Mood:
happyNow Playing: Itunes on Shuffle
Topic: Writing Challenges
4:36pm Sunday 15Oct06
Well I've been attempting to do some work with music playing and have been doing more singing than working. Funny how that happens. Somehow it makes me think about the warm up mentioned in The Weekend Novelist by Robert J Ray. The warm up is to write for ten minutes using the start line, "I remember..."
In keeping with music... I remember listening to Elvis Presley on 78's. My favorite song was Teddy Bear. I'd play it over and over keeping myself amused in my bedroom. The 78's were the only records I could touch as we (society) had moved into LP's and my mother didn't want me to ruin those. She didn't really have to worry though. I was already aware of the delicateness of albums and worshipped music too much to ruin an album as an experiment like maybe cutting my Barbie dolls hair (which I regretted.)
One of my last memories of still living with my father was me in my bedroom listening to Sly and The Family Stone on LP with my brother Charles' old record player. I loved Sly and The Family Stone, aside from their music being fantastic, primarily because they had the words to their songs on the album inserts. I still can't understand why a singer doesn't give the lyrics to their songs. In my room I sang Family Affair and Hot Fun in the Summertime and Stand. My father peeked in at me and smiled watching me enjoy myself in my own performance for my imaginary audience.
I remember the calm nights after the violence sitting in the living room with my mother while she played Stevie Wonder's album with Blame it on the Rain, Looking for another Pure Love and I believe (when I Fall in love it will be forever). That was Talking Book with Stevie in braided hair. My favorite song for the longest time was Big Brother because I understood it and knew that it was deeper than my young thoughts could fathom.
Lyrics - My name is secluded. We live in a house the size of a matchbox, roaches live with us wall to wall. You've killed all our leaders, I don't even have to do nothing to you. You'll cause your own country to fall...
More recently Tuesday Heartbreak is my favorite off that album. My mother played that album so much that it skipped on You are the Sunshine of My Life. We just sang the song with the skip.
I remember her playing Sam Cooke's Album with Only Sixteen and Chain Gang and Everybody loves to cha cha cha. My favorite song then and now is Bring it on home. I loved that deep voice that sang the harmonies to Sam Cooke's silky smooth voice. It wasn't until I was an adult that I found out that it was Lou Rawls singing the harmony and it made me love that song more.
I remember that as early as five years old my mother liked my singing voice. If a song I liked came on the radio I was expected to sing it. One Less Bell to Answer from the Fifth Dimension was one of them and You Make Me Feel Brand New by the Stylistics.
I don't remember when I got fanatical about knowing everything about the music my mother owned but I do remember when it started making a difference. When my mom and I went music shopping I would pick up an album and turn it around and read the album cover until I recognized a name. If the songs were written by someone who wrote songs on someone else's albums, people who produced albums. They weren't playing a lot of black music on the radio. You had to be a music detective in order to discover new good artists. I could hand an album to my mother and say, "Buy this." And she would without question.
I knew that Luther Vandross sang on Quincy Jones' album Sounds and Stuff Like That. That his was the same voice on Change's Searching and was prepared when he went solo. I knew the voice as we called him in LTD was Jeffrey Osborne. I took the chance without fear and bought Jonathan Butler's first album (a double album) because he was produced by the same man that produced or worked with George Benson, Al Jarreau and Freddie Jackson. My ex Jeff still talks about that purchase in hushed awed tones. ha ha!
EY
