Sparks from the Fire

OK, so I’m going to talk a little bit today in generalities.  OK, so there are still great songs being written, still great craftsmen out there who really know what they’re doing, still great records being made.  I’ll allow you all this right from the get go, but I think our industry, besides the death of the record business, is in a serious creative low as well.

Sonically, we’re at an all-time high.  The ability to capture the actual sound of the instruments in perfect, pristine quality has never been better.  Those who still grumble about the “coldness” of digital just haven’t been really listening lately.  The advancement of processing power and ram in computers has finally caught up and now the warmth of analog is back.

But much of the rest of the creative part of our industry is mired in mediocrity.  I blame this on humanity and our penchant to always try to attain perfection the easy way.   Nothing wrong with that except when it doesn’t work.

I just wrote a 7-part blog post (The IRA Awards) on great lyrics just to remind us of what could be, of the greatness of craft, of the delight of a well-lyricised song.  I write “remind us” because I think we’re losing track of a great tradition – the well written lyric.

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Irving Berlin - Playing the black keyes

Great songs have long been a deep and rich part of the American culture and consequently the world culture as well.  I can safely say that it would be any composer/lyricist’s dream to someday write a classic – a song that is so universal and so iconic that it becomes a part of the fabric of history and lives beyond its time.

This century’s, no make it this millennium’s Ira Award for Best Lyricist of classic songs goes to Irving Berlin.  Of course he was also the composer of these songs as well.

The story goes that Mr. Berlin, who had small hands wrote most of his songs in the key of F# because he preferred to play on the black keys of the piano where the stretch was not so large for his fingers.  Later in life, when he could afford it, he had Steinway make him a special upright piano with a large crank on the side that when turned, tightened the strings and thus changed the sounding key of his F# fingerings – sort of a guitar capo for the piano.

This man had his fingers not only on the piano but also on the pulse of America like no other lyricist since.  Among the many great classic songs he wrote were “Alexander’s Ragtime Band”, “Easter Parade”, “White Christmas”, “There’s No Business Like Show Business”, “God Bless America”, “A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody,” “Always”,  “Puttin’ on the Ritz”, and “What’ll I Do”.

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Welcome to Part 2 of the Ira Awards!  If you have no earthly idea of what the Ira Awards are, then go to Part 1 and find out.  Besides, who would start anything with Part 2?

Joni Mitchell-Self Portrait

If you’ve already read Part 1, then welcome back!  Tonight let’s start with Joni.  In Part 1 I opened with the expression “A poem doth not a lyric make”.  Joni Mitchell, in my book, comes the closest to writing poetry that works as lyrics.  It is her genius to do so.  Even though she can make it work sometimes, I still wouldn’t try it if I were you.  Joni Mitchells only come along once in a lifetime.

Joni writes a lot like Paul Simon – she paints an impressionistic picture.  She is a poet at work on a lyrical canvas.  She sometimes tells a story, but that story often just has splotches of through line and she leaves it up to the listener to fill in the blanks.  She is also, you may already know, an accomplished painter whose work often graces her album covers.

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I learned my craft as a composer/lyricist writing for the theater.  It’s probably why I write a lot of story songs.  I worked and studied as an actor and that also gave me my own interesting slant on song writing.  I try to write from my own particular corner on life, but sometimes I can write from a particular character perspective that is not me – though even in those songs there’s always an essence of me in them even if they are of another character.

Mary Magdalene-El Greco

I sometimes like to write from the particular perspective of the singer for whom I’m writing.  In the case of Julia Wade, my wife and Watchfire Music recording artist, this is particularly true.  Because I know her so well, sometimes I can get inside of her and see things from her point of view.  Before writing this kind of a song for her, I’ll usually discuss the moments in depth with her and glean from her feelings all that I can.  Then I know that when I’ve finished writing the song, she’ll naturally have a real affinity for it.

Julia’s long been fascinated with Mary Magdalene and has spent countless hours researching her life on line and reading books about her.  She was deeply into the discoveries, revelations and suppositions brought out by Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code” long before the book came out and fueled the imaginations of millions around the world.

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I sat in my chair overlooking the sea.  Julia slept a heavenly sleep.  The Jamaican morning dawned grey and then pink, then red, then orange.  The sea was glass.  The air, sweet with palm and sea salt, mango and hyacinth.  The quiet, uninterruptible.

The opening chords on my guitar could not help but reflect the moment.  I took the wings of the morning and I dwelt in the uttermost parts of the sea.  I was there with my lyricist partner, David, as he wrote these words centuries ago.  The music of the song poured forth.

Once upon a time there was a genius songwriter named David.  He was quite a guy — shepherd, warrior, womanizer, king — but his real legacy is his songs.  They’ve been known worldwide not for decades, not for centuries, but for millenniums.  Over a hundred and fifty of them have been preserved down the centuries in the greatest selling book of all time.  Unfortunately the music of these songs was lost, but the lyrics remain.

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