  “One Love/People Get Ready,” giving co-authorship credits to both Marley and Mayfield.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Sunday 24 March

The YouTube version was released in 2004 as one of Playing For Change’s initial recordings.  With a mission to “inspire, connect, and bring peace to the world through music” the creators of the project (producer/sound engineer Mark Johnson and producer/musician Enzo Buono) traveled the world, recording local musicians who would perform the same song, but interpret it in their own style.

Very much keeping in the spirit of Marley’s message it was the second release after “Stand by Me” (which has received over 40 million YouTube hits) and features musicians based in: USA, Democratic Republic of the Congo, France, Israel, South Africa, India, Italy, Nepal and Zimbabwe.

“One Love/People Get Ready”

 One love, one heart

Let’s get together and feel all right

Hear the children crying (One love)

Hear the children crying (One heart)

Sayin’, “Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right.”

Sayin’, “Let’s get together and feel all right.”

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa

 Let them all pass all their dirty remarks (One love)

There is one question I’d really love to ask (One heart)

Is there a place for the hopeless sinner?

Who has hurt all mankind just to save his own?

Believe me

 One love, one heart

Let’s get together and feel all right

As it was in the beginning (One love)

So shall it be in the end (One heart)

All right, “Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right.”

“Let’s get together and feel all right.”

One more thing

 Let’s get together to fight this Holy Armageddon (One love)

So when the Man comes there will be no, no doom (One song)

Have pity on those whose chances grow thinner

There ain’t no hiding place from the Father of Creation

 Sayin’, “One love, one heart

Let’s get together and feel all right.”

I’m pleading to mankind (One love)

Oh, Lord (One heart) Whoa.

 “Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right.”

Let’s get together and feel all right.

 “Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right.”

Let’s get together and feel all right.

Never mind the channel, I wish I could remember that radio station’s call sign. With a transmitter somewhere around the Boston area It was one of those low power AM stations with a license to broadcast only during daytime due to ionospheric changes at night.  Nearly forty years on and at least I remember their slogan – “The station you can’t hear in the dark.”

Working five, sometimes six mornings a week in college as a breakfast cook I’d amble in at a little before 6:00 and (perhaps your morning routine is similarly ingrained): 1- Change into my whites, 2- Tie back my hair, 3- Top it all off with a paper hat and apron, and 4- Find my station on the transistor radio, just signing on the air.

Wonderfully provocative, at least for a college student, I guess you could call its programming “coffee house blend,” with plenty of local artists and whoever was playing at Passim’s that month, along with the likes of Martin Mull, with selections like “Marian, Who’s Not the Marryin’ Kind” (she’d lost her ring finger), or the marvelously satirical Rootboy Slim and the Sex Change Band, singing “I’m Not Too Old For You” (with the line, “When you turn 17, I’ll just be 32….”), and then there was Dory Previn.

Born in 1925 into a strict Irish Catholic family (as Dorothy Veronica Langan) and raised in northern New Jersey she toured as a chorus line dancer and began to write songs after high school.  Upon marrying conductor and composer Andre Previn in the late ‘50s, she and her husband began to collaborate on writing motion picture songs and received several Oscar nominations in the 1960s.

After divorcing her husband (who had fathered Mia Farrow’s newborn), Previn set out on a solo career as a singer-songwriter.  With typically ironic lyrics that focus on sexuality, psychology and religion she released seven albums during the 1970s, before stepping away from the music industry for a time to concentrate on her writing.

This song, which I have yet to hear in the dark, was dauntlessly featured on her 1974 album, “Dory Previn” …and to answer your question, some Biblical scholars say yes, while others say no.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Saturday 23 March

Did Jesus Have a Baby Sister?

 Did Jesus Have a Baby Sister?

Was she bitter?

Was she sweet?

Did she wind up in a convent?

Did she end up on the street?

On the run?

On the stage?

Did she dance?

Did he have a sister?

A little baby sister?

Did Jesus have a sister?

Did they give her a chance?

 Did he have a baby sister?

Could she speak out, by and large?

Or was she told by Mother Mary

Ask your brother he’s in charge

He’s the chief

He’s the whipped cream

On the cake

Did he have a sister?

A little baby sister?

Did Jesus have a sister?

Did they give her a break?

Her brother’s

Birth announcement

It was pretty big

Pretty big, I guess

While she got precious

Little notice

In the local press

 Her mother was the Virgin

When she carried him

Carried him, therein

If the little girl came later, then

Was she conceived in sin?

And in sorrow?

And in suffering?

And in shame?

Did Jesus have a sister?

What was her name?

 Did she long to be the savior

Saving everyone she met?

And in private to her mirror

Did she whisper…saviorette?

Saviorwoman?

Saviorperson?

Save your breath!

Did he have a sister?

A little baby sister

Did Jesus have a sister?

Was she there at his death?

And did she cry for Mary’s comfort

As she watched him

On the cross?

And was Mary too despairing?

Ask your brother

He’s the boss

He’s the chief

He’s the man

He’s the show

 Did he have a sister?

A little baby sister?

Did Jesus have a sister?

Doesn’t anyone know?

“I’ve seen enough groupies hanging around to sense their loneliness, even though they usually don’t show it. I can’t really understand them, but I just tried to feel empathy and I guess that’s what came across in the song.” – Karen Carpenter, referring to her lack of personal experience with the song she and her brother had just had a huge hit with, in a 1972 interview.

With the title “Groupie (Superstar)” when it was first released in 1969 the song was originally credited to Delaney & Bonnie and Friends featuring Eric Clapton.  Though not mentioned by name, among those “friends” were Leon Russell and then-backup singer, Rita Coolidge, who is believed to have provided the inspiration for the song and whose version (now called, “Superstar”) was featured on Joe Cocker’s live album, “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” in 1970.

Although he was unaware of either version of the song, Richard Carpenter heard Bette Midler perform it on the “Tonight Show” and despite the fact that his sister had heard the other versions and didn’t much care for it, Carpenter could barely wait to arrange it…while altering a few lyrics to make it less risqué.

Recorded in L.A. with the almighty “Wrecking Crew” backing her up for the session, Karen Carpenter used the lyrics her brother had scribbled on a napkin and recorded her vocal in a single take, which is normally referred to as the “work lead” and is what the other musicians usually use for guidance iafter they’ve been through it once.  No matter, The Carpenters version rose all the way to Number 2 on the Billboard Charts in 1971.

A decade later, in 1981, Sonic Youth was formed in New York, its name chosen in response to the popular Reggae trend of featuring “Youth” in a band’s name, and to honor the recently departed Fred “Sonic” Smith of the metal group, MC5. Now considered to be among “the first wave of American noise rock groups,” the members of Sonic Youth claimed to have been greatly influenced by Patti Smith, Joni Mitchell, Iggy Pop and ……The Carpenters (!)

This rather interesting (and idiosyncratic) version of the song first credited to Delaney & Bonnie and Friends et al. was featured on the 1994 tribute album  “If I Were a Carpenter”.

LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Friday 22 March 

 Superstar

Long ago

And oh so far away

I fell in love with you

Before the second show

Your guitar

It sounds so sweet and clear

But you’re not really there

It’s just the radio

 Don’t you remember you told me you love me Baby?

You said you’d be coming back this way again Baby

Baby, Baby, Baby, Baby, oh Baby

I love you, I really do

Loneliness, is such a sad affair

And I can hardly wait

To be with you again

What to say

To make you come again

Come back to me again

And play your sad guitar

 Don’t you remember you told me you love me Baby?

You said you’d be coming back this way again Baby

Baby, Baby, Baby, Baby, oh Baby

I love you, I really do

 Don’t you remember you told me you love me Baby?

You said you’d be coming back this way again Baby

Baby, Baby, Baby, Baby, oh Baby

I love you, I really do

Having regularly posted pictures online for a few years now, while seeing others do the same, it has often amazed me how readily the subjects in the pictures can travel back and forth through time.  One minute they’re one age and the next they’ve either grown older or (miraculously) younger.

With a blog that begs for a different picture each day (which somehow is meant to tie-in with a line from the featured song), this has certainly been the case with me, and of course it’s part of the fun.  But after posting yesterday’s Paul McCartney song that focused on the topic of…well…”yesterday” and the subsequent process of aging, another Paul McCartney-related song came to mind, as did the niggling question: What or when is a person’s actual Optimal Age?

Never mind the “peak this, or maximum that” of your teenaged years.  On the face of it (and barring any misadventure) it’s hard to argue with the mid-20s, an enchanted time when those cognitive pistons are finally firing in unison, and one is fully able to celebrate the cocksure “Body Electric.” …And yet argue I will.

Because when it comes to judgment, emotional intelligence and if not wisdom at least decades of perspective, and despite a noticeably depreciating mortal coil (and since having the body of a 25 year old isn’t an option) I’ll take the mid-50s anytime. How about you?

By this age one has pretty much proven what one is going to prove (although not totally) and although confidence in the “Body” (electric or otherwise) may not be what it was, confidence in the “Self” more than makes up for it. What’s more and genetics willing, optimism prevails about the future as well.

Research (and personal observation) shows that even waaaay late in life, and fully in the face of the havocs of age, the potential exists for physical, mental and social growth if the proverbial “woof,” in the form of an active appreciation of the wonders-of-this-life, is willfully aligned with a genetic and cultural “warp” that enables one to do so.

Although it fatalistically veers from my point (and I suppose I can’t blame it), “Those Were the Days” was originally written in Russian by poet, Konstantin Podrevskii, with music by Boris Fomin, and later translated by Folk musician, Gene Raskin. It was none other than Paul McCartney (of course) who heard Raskin perform it at a club in London and with Mary Hopkin in mind, duly had his agent purchase the song rights.

The 18 year-old Welsh singer had recently signed with Apple Records and with McCartney serving as producer this, her debut single, topped the UK charts, while reaching Number 2 in the US.  With studio time remaining , it’s interesting to note that the 26 year-old McCartney (whose Optimal Age seems to have been between the ages of 20 and now) also had Hopkins record alternate versions of “Those Were the Days” in Spanish (“Que Tiempo Tan Feliz”), German (“An jenem Tag”), French (“Le temps des fleurs”) and finally in Italian (“Quelli Erano Giorni”).

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Wednesday 20 March 

Those Were The Days

 Once upon a time there was a tavern

Where we used to raise a glass or two

Remember how we laughed away the hours

And dreamed of all the great things we would do

 Those were the days my friend

We thought they’d never end

We’d sing and dance forever and a day

We’d live the life we choose

We’d fight and never lose

For we were young and sure to have our way

La la la la…

 Then the busy years went rushing by us

We lost our starry notions on the way

If by chance I’d see you in the tavern

We’d smile at one another and we’d say

 Those were the days my friend

We thought they’d never end

We’d sing and dance forever and a day

We’d live the life we choose

We’d fight and never lose

Those were the days, oh yes those were the days

La la la la…

 Just tonight I stood before the tavern

Nothing seemed the way it used to be

In the glass I saw a strange reflection

Was that lonely woman really me

 Those were the days my friend

We thought they’d never end

We’d sing and dance forever and a day

We’d live the life we choose

We’d fight and never lose

Those were the days, oh yes those were the days

La la la la…

Through the door there came familiar laughter

I saw your face and heard you call my name

Oh my friend we’re older but no wiser

For in our hearts the dreams are still the same

 Those were the days my friend

We thought they’d never end

We’d sing and dance forever and a day

We’d live the life we choose

We’d fight and never lose

Those were the days, oh yes those were the days

La la la la…

Shortly before his death in 1980, John Lennon noted that the lyrics are “…good, but if you read the whole song, it doesn’t say anything. You don’t know what happened. She left and he wishes it were yesterday, that much you get, but it doesn’t really resolve… I don’t believe in yesterday. Life begins at 40, so they promise, and I believe it. What’s going to come?”

Officially credited to “Lennon/McCartney” the song with “Scrambled Eggs” as its working title, was written solely by Paul McCartney, whose initial concern was that he had subconsciously plagiarized someone else’s work.  When nobody claimed it he began to tinker with it and write lyrics to suit while the Beatles were working on “Help,” which apparently annoyed director Richard Lester, who told McCartney to finish with it or he would have the piano that had been placed on the film’s sound stages removed.

“Blimey,” said George Harrison, “he’s always talking about that song. You’d think he was Beethoven or somebody.”

Accompanied by a string quartet, the succinctly titled “Yesterday” was finally recorded at Abbey Road Studios, four days before his 23rd birthday in 1965.  As McCartney was the only Beatle to appear on the track it was essentially a solo performance.  As a result, the other band members refused to permit its release as a single in the UK.

Their veto didn’t hold sway in the US, however and not only did the resulting single top the Billboard Charts for a full month, it went on to become the most played song on America’s airwaves for a consecutive eight years.  By the time “Yesterday” finally hit the British charts a full ten months after the premier of “Help,” English crooner, Matt Monro had already had a top ten UK hit with his, the first of many, cover versions.  In fact, “Yesterday” remains one of the most covered and recorded songs in history; voted as the Best Song of the 20^th Century by a BBC Radio 2 expert listener poll, and the Number One Pop Song Ever by both MTV and Rolling Stone.

Not that it hasn’t received it’ share of criticism.  The freewheelin’ but sometimes inscrutable Bob Dylan claimed not to like it.  “If you go into the Library of Congress, you can find a lot better than that. There are millions of songs like “Michelle” and “Yesterday” written in Tin Pan Alley.”  Dylan is said to have recorded his own version but it was never released.

Recorded by ABC TV (and distributed by ITV) as a promotion for “Help” on the 1 August 1965 broadcast of “Blackpool Night Out,” this was McCartney and the lads’ first performance of  “Yesterday” on British television.

LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Tuesday 19 March

 Yesterday

 Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away

Now it looks as though they’re here to stay

Oh, I believe in yesterday

 Suddenly, I’m not half to man I used to be

There’s a shadow hanging over me

Oh, yesterday came suddenly

 Why she had to go I don’t know she wouldn’t say

I said something wrong, now I long for yesterday

Yesterday, love was such an easy game to play

Now I need a place to hide away

Oh, I believe in yesterday

Even in the face of inflation my research is of the two-penny variety, so it’s a good thing we’re not wasting any paper here.  But it’s interesting to note that Satire, easily the snarkiest form of humor, is widely regarded (along with Irony) as one of the earliest forms of literary expression. As a result, it readily beats out such disciplines as history and anthropology as a means of comprehending an earlier society’s collective values.

But there’s more! Not only is Satire a powerful way to understand contemporary or antediluvian issues, but it has also been known to have clairvoyant qualities. For example, and maybe you even remember this from 1975 when, after Gillette introduced its Twin-blade Trac-II razor, the very first episode of Saturday Night Live satirically featured a mock ad for a triple blade razor (called Triple-Trac). It took a few years, but Gillette’s Mach3 triple-blade cartridge was introduced in 1998.

Then in 2004 “The Onion” satirized the promotion of multiplying blades with its “Fuck Everything, We’re Doing Five Blades” piece…and this time it only took Gillette two years to introduce its Fusion cartridge with…five-blades.

Satire, Yesterday and Today.  Speaking of which, back in ’75 one of the featured artists during the second week’s episode of SNL was (one of our favorites) Randy Newman, who sang “Sail Away” from his 1972 album of the same name. The song as you may recall, takes the form of a “pitch” being made by a slave trader to a poor, unfortunate sole in Africa and the host of that week’s show was Paul Simon, who introduced the performance by saying that he wished he’d written it himself.

Because there’s always room for a little satire, here’s another track from the same album, which Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys actually credited for briefly keeping him from sliding into further depression at the time of its release.  Sound satire will do that for you.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Monday 18 March

Political Science

No one likes us, I don’t know why

We may not be perfect, but heaven knows we try

But all around, even our old friends put us down

Let’s drop the big one and see what happens

We give them money-but are they grateful?

No, they’re spiteful and they’re hateful

They don’t respect us-so let’s surprise them

We’ll drop the big one and pulverize them

 Asia’s crowded and Europe’s too old

Africa is far too hot

And Canada’s too cold

And South America stole our name

Let’s drop the big one

There’ll be no one left to blame us

 We’ll save Australia

Don’t wanna’ hurt no kangaroo

We’ll build an All American amusement park there

They got surfin’ too

Boom goes London and boom Paris

More room for you and more room for me

And every city the whole world round

Will just be another American town

Oh, how peaceful it will be

We’ll set everybody free

You’ll wear a Japanese kimono babe

And there’ll be Italian shoes for me

 They all hate us anyhow

So let’s drop the big one now

Let’s drop the big one now

St. George is Patron Saint of England, and St. Andrew is Scotland’s, and St. David is Wales’ Saint, and everyone knows who the Patron Saint of Ireland is.  But who do you suppose is Patron Saint of Northern Ireland?

Here’s a hint, his remains are said to rest in Downpatrick (i.e. “Patrick’s stronghold”) about 20 miles from Belfast.  And here’s another, in addition to the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew, St. Patrick’s is the third cross featured on the Union Jack.  Trick question and Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Born in Roman Britain and carried into slavery by Irish raiders when he was 16, St. Patrick (as he has been known for way-more than a millennium) worked as an Irish herdsman for six years before escaping back to Britain where he became a person of the cloth. Eventually returning to northern Ireland as an ordained bishop-on-a-mission, he is believed to have founded his first church in a barn near Downpatrick in AD 432 and then to have set up the center of his Christian teachings in the northern Irish township of Armagh.

Dedicated to spreading the gospel to all throughout that Emerald Isle, he gained renown for training pastors, planting churches, healing the sick and “casting out demons.”  But since the modern scholarly mind has little tolerance for ancient miracles, it is frequently speculated that his most famous deed, the banishment of all snakes from Ireland, is actually a metaphor for the expulsion of pagan beliefs.

Although never formally canonized by the Pope, St. Patrick is honored by the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Eastern Orthodox and Lutheran Churches and ‘though he is indelibly associated with the Republic of Ireland he is roundly celebrated in his “home base” of Northern Ireland (with a population that’s 41 percent Catholic and 14 percent Anglican), whose largest city, Belfast is in the thick of its annual four-day St. Patrick’s Festival at this very moment.

Also known as “I’ll Tell me Ma”, this song is most assuredly playing somewhere within those city limits as you read these lines. Although it originated in the streets of Belfast as a children’s skipping song, its lyrics were long ago adapted to suit other locations where it is sung as well. For example, there are versions where the Belle comes from Brisbane or London or Dublin or the “Golden City” of Edinburgh.

It’s performed here by Lick the Tins, an ‘80s Celtic/Folk/Rock band from London, best known for its spirited rendition of “Can’t Help Falling in Love With You”. Although the group broke up soon after this release, rest assured that in Belfast (and everywhere else that celebrates the legendary St. Paddy this weekend), as long as there are those who’ll wear the green, there will be boys who forever and a day… “won’t leave the girls alone.”

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – St. Patrick’s Day 2013

The Belle of Belfast City

Tell my ma when I go home,

The boys won’t leave the girls alone,

They pulled my hair and stole my comb,

But that’s all right ’till I go home.

She is handsome, she is pretty

She is the belle of Belfast city,

She is courting, one, two, three

Please won’t you tell me who is she?

 Albert Mooney says he loves her,

All the boys are fighting for her,

Knock on the door and they ring the bell

Oh my true love, are you well?

Here she comes, as white as snow,

Rings on her fingers and bells on her toes,

Old Johnny Mary she says she’ll die

If she doesn’t get the boy with the roving eye.

Tell my ma when I go home,

The boys won’t leave the girls alone,

They pulled my hair and stole my comb,

But that’s all right ’till I go home.

 She is handsome, she is pretty

She is the belle of Belfast city,

She is courting, one two three

Please won’t you tell me who is she?

 Let the wind and the rain and the hail blow high

And the snow come tumbling from the sky

She’s as nice as apple pie

She’ll get her own boy, by and by

When she gets a lad of her own,

She won’t tell her ma ’till she comes home,

Let the boys stay as they will,

For it’s Albert Mooney she loves still.

 Tell my ma when I go home,

The boys won’t leave the girls alone,

They pulled my hair and stole my comb,

But that’s all right ’till I go home.

She is handsome, she is pretty

She is the belle of Belfast city,

She is courting, one two three

Please won’t you tell me who is she?

Tell my ma when I go home,

The boys won’t leave the girls alone,

They pulled my hair and stole my comb,

But that’s all right ’till I go home.

She is handsome, she is pretty

She is the belle of Belfast city,

She is courting, one two three

Please won’t you tell me who is she?

Tell my ma when I go home,

The boys won’t leave the girls alone,

They pulled my hair and stole my comb,

But that’s all right ’till I go home.

She is handsome, she is pretty

She is the belle of Belfast city,

She is courting, one two three

Please won’t you tell me who is she

As with YOUR family’s history (whether you know it or not) our well-thumbed genealogy (unambiguously entitled, “A New England Family”) contains some rather compelling stories.  Take the tale of mystery and romance that surrounded my great, great grandfather.

Known to all as “the Squire,” and an esteemed citizen of Newburyport, Mass., he had an outsized personality, counting Nathaniel Hawthorne and Franklin Pierce among his personal friends. He was also exceedingly pious, attending services every day (twice on Sundays) at the Old South Presbyterian Church.  But only in recent years can it be comfortably affirmed that the Squire was born out of scandal.

In 1776 a Revolutionary War soldier named Moses Pettingell returned to Newbury (later part of Newburyport) where he joined his brother Eleazer in a “house with brick ends” that they had inherited from their father.  In good weather they fished, in winter they made shoes.  Which remained their practice in 1791, when the two men hired on a housekeeper named Sally Beckett, who had come from Exeter, NH seeking employment.

Four years later, on 6 June 1795, records indicate that Sally and Eleazer were married.  They also indicate that a son was born the following month.  The resulting gossip was only intensified when the child was given the name Moses. Never mind the timing, cryptic speculation would be whispered in family circles for generations regarding the matter of paternity.

Yet what strikes one as remarkable was the subsequent conduct of the three household elders, who came rolling out of Calvinistic 18^th Century Massachusetts to share equally in young Moses’ care and upbringing. Although they were common people, unschooled and socially unversed, a course of action was set in place.  No further children were born, the senior Moses remained unmarried and together they worked, saved and methodically prepared young Moses for a life far beyond their own experience.

As indicated by the quality of the writing found in the Squire’s diaries it’s apparent that his schooling was more extensive than the ordinary child, and that Presbyterianism was a major influence from a young age. When he was 15 in 1810, his uncle/parents built a new house that was markedly larger in size, quality and pretension than the humble brick. Conspicuously situated near the mouth of the Merrimack River, their intention was manifestly to furnish the boy with the grandest, most expensive house in the community.

Kind, generous to a fault, and with no discernible bad habits, Moses Pettingell never seemed bothered by the circumstances of his birth, becoming a bastion of his community, while ever-maintaining the instilled belief that he was marked for a special place in life… That he would turn out to be an abysmal businessman and an even worse investor is an account for another time.  Never mind his dim view of Unitarians.

Perhaps I’m wrong in thinking that such a musty old story typifies a uniquely regional sensibility. But for me it remains another reason… (like these provided by Jonathan Richman and The Modern Lovers back in 1976) …why I love New England.

LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Thursday 14 March 

…New England

See, I come from Boston

I’m gonna tell you about how I love New England

It’s my favorite place

I’ve been all around the world, but I love New England best

I might be prejudiced

But it’s true, I love New England best

Well, now…

You know, ladies and gentlemen

I’ve already been to Paris

Already been to Rome

And what did I do but miss my home?

 I have been out west to Californ’

But I miss the land where I was born

I can’t help it

 Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day

Oh, New England

Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day

Oh, New England

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

I have seen old Israel’s arid plain

It’s magnificent, but so’s Maine

Oh, New England

Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day

Oh, New England

Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day

Oh, New England

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do

 Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day

Oh, I love New England…

Before Michael Jackson, before the Amazing Little Stevie Wonder, there was Frankie Lymon.  And just like Jackson and Wonder, he got his professional start at the age of 13.

Born into a poor Harlem family in 1942, Franklin Joseph Lymon, was working as a grocery boy at the age of ten and, with a knowledge of the world well beyond his years, soon began to augment his income by hustling prostitutes.

While still 12 he became enthralled with a Doo-Wop group called the Premiers at a local talent contest and didn’t hesitate to introduce himself as a singer.  After participating in a jam session Lymon was invited to join the group by lead vocalist Herman Santiago, just before they changed their name to the Teenagers and landed a recording audition with a newly created record label.

Santiago and the group’s tenor, Jimmy Merchant, had completed a song for the occasion, which was inspired by some love letters that a friend had received from his girlfriend and shared with them, including the line, “Why do birds sing so gay?”

On the day of the audition Santiago had a sore throat and was unable to sing lead so the precocious Lymon happily stepped in and added his own embellishments. Released as “Why Do Fools Fall in Love” by “Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers,” the song was an instant hit in 1956, reaching Number 6 on the Billboard Charts and Number One in the UK, the first chart topping single there by an American Rock & Roll group. Other hits followed but the limelight was short lived.

Although Santiago had graciously stepped aside as lead, Frankie Lymon soon left the Teenagers to embark upon a solo career that was sadly hampered by a heroin addiction that would take his life at the age of 25.  The Teenagers, who struggled on with other lead singers, finally disbanded in 1961, leaving behind a high-voiced signature sound that at its early best proved to be hugely influential on the wave of girl-groups to follow, while serving as a veritable blueprint for many of Motown’s most successful recordings.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Wednesday 13 March 

Why Do Fools Fall in Love?

Oh wah, oh wah, oh wah

Oh wah, oh wah, oh wah

Why do fools fall in love?

Why do birds sing so gay?

And lovers await the break of day?

Why do they fall in love?

Why does the rain fall from above?

Why do fools fall in love?

Why do they fall in love?

Love is a losing game

And love can be a shame

I know of a fool you see, for that fool is me

Tell me why, why, why, tell me why

Why do birds sing so gay?

And lovers await the break of day?

Why do they fall in love?

 Why does the rain fall from above?

Why do fools fall in love?

Why do they fall in love?

 Why does my heart skip a crazy beat?

Before I know it will reach defeat

Tell me why, why, why

Why do fools fall in love?

I think I understand why John Ford disliked the song and don’t believe it was a generational thing between the 68-year-old film director and Gene Pitney, the 22-year-old teen idol who had been hired to sing it.  I say it was a case of a proposed theme song that cut across the deep aesthetic grain of a rare artist who remains the only person ever to win four Best Director Oscars.

Although his major awards were won for adaptations of iconic 20^th Century novels, he is best remembered for his acute feel for the 19^th Century American frontier. In addition to customarily breathtaking cinematography and a consistently clear visual style, Ford was highly adept at incorporating a film’s musical score into the story. So much so that it sometimes took on greater importance than dialogue.

So despite the many merits of a pop song that had been commissioned by the studio for what would prove to be Ford’s last great film, in 1962, it didn’t blend well with the director’s elegaic vision.  And John Ford wasn’t one who liked to be told what to do, as one studio executive famously learned when he complained that one of Ford’s films was falling behind schedule.  The accomplished director quietly held up the script and tore out an entire scene saying, “There, now we’re all caught up!”  True to his word the scene was never filmed.

Nor was the song, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” written by a couple of Brill Building collaborators named Burt Bacharach & Hal David, used in the now classic film, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.” Instead, Ford opted for the “Ann Rutledge Theme” from his 1938 film,” Young Mr. Lincoln,” starring Henry Fonda.

Not that it was a tragic decision. Evocatively filmed in Black & White and starring John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart, the movie was a huge success and, peaking at Number 4 on the Billboard Charts, so was the song.  Be sure to listen for those two shots after “…shot Liberty Valance,” if you’re in any doubt about the bravest of them all.

 LISTEN TO THIS SONG – Tuesday 12 March 

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

When Liberty Valance rode to town the womenfolk would hide, they’d hide

When Liberty Valance walked around the men would step aside

‘Cause the point of a gun was the only law that Liberty understood

When it came to shootin’ straight and fast, he was mighty good

 From out of the East a stranger came, a law book in his hand, a man

The kind of a man the West would need to tame a troubled land

‘Cause the point of a gun was the only law that Liberty understood

When it came to shootin’ straight and fast, he was mighty good

Many a man would face his gun and many a man would fall

The man who shot Liberty Valance, he shot Liberty Valance

He was the bravest of them all

The love of a girl can make a man stay on when he should go, stay on

Just tryin’ to build a peaceful life where love is free to grow

But the point of a gun was the only law that Liberty understood

When the final showdown came at last, a law book was no good

Alone and afraid she prayed that he’d return that fateful night, awww that night

When nothin’ she said could keep her man from goin’ out to fight

From the moment a girl gets to be full-grown the very first thing she learns

When two men go out to face each other, only one returrrrns

 Everyone heard two shots ring out, a shot made Liberty fall

The man who shot Liberty Valance, he shot Liberty Valance

He was the bravest of them all

The man who shot Liberty Valance, he shot Liberty Valance

He was the bravest of them all