Sparks from the Fire » composer

The Decline of Lyrical Craftsmanship – Part 1

Peter Link — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 10:45:32 +0000

Stephen Sondheim, one of our great present day lyricists, likes to say that lyric writing is puzzle solving. The puzzle is how are ya’ gonna get all them words to fit together into that pretty little melody and still make sense. I’ve now spent almost a half-century trying to solve these puzzles, and though I’ve certainly gotten better at it, it’s still a laborious but fascinating process.

However, as I’ve been improving in the craft, I’ve watched the noble art of the craft plummet into the depths of despair. Perhaps I’m being a bit dramatic here, but often, when I’m reading or hearing many of today’s lyrics, I find myself groaning over the cheesiness of the content and the hollow and paltry result of the lack of craft.

OK, you say, give it to us, Pete. Do your thing.

So glad you asked…

Rhyming
I come from the world of the theater where rhymes had to rhyme (“shoe” does not rhyme with “blues” nor does “time” rhyme with “fine”) and if your rhymes ‘cheated’, you would be severely reprimanded by the critics. I studied under the tutelage of Alan Lerner, one of our masters, (Brigadoon, My Fair Lady, Camelot) and he wrote perfect lyrics that rhymed, scanned to perfection and are still today treasures of the American Songbook (If Ever I Would Leave You, The Heather On The Hill, I’ve Grown Accustomed To Her Face, and on and on). He would work, not hours, but weeks on one song lyric and, when presented, it would be a flawless piece of masterwork.

He turned me on to the one and only professional’s rhyming dictionary – the only one I’ve ever used and still highly recommend – The Clement Wood Rhyming Dictionary. None others come close. I keep one in each room of my apartment and hardly ever leave home without it. With it, the world of rhymes is literally at your fingertips and every possibility is represented within its pages. Short of the Bible, it’s my favorite book.

Rap music today has simply slaughtered the craft of rhyming. I am in no way against Rap music. It is a completely legitimate style of music representing the urban culture of today, but in it, most rappers rhyme with no regard to craft using any word in the vicinity of the vowel sound. For instance not only can ‘street’ rhyme with ‘beep’, but it can also rhyme with ‘ease’ or even with ‘help’ because ‘help’ has an ‘e’ in it.

To my ear that’s a point off – any of those kind of false rhymes. Ultimately they disappoint the listener’s ear and prove unsatisfactory. The trouble is that we now have a couple of generations so used to bad or cheated rhymes that they don’t even know what to listen for in the first place. And so it strikes me that the powerful tonality of rhyming is in jeopardy of being lost for generations. The result of this ignorance of style is that bad rhyming has now spread into pop music and even the theater where it is unfortunately now accepted and used often without criticism.

Call me ancient and stuffy, but it’s said that the decline of a civilization is often first seen in the decline of its language. Look around you, America, it’s like happnin’, you like know what I mean?

I’m a total hard-ass with my students when it comes to perfect rhyming. Cheat once and you get a point off. Get 5 points off and you have a mediocre song. Get 10 points off and you better start over and get to work.

Scanning and Jamming
I spoke to a ‘professional’ lyricist the other day and mentioned that in her second verse her lyrics did not scan. She said back to me, “What’s scan?” I stood dumbfounded. This is like saying to a musician, “ You’ve got a mistake in the third measure” and them saying back to you, “What’s a measure?”

The most powerful tool in popular music is repetition. It’s how we learn a song and it’s why good songs are ‘sticky’ or considered to be memorable melodies – because they scan – each time you hear the hook it’s the same notes in the same rhythms scanning (repeating) perfectly. Each time you hear the verse, the melody is exactly the same even though the words are different. Change a word or jam two words into the line where there should only be one, jam two or three syllables in where there should only be one and you lose the scan, you lose the repetition of the melody and confuse the ear of the listener.

So much of the music I hear today is ruined by lazy lyricists jamming words into melodies and fouling up the repetitions so that the listener’s ear is confused and the otherwise good melodies are ruined. In perfect scanning the repeated melodies are perfectly repeated even though the words change keeping the integrity of the music. Even the accents of the words – 1^st syllable/2^nd syllable, etc are honored in the repetition. So much of what I hear today is junked up by amateur approaches where scanning is ignored and melodies are slaughtered.

On top of that riffing and licks are also confusing the listener’s ears all in the name of two generations of vocalists trying to be as brilliant as Mariah Carey. I like Mariah Carey, but she singlehandedly destroyed melody for a couple of generations as vocal wannabe copiers trying to sing like her and forcing a twist and turn onto every note – a severe defect that I call being “lick happy” — turned melodies into a series of riffs. Oh, get me my soapbox. I’m feelin’ a rant comin’ on!

Enough. I hope you get the point. Bottom line: Proper scanning is crucial to repetition. Repetition is crucial to commercial music. Without each, music is just not memorable and becomes lost in the wash of mediocrity taking over our industry.

Ira Gershwin, Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Lerner, Lennon & McCartney, Billy Joel, Michael Jackson, Alan & Marilyn Bergman, Lorenz Hart, Irving Berlin, Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter – all followed the great traditions of true rhyming and perfect scanning. It’s why their songs are still sung, played and remembered today. These are the masters. Don’t let their discoveries and work slide away in the dissolving of our language into mediocrity.

John Lennon's Original - "Imagine"

Disneyfied Retreads
And then there’s the content… How many more “I want you, I need you, I love you” songs must we wade through? Don’t we, as a people, have anything better to think and sing about? When’s the last time you heard a great song with a new fresh lyric that wasn’t a retread of teenage discovery? Certainly love is a most powerful subject to write about, but can’t we yet find something new and interesting to write about that has a new twist, a new insight?

Every time a new animated film comes out I groan at the feeble attempts of the omnipresent love song in the score. They all sound as if they were written by a room full of people trying to write a hit instead of a one talented pro coming up with an original idea.

R&B music, long the bastion of solid lyrical writing especially in the Motown era, has now sunk to pandering the teenage mind consumed with sexual encounter. I listen to some of these blatant sexual references and wonder if any of the writers of today ever listened to “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes” or “Baby It’s Cold Outside” or “My Funny Valentine” or even “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”. Here were songs that smoldered in their sensuality without clobbering you over the head with blatancy.

Art evokes. Commercialism steamrolls. I’d rather a song tickle my fancy than slap my face. I prefer discovering a rich dramatic moment rather than being deafened by the obvious. Give me a song that stimulates my brain and softens my heart and I’ll carry that song with me in the back of my mind for the rest of my life. After all, isn’t that why we write ‘em?

Summary
Every age has its mediocrity. “Flat-Foot Floosey With A Floy Floy” had its moment in the sun in the 30s but not many of us go around singing it today. But decades are not remembered for their mediocrity. They are remembered for their ground-breaking flashes of brilliance. What will this music generation sing to their kids? “I Want Your Sex”?

My generation sings John Lennon’s “Imagine” and Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, Seals and Croft’s “Summer Breeze” and Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” and The Beatles’ “Let It Be”. I could go on… and I will – Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish” and Earth, Wind and Fire’s “September”, Billy Joel’s…

Even More Inspiration

Spiritual Scientist

Peter Link — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:09:27 +0000

I’m not particularly big on the word “religion”. I find it to be oft times restrictive, non-inclusive and all too often divisive. Though I have studied the world’s religions all my life, it’s not a field that I find myself associating with very often. When anyone asks me if I am a religious person I often answer, “not particularly, but I am a spiritual seeker.”

There’s probably no greater cause of war throughout history than religious differences. The only thing that comes close to it is greed. I choose to stay as far away from the human element of religion in my spiritual practice, which, of course, is rather impossible, but, for me, preferable. We humans (and I count myself as one) have confused the study of God, consciousness, reality, our world, matter, thought, spirit and the universe by dividing into groups and along the way, shutting doors and windows to alternative thought in an effort to protect our own.

It strikes me that religions often are more limiting than creative. They often force the thinker into a box and essentially say, “think this, study this, here is the only truth – shut the rest out.”

If there is anything that I’ve learned in my life’s study of spirituality, it’s that nobody has a corner on truth. Truth is truth. Everybody has access to it. Every religion I’ve ever studied captured and illuminated much truth for me. The only thing that really ever got in my way was the differences in language or the various definitions of words that are tossed about. Most religious differences I’ve found to be based on a confusion of semantics.

So I choose to call myself first a spiritual seeker rather than a religious person. I hope this does not offend you as I approach the writing of this post with the objective of unifying thought as opposed to dividing it.

Wikipedia states, “A scientist in a broad sense is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense a scientist is an individual who uses a scientific method. The person may be an expert in one or more areas of science… Some perform research toward a more comprehensive understanding of nature, including physical, mathematical and social realms… This is distinct from philosophers, those who use logic toward more comprehensive understanding of intangible aspects of reality that lack a direct connection to nature, focusing on the realm of thought itself.”

If we’re to accept these definitions put forth by Wikipedia, then I suppose I’m sort of a scientist/philosopher, a combination of both. I do engage in a “systematic activity to acquire knowledge” and also I do “use logic toward more comprehensive understanding of intangible aspects of reality…, focusing on the realm of thought itself.”

All said and done, I prefer the word “scientist”. I find spirit to be actually quite tangible the more I study it and matter to be less and less the reality. So I call myself a spiritual scientist.

If I am pinned down to name a life religion I admit very freely to being a Christian Scientist. For those who need a specific religious definition of the way I think, that explains it as well as I know how on the religious level. I grew up a Christian Scientist, attended the Christian Science Sunday School and learned the principles of the religion. In my late twenties and early thirties I decided to explore beyond and commenced a 20-year journey of examination of many of the world’s great religions. This journey was primarily the result of some very serious and thoughtful research I participated in the first couple of years of that journey using the drug, LSD.

The controlled research that I and a few friends took part in certainly opened our minds to many things never before considered regarding life, consciousness, reality and matter and launched me into even further study of spirituality in areas that did not include drugs. It became very clear to me that drugs were not the answer, but I will say that they did provide me a fascinating starting point for exploration and launched my bark into immediate waters of wonder and matter/mind-blowing thought.

I then spent a few years as a practicing Hindu and found that religion to be immaculate in its conception, rich in thought, radical in approach and full of truth. Ultimately I found it difficult to practice it as a western capitalist trying to build a career in show business in NYC. I don’t know whether that would be true for me today, but decades ago I then moved on to Buddhism.

For a couple of years I studied the Dhammapada, generally accepted to be the words of Buddha, and found these verses to be elegant truths that rarely differed from the teachings of Jesus Christ. Studying Buddhism was a joy for me because it further substantiated my understanding of the basic truths of Christianity. There were, of course, many unfamiliar words that in the beginning would scare me and actually put me off until I learned to simply explore the meaning of the word. Always these strange words constructed in foreign languages revealed to me truths that I already believed and understood when translated into my own language. Through these studies I learned not to be fearful of words that I did not use or even know and rather look at their strangeness as opportunities to shed new light on spirituality.

I finally came to understand that human language is insufficient to explain the world of spirituality. It simply was not invented for that world. And so looking at spirituality through the various lenses of language became a plus rather than a minus.

I studied Confucianism, Jainism, the Koran, Judaism, Taoism, and Bahá’í through those years of seeking and honestly found that basically, they all said pretty much the same thing, but used different words.

I then, while in my mid forties, began to have a number of serious physical problems for the first time in my life. As I had never been to a doctor, taken medicine or set foot in a hospital, I decided to tackle these physical problems by healing them rather than using the medical route.

I visited a Christian Science Practitioner to elicit his help. We commenced a three-month series of meetings – one a week – where we systematically did a “spring cleaning” on my thinking. One visit we would discuss business ethics, the next, self-confidence, the next, sexuality, and so on. Each week he would correct my thinking and adjust my consciousness of right and wrong. He was merciless and I dove into this cleaning of my attic with him. During the week I would practice what he taught.

After 3 months of these meetings I was a better man – mentally and physically. We never discussed my physical problems at all – only my mental insufficiencies or confusions. I cleaned these up and committed to a better way of thinking and practicing that thought – a better way of living.

In the course of those three months all of my physical problems cleared up and went away. I was healed. There was never any difficulty moving through this experience. It was all completely positive and I enjoyed the challenge of cleaning up my mind and watching the physical ills disappear as a by-product of that mental purification.

I became a practicing Christian Scientist once again. However, Christian Science was then the basis of my thinking, the central core, though not the circumference of my thinking. Since then I have borrowed helpful corrections to thought from all the sources I studied over those years countless times. Again, truth is truth and I had a myriad of ways to investigate it and look at it.

I have never found this mixing pot to be confusing to my practice and demonstration of truth. My spiritual seeking continues to this day – probably more than ever as I grapple with life, and become more conscious of my own spirituality. The more I learn; the more there is to learn.

In the last ten years I have chosen music as my central tool of exploration. As a life work, music is probably what I’m best at. I’ve spent a lifetime practicing, so why not use it as the means to explore the objective of utmost importance. Exploring spirituality through music is really fascinating because music is such a universal language. It is not limited by spellings and strange words, but is appreciated and loved by all mankind.

Music too is a fascinating science. Again, the more I learn; the more there is to learn. The two, music and spirituality, seem to go hand in hand for me. One complements the other. I am a more spiritual man when I’m creating my music and I’m definitely a better musician when I approach the creation of music spiritually.

I am also always at my best as a person when I am in the studio writing, arranging, orchestrating, etc. There I am the happiest, the most fulfilled and the least stressful. Trouble just seem to fall away when I walk into my studio and I find myself doing everything I can in life to get to work musically. On days when the rest of life gets so hectic that I can’t do that work, I struggle. On the days that I work, I am fulfilled.

Still some things to be learned here… )

So I am a spiritual scientist/philosopher/musician. Being a human being is far too often a struggle. Here is where I need to improve and learn to manage life. Here is where I’m still stuck – earthbound. Both The Missus and I now discuss daily how we can approach these issues of humanity more gracefully and productively. Here is where the problems lay. Here is the next plateau of concentration.

In the meantime, however, I have my joy life, my world of peace, creativity and fulfillment to enter into and explore. My gratitude abounds for this space in thought. I am divinely fortunate.

I don’t know what I can accomplish during the rest of my time here on Planet Earth, but I do know that I am committed to this one endeavor only – scientific spiritual seeking through music. Everything else pales in comparison. Eating, sleeping, the laborious minutiae of everyday life all are just things to work through so that my true commitment can be practiced. The human experience is a stepping-stone to the divine. We’re trying to make those steps shorter every day.

Even More Inspiration

I Stood In The Wings… Part 4

Peter Link — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 16:12:22 +0000

This is Part 4. If you haven’t yet read Part 1, 2 & 3, I highly suggest you do so first.

He was a chicken. I don’t mean he was afraid to do things; I mean he was really a chicken. Well, not in all actuality, but he was acting a chicken.

Let me explain.

I was performing at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel Ballroom in some unremembered benefit back in the days when I did such things, and after I had finished my act, the stage manager asked me if I’d like to see the rest of the show. I said that I would and during the blackout and set change for the next act I was quickly led to a front row table right smack at the stage proscenium. I was so close to the next act that the comedian could have stepped on my head if he wasn’t careful.

I was not, this time, literally ‘in the wings’, but I was so up close and personal that it felt like it.

I do not remember the comic’s name, but I will never forget his act. It was hilarious and he kept the audience howling with hysterical laughter for a full ten minutes.

Like I said, he was a chicken. He was totally committed to being a chicken and, of course, he had to be. His act was so ‘out there’ that he would have bombed horribly if he had not been so committed. In it, he chicken-scratched, he rooster-strutted, he hen-squawked, he flapped his wings, he clucked, he gave us the best “cockadoodledoo” I’ve ever heard and he chickened about the stage in a total frenzy for the full ten minutes. What’s more, he wore no chicken costume at all. Just a man in his pants and shirt, but he impersonated a chicken before our very eyes. (Or perhaps he imchickenated a person when he finished his act.)

About the only thing he did that was un-chicken-like was that he sweated. Oh my god did he sweat. This comic was workin’ the house and was chickening so deeply that he must have lost ten pounds in ten minutes. The sweat flew off him like he was in the shower and any number of times flew right on me as I sat, fascinated and wet. I’ve seen men do this in the last frantic minutes of an overtime basketball game, but never such a constant shower on stage – and I’ve never had, before or since, the ‘privilege’ of taking part in anything resembling that shower of activity.

I don’t remember ever laughing. I remember thinking that he was really funny, and being aware of the audience roaring almost continuously, but laugh myself? Not. I was too fascinated with the caloric burn, the intense mad workout and the tsunami-like proportion of his effort as the sweat flew off him like feathers.

I remember thinking that I was glad that I had never chosen to be a comic. For such a funny thing, it’s just hard work! He was a big man, which made his particular chicken character even funnier, of course. He was so committed that I wondered how long, when he finally got off stage, it would take him to transform back into a human being. Perhaps they had a big bowl of chicken feed and water waiting for him back in his dressing room.

After the show, as I too was a cast member, I was hanging out back stage, and had to go see him and thank him for his wondrous performance. He took one look at me and snarled, “Oh, you’re the guy sitting in the front row who never laughed! Wha’ja think this was, Othello?

A comic to the end.

The stage is an amazing thing. It gives permission – permission to the performer to be the center of attention in the room. It contains within itself the power of focus. It says all by itself even when empty, “Here I am. Watch me.”

And yet, get too close and sometimes you can cross the line of demarcation from audience to performer unknowingly. When that happens, life changes dramatically and suddenly you’re on the other side. You’ve moved from a very safe place of being entertained, to a very dangerous place indeed – if you don’t know what you’re doing. It’s a whole other world up there and very few except the elite really understand it and can exist comfortably therein or thereon. I’ve learned to respect it deeply and also respect the great talent, experience and know-how it takes to fill that space with magic.

Many who perform never really get it and it defeats them eventually. Few truly succeed. It’s one of the wonders of life on Planet Earth – the stage. I learned early in life what it takes to be a great performer. I often stood in the wings and watched them, the great ones, and tried to figure out just how they did it. The best one-word answer I can come up with is ‘commitment’. The best are totally committed to that moment in time – to the doing of that moment fully in imaginary circumstances. It ain’t easy. And for those who can actually get the job done, I take off my hat – and watch from the wings.

My most recent experience standing in the wings has been the longest. For the past seven years I have stood in the wings watching my wife, Julia Wade (affectionately known here as ‘The Missus’) change the face of music in the Christian Science Church performing as Soloist every Sunday at its world headquarters in Boston. When she was offered the job seven long years ago she was given the direction by the Board of Directors to lead the music of that church into the 21^st century.

We used to joke that she would take it from the 19^th century leapfrogging over the 20^th and into the 21^st the music was so behind the times.

It was not an easy job. There were many against change of any sort. In the beginning, even some of those closest to her position were against change and fought her in subtle and not so subtle ways. But she persisted with the loving support of the Board of Directors and though she often came under fire for her 21^st century choices of style, sound, instrumentation, techniques of performance and especially choices of material, she was a strong world leader in the movement and won over, by example, most of those who were afraid to change in the beginning. She also, again by example, showed Christian Science churches around the world musically what they could do and how they could do it in their own churches.

The first 3-4 years were especially tough on her. Often there was great resistance and some turmoil, but through a very high sense of prayerful integrity she led the movement of change – sensitively and definitely.

Now, seven years later, music in this church is seen and heard in a whole different landscape. She has been able to hold on to the greatness of the past while expanding the range of music so that all would be attracted to the teachings of the church on a musical level.

Along the way also I have witnessed many who did not appreciate a more modern music in the beginning learn to first accept it and then understand and love it in the end. Not only was she able to make the changes required, but also she was also able to educate as well – education being the panacea for revolution.

And now her time is coming to an end. At the end of April, 2012 she will complete her job as soloist and move on to a wider sphere of audience and peoples. Focusing more on her recording career and international concert career, she will continue to be an inspirational communicator through music and I see her taking the experience of seven years of leadership and performance to an expanded world.

These past seven years I’ve had the great privilege of being the unofficial “man behind the curtain” in this endeavor. As her principal composer and record producer I’ve been able to watch and consult from a bit of a distance and sometimes help her through the shallows and depths of the experience. I’ve stood in the wings and watched, fascinated, as she encountered obstacle after obstacle and moved gracefully forward.

I’ve been grateful and relieved to be able to stay behind that curtain and not have to step out on that stage with her. She’s always been the point man (woman) and taken the heat (and gotten the applause) and I’m fine with that. I’ve learned that standing behind the curtain is where I belong in life. I’m good there. It’s a comfortable place for me and it’s where I’m at my best.

The next four months, as she moves towards her time of closure, I shall stay behind that curtain and continue to encourage, suggest and yes, take notes on how she might do it better. In the meantime, I’m still fascinated in watching greatness evolve from this up close and personal position.

I get to continue to study talent and investigate and explore the amazing craft of performance from my dark protected corner of the stage, there in those wings in the safety of my thoughts and observances.

Many people aspire to the stage. I learned early on in my career that it’s just not my place and I’m good with that. I’m happy to watch and learn and I’ve been very fortunate to stand in those wings.

After all, I’ve had the best seat in the house.

Even More Inspiration

I Stood In The Wings… Part 1

Peter Link — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 23:40:29 +0000

I’ve had the great pleasure of working with some pretty amazing performers in my life – both stage and concert hall. My chosen spot has always been to watch (or work) from the back of the house – usually just about as far from the stage as one can get. After a short, but most successful career as an actor, the lead in Hair on Broadway, the lead in my own Salvation Off-Broadway and a leading role in TV’s soap, As The World Turns, I decided that acting was not my thing and retired to the more comfortable confines of director/composer.

There, I had the opportunity to watch both my own work and the work of some pretty fabulous performers over the years. There, from the back of the house. The greatest of stars figuratively pull those in the back of the house on to the stage – their magnetism or charisma is so great that you feel that you’ve got the best seat in the house no matter where you stand.

But occasionally, when someone gave a performance that was so electrifying as to just bowl me over, I have snuck around backstage, where as a composer or director I was always permitted, and watched, up close and personal, from the wings.

Very early in my career, just out of college, I spent two summers working as a chorus boy of the St. Louis Municipal Opera, probably the largest summer stock theater in the country. For one one-week run they brought in Nureyev and Fontaine, at the time, the two most popular ballet dancers in the world. I, with two years of ballet under my belt and at least knowing first position from second position, was asked to be an extra in their famous productions of Swan Lake and Romeo and Juliet.

One of my claims to fame was that I was actually pinched on the butt by none other than Rudolph Nureyev on stage. Seems I got too wrapped up in my role as dice player far up-stage and did not see Mr. Nureyev behind me trying to make an entrance. Rather than push me out of the way, he simply reached down and gave the surprised young extra a sweet pinch.

But already I stray from my point…

At the end of each performance I would rush around after the company bows and stand enchanted in an isolated spot in the wings and watch Nureyev and Fontaine take their bows. It was there that I learned the purpose of bows and got a terrific lesson from the masters on just how to perform ‘the bow’.

First of all their grace was magnificent. On top of that, their bows were choreographed – two great ballet dancers still dancing long after the performance was over. But what I most remember was their love for the audience. Not only did they absolutely adore the applause, but they let it lift them to new character. They simply knew how to take the applause with humility and great appreciation and love. And the more they loved the applause, the more the audience applauded. And the more the audience applauded, the more Nureyev and Fontaine loved it and loved back.

They created a circle of love with the audience and nurtured it and let it grow and grow until all were exhausted and completely fulfilled.

They were the masters of the bows and I got to watch them sweat and preen and joy and love from about 10 feet away. It was better than Swan Lake.

Early in my career as a composer on Broadway I scored and wrote songs for Richard Wesley’s play with music, The Mighty Gents. In this production there was a young, unheard of actor playing the role of a totally down-and-out street junkie. His name was Morgan Freeman and he was so riveting in this role, that in his big scene each night, I would rush from my place at the sound booth in the back of the house to another isolated wing off-stage and watch him do his ten-minute monologue. I completely fell in love with this young actor then and have loved his work ever since.

In the performance he so climbed inside the character of this wasted man that each night I relived the power of his performance over and over. I laughed, I cried, I stared in amazement as he went through just about every human emotion possible. It was my first up-close experience with a great actor and I couldn’t get enough of it.

For this role, this young previously unheard of actor got his first national recognition as he was nominated for the Tony Award as Best Supporting Actor that year.

I also had the same type of experience this time with a whole company of actors who worked together as a great ensemble in Joseph Papp’s Trelawny of the ‘Wells’ at Lincoln Center with Meryl Streep, John Lithgow, Mandy Patinkin, Michael Tucker and Mary Beth Hurt and directed by A.J. Antoon. I had the privilege of writing the music for this production and, once again, found myself, in certain scenes, standing in the wings, spellbound, as these young actors tore up the stage with their natural sense of comic timing and stage know-how.

I wrote a song for the production called Ever Of Thee I’m Fondly Dreaming which would be sung each night by all the above mentioned people (all extremely musical actors) as Meryl both sang and played the piano on stage. I would stand in the wings and sing along adding my voice to the moment though not my stage presence. It was always a sweet moment and often John Lithgow would give me a wink from the stage to the wings as the audience burst into applause at the end of the number.

These moments of learning the artistry of performance up close and personal shall always be indelibly printed in my memory. They are the perks of my experience far beyond the money made or the awards given. They are the reminders of why I keep trying – trying to get a grasp on greatness – trying to see deeply into the moments of perfection and understand better how they came to be.

If you’re enjoying these memories as much as I am, stick around for Part 2… coming in my next post.

Even More Inspiration

Wonderful

Peter Link — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 06:15:52 +0000

I’ve always loved Christmas songs. Who hasn’t? They are iconic references and symbols of one of, for most of us, one of the real highlights of childhood – and then we get to repeat it all in a slightly different fashion as parents years later. These songs take us through these enchanting times and play in the background like a movie score.

Previous to this month I had only ever written one Christmas song – a song recorded by the Jenny Burton Experience called Christmas In My Soul. They say, in the music business, that the month of June is the month to write and begin one’s Christmas album, the preparation of such to be around 5-6 months. Who can write Christmas songs in June? What a silly notion.

This year the Missus has come up short in her search for the perfect Christmas song for her Christmas Day performance in church. She had decided to employ a terrific Boston harpist and together with her organist, Bryan Ashley, keep it small and delicate in accordance with the spiritual implications of the morning. Last year she used a brass quintet plus the church four manual pipe organ and blew the roof off, so this year she wanted to do something completely different.

But no song came to mind to fit the criteria.

While watching her go through her turmoil, I happened to mention one day several weeks ago that perhaps I could write one for her. This was said in a fit of compassion for her plight while I was in the middle of the mad dash of the final throes of my own CD, Goin’ Home.

Seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, she grabbed at the offer and signed me up. At first I thought, “Oh no, what have I gotten myself into?” Where would I ever find the time to do this?

Then she came up with the notion that not only should I write it and arrange it for harp and keyboard, but that we should also record it and sell it for Christmas. Then she came up with the idea that we should also do the sheet music for it and sell that too and let others use it in their churches for their Christmas services as well. Then she came up with the idea that as long as we were going to do all that, she may as well use the song for her musical Christmas Presence lecture that she does around the country with lecturer, Chet Manchester. This only moved the deadline for all this up by about 2 ½ weeks! “Egads,” thought I. “What have I done?”

So I did it. In the next 3 days Julia will record the lead vocal to the orchestrated track, Craig Wagner, the designer, will design all the packaging, I’ll mix the song, the WFM staff will manufacture about a hundred singles to start with and by Thursday we’ll be selling this song that will receive it’s first performance in St. Louis on this coming Sunday. Whew!

Will we make it? With God’s help, we shall.

It’s a new world. Things like this can be accomplished in a matter of weeks, a matter of days now. The power of computers – the power of Mind.

The writing was fun and accomplished in a matter of 48 hours. Once that was done, I knew we’d be OK. The rest was just a matter of getting’ it done.

Julia directed me to the Bible for my text and chose the tried and true – think Handel.

“And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful”

But I also wanted to shed some new light on the subject – not just rehash George Fredric. Julia suggested that I combine the Bible text with some of the text of Mary Baker Eddy and her thoughts on the life of Jesus. Julia and her big ideas! Using text (non-lyrics) always makes good songwriting very difficult in that text is not metered and has a way of not particularly sounding very musical much less poetic. On top of that the text of Mary Baker Eddy cannot be changed by even the alteration of a comma.

However the text she gave me was poetic to a certain extent so I thought I’d give it a go. I had a great deal more content than I needed to begin with. Julia can have her long-winded moments, so I had to do some clever editing. Always easier to cut than to add. While fooling around with several lyrical directions the line struck me like a lightening bolt — “And his name shall be called Wonderful,”

“What a great idea,” thought I. Call the song Wonderful!

And so I did.

I was on my way…

Here is the finished lyric. In another magical musical week you’ll be able to hear, sing, play, perform, buy and listen to the whole thing through the wonderful world of MIDI, LOGIC, the INTERNET and God’s gift of inspiration.

Hot off the presses!

Wonderful

Text by Mary Baker Eddy
Lyrics adapted from the Book of John
Music by Peter Link

The wakeful shepherd beholds
The first faint morning beams,
Ere cometh the full radiance
Of a risen day.

So shone the pale star
To the prophet-shepherds;
Yet it traversed the night, and came
Where, in cradled obscurity, lay
The Bethlehem babe,
And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Wonderful

The people that walked in darkness
Have seen a very great light:
For unto us a child is born,
And a son is given:
And the government shall be upon his shoulder:

And his name shall be called Wonderful,
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful

Now the Son of man is glorified,
Yes and God is glorified in him.
Verily, he says unto you,
“He that believeth on me,
The works that I do shall he do also;
And greater works than these shall he do;

If ye love me, keep my commandments.
And I will pray the Father,
And he shall give you another Comforter”

The prophet of today
Beholds in the mental horizon
The signs of these times,
The reappearance of the Christianity
Which heals the sick
And destroys error,
And no other sign shall be given.

When a new spiritual idea is borne to earth,
The prophetic Scripture of Isaiah is renewedly fulfilled:
Saying “Unto us a child is born, . . .”
“Unto us a child is born, . . .”

And his name shall be called Wonderful.”
Counsellor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace
Yes his name shall be called Wonderful
Wonderful
Yes he is wonderful
Wonderful!

Even More Inspiration

Phoenix Rising

Peter Link — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 09:43:10 +0000

Note: The following is a compilation of several posts and some new updates intended for newer readers of this blog. Much has been written about our new project, Goin’ Home. If you’ve been following all along, you may find some redundancies here; however, if you’re somewhat new to the project, you’ll find here a summary of events and thoughts that will bring you somewhat up to date.

What if today you could go over to your neighborhood grocery, grab that cart and shop for anything your little ol’ heart desired, then, instead of getting into the checkout line, skip that and just head home with your groceries – steak, shrimp, Haagen Daz, throw in a little Kobe Beef, some chocolate truffles and perchance a tin or two of Almas Caviar.

When you got outside with your overflowing shopping cart, the police would be there, but would just look the other way as you passed by chuckling gleefully, licking your chops.

What a great idea! Why don’t we do this? Food should be free! I think most of us would agree that life would be a lot easier if food were free.

Trouble is, after very little time, maybe the next time we went back to the supermarket, the aisles would be empty, the shelves bare. “Hey, all the food is gone!” you might cry. “Well, let’s go back to the farmers and get more,” the store manager would say.

So we’d go to the farmers and say, “Hey farmers, make more food!” They would respond like this: “Without getting paid, it’s just too hard. Sorry, but there’s just no more food. We’re gonna go do something else.”

Well, essentially that’s what just happened to the music business – except for one problem. Of course the farmers equal the artists in this little analogy and the artists, who love to make music, are still saying, “Oh cool, you like my music? You actually want to listen to my music? OK, I’ll give it to you for free!”

So it’s gonna take a little time before this situation is righted. Give the starving artists a chance to really starve. Then they won’t be able to make any more music no matter how much they love to do it. Cuz we all gotta eat!

We are, today, living in that era of empty aisles and starving artists. The music business has collapsed under the weight of horrible leadership. (The four majors ignored the power of the Internet for so long that now they’ve missed the boat.) File sharing and outright stealing have become the norm for millions of young people.

The unfair treatment of artists by the companies has long been legendary (the companies themselves would always make back all their investment before the artists ever saw a cent of their royalties), and now development money has completely dried up as both the major record labels and the indies struggle for survival. Where would the pharmaceutical industry be without research and development? Nowhere.

That’s the old record business.

But all is not lost. Never before in the history of the world has music been more proliferate. Everywhere we turn, there is music. “The day the music died” is a virtual impossibility. Music is simply that much a part of the human consciousness.

So, as part of the natural order of things, a new world emerges. Out of the ashes of the old one rise new ideas, a more fair treatment of the artists by now paying royalties on first dollar earned, and a cutting edge approach to new ways of approaching fans and customers.

It is a renaissance time in which the artist is now asked to be both business person and artist. Not only must he be able to play his guitar, but he must also be able to understand the constantly changing evolution of the Internet and its powers.

In most cases today, the artist must be his or her own investor, marketing department, graphics designer, videographer, accounting department and retail store. Selling from their own websites, many artists have almost been able to accomplish the near impossible. Where most fail is on the all-important level of promotion. By the time the new music is finished, mastered and manufactured, there usually just isn’t enough money left to promote the product.

So the music sells to a few friends and family and sits quietly on a website among millions of other sites that perhaps receives a hundred hits a month, if they’re lucky. And the music languishes on a virtual shelf.

One thing we know for sure: Acts who tour, sell. Acts who don’t, don’t. So we must tour. Touring is expensive, however, and the money is gone. Often, many artists don’t even get to this point, running out of money before the CD is actually completed. It’s a frustrating scenario.

However, now there is the hope of companies like Kickstarter.com and Indiegogo.com, on-line companies where artists and entrepreneurs with creative projects can raise money through crowd-funding from leagues of possible friends and supporters from around the world.

We are exploring this very real possibility right now with a new CD, Goin’ Home – On Heaven and Beyond to be released in November of 2011 and promises to be an in-depth look at a subject that many of us spend most of our lives avoiding. Here is a joyful, sometimes funny, sometimes poignant, exploration of the transition from this world to the next. It’s really a celebration of eternal life.

The CD’s purpose is to open our eyes to the timelessness of our future. The vision is to take an open-eyed look at an eventuality we all will face one day and face it head on.

The music is drawn from both original compositions, and also from the rich tradition of beloved Spiritual songs and Gospel lyrics from the past hundred years of the American songbook.

Great traditional songs like In Dat Great Gittin’ Up Mornin’, When The Saints Go Marchin In, the title song, Goin’ Home, with Antonín Dvo?ák’s timeless melody, and even Spiritual classics, I Ain’t Gonna Grieve My Lord No More and I Got A Robe all receive new fresh approaches and orchestrations and tremendous performances by a powerful cast of New York session vocalists and guest artists.

The choir alone is worth the price of purchase. Led by double gold album R&B/Gospel vocalist, Jenny Burton, it’s performers comprise an ‘A’ list of world-class back-up singers who have sung with just about every major star in the music business – from Celine Dion to Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Sting, Bobby McFerrin and even Luciano Pavarotti. The list goes on and on.

They are flawlessly organized by vocal arranger, Margaret Dorn, (Bette Midler, Jennifer Lopez, Carly Simon, Michael McDonald, Garth Brooks, Diana Ross) and together create a sound that blends with both a rich meticulous warmth and also can get up and shout down the rafters when needed. They are: Angela Clemmons, Keith Fluitt, John James, Kevin Osborne, Catherine Russell, Vaneese Thomas and Darryl Tookes.

Guest artists joining this gathering of superb talent include: Julia Wade, who with seven Inspirational solo CDs under her belt is Watchfire Music’s best-selling recording artist, Tom Tipton, who served for 29 years as a soloist at Reverend Robert H. Schuler’s internationally famous Crystal Cathedral and has sung for four U.S. Presidents, Barry Danielian, one of New York City’s most in-demand session players recording with such pop notables as Celine Dion, Paul Simon, Bon Jovi, Ricky Martin, and James Taylor, and AHMIR, the #1 most popular R&B group on YouTube with over 50 million views.

We also close the CD with a new song recently penned by Grammy award winning songwriter, Julie Gold, best known for Bette Midler’s version of her song From A Distance which won the Grammy for Song of the Year in 1991. Come To Me As A Bird is a heartbreakingly beautiful new song that is sure to capture the imagination of millions.

Watchfire Music, www.watchfiremusic.com , an Inspirational music company and on-line store, will release this CD and be the machinery behind the product. Without the machinery, it’s pretty much a dead end road no matter how talented you are. That machinery is almost in place. The company is now in the black and running off earnings and no longer investor monies.

However, we’re not a rich organization. We have to find special funding for special projects. This new Kickstarter concept is most interesting to us because we have such a loyal and appreciative customer base. We receive letters every day from people around the world expressing their gratitude.

With the projected Kickstarter money we will hire an Internet publicist, who knows these new and far less expensive ropes very well. We have little overhead. We run our company from virtual offices in four cities across the country over Skype, the Internet and email with a little telephone thrown in.”

It’s a different world, but I truly believe we’re on the cutting edge of it. The Internet is the new way and we’re using it and understanding it. It’s an exciting new Phoenix rising that fascinates me every day.”

So, once again we mount another CD, another show, but with a stronger machinery behind us. With the success of Watchfire Music over these past 6 years during the roughest period in the history of the music business, we have been able to put together a strong on-line presence, a smoothly working delivery system to tens of thousands of loyal customers and have an Inspirational record company and on-line store to back this project.

Let’s be honest here, however. The future of the music business, with all the file sharing and “free music” concepts, is a very tough road ahead. The Internet is the new Tower Records and the hope is that this new and challenging world will provide a new start and a better way.

We’re small, but nimble – perhaps not yet a supermarket, but rather an elegant deli finding it’s way through this new world.

A three-city tour and subsequent Internet webcasts of the live performances are in the planning stages for 2012.

To find out more go to:

http://kck.st/o9vUvR

Even More Inspiration

Chanting/Enchanting

Peter Link — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 18:58:20 +0000

Alan Smallwood

In an earlier marriage my wife at the time chanted the Nichiren-Buddhist mantra “Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo”. She was going through a particularly rough stretch in her life and she would go off and chant in our guest bedroom every day for a couple of hours. She would always emerge from these sessions a different person – calm, centered, and quietly joyful.

I supported this practice at first because I saw that it worked wonders for her and over the couple of years that she chanted, I grew to love the sound of her voice pealing through the house, its mellifluous vibrations casting its positive spell over both our lives and probably even helping our plants to grow and be happy as well.

I think it was the thing I missed about her most when we parted.

Several years afterwards I began to work with a young musician named Alan Smallwood who came into my life at just the perfect time and brought to me in musical terms exactly what I seemed to be missing in my life.

As a musician, I had no real formal training. Most of what I knew came from playing in bands, singing in folk groups and conducting student choirs. I did study drums for several years with a fine teacher as a kid, but that was about it.

So there were many holes in my understanding and knowledge of this amazing world of music and consequently there were many holes in my music. Alan Smallwood, several years younger than I, filled these holes with his genius, his fascination with the then developing new technology of synthesis and became my musical director and arranger/orchestrator for many of the musical projects that I created.

It’s possible that I taught him a few things along the way. He would probably tell you that today in his humble, sometimes self-deprecating manner, but what I really remember from the association is all that he taught me.

‘Woody’, as we lovingly called him, was always a flurry of energy. In normal life that energy would spill out in a myriad of ways sometimes verging on a kind of scattered turmoil; however, when he would sit down at the piano or with his beloved Polymoog Synthesizer, he would turn into a concentrated force of magical wonder as his music poured forth out of his mind and fingers. He would transform before our very eyes into the boy genius that we all knew him to be.

He taught me how to arrange for a rhythm section. He taught me synthesis programming. He taught me how to rehearse a band and get the most out of my musicians and he taught me how to write for musicians and challenge them and trust them. Did he know at the time that he was teaching? Probably not. I learned by osmosis, by watching the kid do his magical thing.

As we both evolved as musicians we began to drift in and out of each other’s lives more and more as I got into the Industrial market and Woody went off to work as a side man with the likes of Lou Reed, Edgar Winter, David Clayton-Thomas of “Blood Sweat & Tears” and also with Marilyn McCoo, Eartha Kitt and Della Reese.

For a couple of decades then we hardly saw each other. He made the root of his living doing radio and television commercials with a jingle house here in NYC and that was a world that I never really ventured into, so our lives didn’t really touch.

But I always knew we were intertwined through the music that we had shared and especially the understandings of music that he had taught me.

Over the past year, “forces” have seemed to be bringing us back together. A phone call here, a possible gig here and there that fell through or got postponed, but nothing really concrete. Just enough to get him back into the back of my mind.

Then one day I received an email from him with a single song MP3. He, still in his humble fashion, suggested that this piece of music might interest me since I was doing this ‘Inspirational thing’. It was cut #2, Winds Of Change from his album called The Far Reaching Sound. I sat mesmerized listening to this beautiful work from my old friend who had obviously grown even more as a musician over the decades.

I immediately wrote him back and said, “Send me the whole CD immediately!”

He did, of course, and Watchfire Music has now added Alan and The Far Reaching Sound to our roster of great music.

Woody’s CD explores the merging of music with the Nichiren-Buddhist mantra “Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo”. In his own description, “the mantra is sung in a similar fashion to traditional chanting. These songs present an aspect of the chanting experience while also taking the listener on exotic musical journeys.”

His description, for me, is totally accurate. The CD has found a continuous home in my computer for the last few weeks now and gets played nearly every day filling our home with its most special music and beautiful chant.

Many of you, our loyal customers, are Christian-based people. Here I ask each of you to keep an open mind and an open heart to the truths of existence. Give this music a listen. Don’t let ‘religion’ be constrictive. Expand your thought and stay open to truth in all forms – in language, style and music. We can all get inspired in a myriad of ways. Here’s one of them. Check it out. It certainly works for me.

Chanting. Try it. It’s enchanting.

Even More Inspiration

Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn

Peter Link — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 16:43:29 +0000

Barry Danielian - Trumpeter

Yesterday I had a blast. Inspirational music took on new meaning as I recorded virtuoso trumpeter, Barry Danielian, here in NYC at Link Recording Studios. I needed a 16 bar trumpet solo for the song, In That Great Gittin’ Up Mornin’ which is the climax song on my forthcoming CD, Goin’ Home – A Gospel Cantata – On Heaven and Beyond.

I had lost my precious musician phone book last year with all its numbers and so I called my friend, guitarist, Chieli Minucci and asked him for a recommendation of a great trumpet player who could play like the angel, Gabriel. Chieli recommended Barry Danielian. When Chieli speaks; I listen. I hired Barry for the gig.

I wrote the first 4 bars of the trumpet solo for Barry to get him started and then gave him the direction to improvise the rest, to keep it Gospel, make it hot, iconic, hotter, joyful, timeless and apocalyptic. Think, in the climax of the solo, Gabriel on acid trying to blow the roof off the moon. I sent him home to listen to the track for a couple of days and he showed up yesterday afternoon ready to go at it, trumpet in hand.

We did 6 takes – each one discussed relating to shape, development and mood. Barry was the perfect partner in crime. He listened, but also brought his great ideas and mastery of his horn to the moment.

As I mentioned, the first 4 bars were written, but I wanted the next 12 bars to be improvised with the last 2 bars of the 12 sliding back down into the vocals. Since this was supposed to be Gabriel, the trumpeting angel of Biblical lore, he’d better be good. Barry was great. He fulfilled the promise, hopes and expectations beyond my dreams.

After he had gone, I took a couple of hours and studied the various takes and composited together the best of the 6 takes into a gorgeous and soaring angelic moment. As I sat back and listened when finished, I found myself suddenly standing triumphantly and raising my arms above my head like Rocky on the Liberty steps. It was a true moment of inspiration.

Barry (blue shirt) w/ Tower Of Power

We talk a lot about inspiration here at Watchfire Music. It seems like we’re always trying to get there one way or another. Well, yesterday we did it, and, best of all, when we got there, we had recorded it for all to experience. That’s the great thing about music. It can do its thing to you over and over. It’s a wonder.

There’s nothing like working with a great musician. It’s not just the way they play, or their mastery of their horn, or their chops that makes them great. What always stands out to me is their ability to listen and to take direction. You’d think that somebody with all that ability would not have to listen, but that’s often what separates the men from the boys – their ability and grace to drop their own ego and listen, to take input, and to collaborate.

Here’s a little more info on this modern Gabriel:

Trained from an early age in his first love, jazz, some of Barry’s most memorable performances have been with such greats as Dizzy Gillespie, Illinois Jacquet, Paquito DeRivera, and Branford Marsalis. Equally valuable in the evolution of his style were some of his first New York gigs, with Latin giants Eddie Palmieri and Tito Puente. Starting in 1984, he toured widely with these bands over a number of years and began an impressive series of Latin recordings with such artists as Marc Anthony and Ricky Martin.

Dizzy Gillespie & Barry Danielian

Barry’s mileage on the road increased in 1985 with the first of several tours with rock fusion giants Blood, Sweat and Tears, and subsequently with Paul Shaffer and the World’s Most Dangerous Band, Queen Latifah, and Jon Bon Jovi. The early 1990s saw Barry on world tours with Latin-pop star Emmanuel and funk legends Tower of Power.

During the mid-1990s, Barry began to realize the reputation he enjoys today as one of New York City’s most in-demand session players and arrangers, racking up more than 200 recordings with such pop notables as Celine Dion, Paul Simon, Billy Joel, Natalie Cole, and James Taylor, as well as with touring partners Queen Latifah and Tower of Power. His Jingle/TV and motion picture credits (for Touchstone, Columbia, and others) from this period are too numerous to mention.

I am deeply privileged in life to work with the best. Yesterday was just another one of those great life experiences of music and creativity.