Music That Deserves to be Remembered

VegasGeorge

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Performers/Songwriters pass on, and their music fades. We no longer hear it around us, and the memory of it starts to disappear. Dan Fogelberg has been gone now for over 13 years, and it's probably been 10 years since I last heard any of his tunes being played. Frankly, I had forgotten all about him and his music. Then, miraculously, something brought one of his songs back to my attention. "Longer" has such a simple and beautiful melody, and the poetry is nice. I chorded it, and added it to my personal tunebook. Then, I remembered "Leader of the Band," Fogelberg's tribute to his bandleader father. And now I have that one to.

It causes me to wonder, how many other beautiful and worthy tunes are out there that have slipped away from me? How many deserving songwriters have I inadvertently turned my back on? It is food for thought.
 
Unfortunately, there is so much music out there, we are reduced to playing "greatest hits" and forgetting the other songs that weren't quite as popular but are, in actuality, fine pieces of music.

So much music, so little time.
 
After seeing the documentary on Linda Ronstadt "Sound of My Voice" and really seeing the breadth of her work I went back to listen more again. She had such a range in so many genres. I can't think of a singer now that can touch her (and I don't ignore music because it's new. It just has to be good. Autotune is a creation of Satan lol).
 
After seeing the documentary on Linda Ronstadt .... I went back to listen more again.

That exact same thing happened to me about three weeks ago. She was so much better than I gave her credit for at the time. I was pretty dumb back then. I had no idea she sang Gilbert and Sullivan on Broadway, no less!
 
This is why we brought back the song Tiptoe Through the Tulips. When it first came out, it hit the charts and stayed at #1 for weeks and weeks. Such a lovely tune, we do the best we can at it. I hope the younger generations keep it going!
 
I'm reminded of "Yesterday", the recent movie where everyone but a select few forgot the Beatles. We as musicians have a duty to preserve the oral history that is music.
 
A few weeks back I was jamming with Tiki Dave on his Friday Facebook Live session, and he did two songs that I hadn't thought about in ages. They were released in my high school/young adult years, and were two of my favorite artists. Leader Of The Band - Dan Fogelberg, and I Saw The Light - Todd Rundgren. Man what memories those songs brought back. I found the music for the Rundgren tune and played it for an open mic the next week. Such wonderful music that made me so happy to play. It's weird where these little snippets of musical memory come from. Just this week I heard another old favorite on an Air B&B commercial.....Forever Young by 80s band Alphaville. I played it yesterday at the open mic. Wonderful melancholy tune.
 
There has been so much music published over the last 1000 years. Around the turn of last century millions of music books were printed, if you look up Ian Chadwick's library you can get an idea of how many. How do you pick one to play?

Also there is copyright. Some artists, or their heirs, are so protective that the only way to access their work is to effectively steal it. The work ends up being forgotten.

Dan Fogelberg has several songbooks in print, they would be a good place to start re-discovering his music. Even if you are a dreadful player, running through the tune on your uke before listening to the audio can make the experience so much better. If you know the words and the story, the tunes become much more alive.

Linda Ronstadt has lived through some amazing phases of music, but I don't think she wrote any of her own tunes. So you might have a different approach to studying he music. You would be looking at and listening to her versions of the songs.

At our ukulele group we hardly ever play a tune written in the 21st century. We are 21 years into the century, the oldest person born this century is just around 21 years old. They may have produced some music like Billie Eilish, but most will only just be starting out. Who has tried to play Billie Eilish on ukulele, its not easy because of the effects and the way she sings. However, if you buy the songbook and work through the tunes, the music does open up for you and you start to see some genius.

If you want to encourage the young ones, I think you need to get where they are instead of trying to tell them how great it was in 1964, when you had a thing for George. You can buy Billie Eilish songbooks, you can arrange the music for ukulele, but it may not be exactly like Billie's version. Her music is actually not very complicated in some ways. There are other young artists to patronise as well. There are also your artists born in the 1990s you can follow.

Often the process can go that you learn to play a contemporary tunes with some younger people and then they start to look for more repertoire and find Linda Ronstadt and Dan Fogelberg, and you can watch them have the same enjoyment you did when you bought the album and played it for the first time.

“If you want to encourage the young ones, I think you need to get where they are instead of trying to tell them how great it was in 1964, when you had a thing for George.” OMG yes, Bill. Taylor Swift, 21 Pilots, etc., too. Sometimes I want to scream No more Beatles! to my group. And much as I enjoy the occasional flashback, I would gleefully banish all Hits from the 70s and 80s stations from the airwaves. Let’s move on, fellow codgers! However, I am derailing the original post. /rant
 
“If you want to encourage the young ones, I think you need to get where they are instead of trying to tell them how great it was in 1964, when you had a thing for George.” OMG yes, Bill. Taylor Swift, 21 Pilots, etc., too. Sometimes I want to scream No more Beatles! to my group. And much as I enjoy the occasional flashback, I would gleefully banish all Hits from the 70s and 80s stations from the airwaves. Let’s move on, fellow codgers! However, I am derailing the original post. /rant

I have a counter-rant. People should make music. So much of youtube videos is devoted to guitar players/ukulele players emulating perfectly established songs. Yes, that takes some technical skill because you have to go measure for measure and parrot what you've heard. But we are one of the few species on god's green earth that have creativity. So why not use this divine gift? Take two or more chords and make something. Even though I shudder musically at some of the videos of the midnight ukulele disco, I respect those folks much more than I do some youtube wunderkind who can perfectly play a Metallica song
 
When i tried to learn Five Foot Two i was wondering if people disliked it as much in the old days as I dislike Tiny Tim being associated with the instrument I love. Wouldn't it be funny in the future if another civilization found copies of Facing Future and Tiptoe Through the Tulips and didn't realize it was the same instrument?
 
..... and I Saw The Light - Todd Rundgren. .

That is a great song. Rundgren is a good writer and musician. The album Something/Anything where this song appeared also featured Hello It's Me, another classic. That was a really good album. Interesting point- Todd said that I Saw the Light was his attempt to write a song that sounded like Carole King. (speaking of whom, she has an enormous catalogue of hits)

A little while back I heard Jim Croce's song Operator and spent an evening on YouTube listening to his music. Great to have that resource to go down the rabbit hole.

 
Since I brought it up-

A lovely heartfelt song from an artist who was gone way too soon

 
I have a hard time remembering a lot of things nowadays.

But PBS broadcasts (folk, soul, ...) and some Netflix documentaries (like on Frank Sinatra) help. So does my extensive collection of CDs (good CD players are getting harder to buy as mine break down... Mr. Bojangles, House on Pooh Corner, Me and Bobby McGee...). Uke groups and meetups certainly help (Broadway melodies theme, The British Invasion...). And I have intended for years to buy another turntable to start playing my LPs from pre-Walkman days.
 
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I have a counter-rant. People should make music. So much of youtube videos is devoted to guitar players/ukulele players emulating perfectly established songs. Yes, that takes some technical skill because you have to go measure for measure and parrot what you've heard. But we are one of the few species on god's green earth that have creativity. So why not use this divine gift? Take two or more chords and make something. Even though I shudder musically at some of the videos of the midnight ukulele disco, I respect those folks much more than I do some youtube wunderkind who can perfectly play a Metallica song

I copy because I don't have the songwriting or music writing skills. Wish I did. Maybe someday ill have a better grasp of music theory to put a tune together. I just can't hear lyrics pop into my head either. I'm at least trying to play some extra riffs or whatever to not make a song sound identical to the original.
I'm glad someone else mentioned the Beatles can't handle them.
 
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This... and Dan Fogelberg...at least I was lucky to see the latter live...
As time marches on and the universe of music (& music distribution) grows vaster and the world grows more complex, will voices like these guys ever bubble up for the world to discover...
 
Sidebar... stunning to read, let alone imagine...
The loss of Jim Croce was tragic to so many, but likely none more than son AJ...

"A. J. Croce was just eight days shy of his 2nd birthday when he lost his father, but that would not be the last tragedy he would suffer. Two years later, he became blind in both eyes as the result of abuse by his mother’s boyfriend. He eventually regained vision in his left eye. In 2018, A. J. Croce lost wife and muse, Marlo, of 24 years to a rare heart virus. Through it all, music has always brought the younger Croce solace. He taught himself how to play the piano and wrote his first song at age six."
https://www.culturesonar.com/being-jim-croces-son-heartache-and-heritage/

Since I brought it up-

A lovely heartfelt song from an artist who was gone way too soon

 
My two cents. Growing up a in the 60's and 70's I have been a big admirer of Billy Joel. I can tell you exactly where I was the first time I heard Piano Man on my car radio. My ears perked up.
We all know the hits and they're classics. I've gotten to hear Billy live a few times and his shows were always great. He actually gave me a thumbs up at the New Haven Coliseum once. I was wearing a NY Yankees shirt and he was pointing at me while giving the thumbs up.
My personal favorite are songs that he generally doesn't perform live. At least I've never heard him do these in concert. Rosalinda's Eyes, my all time favorite. Beautifully written. Roberta is a close second. Third is a song from Nylon Curtain called She's Right On Time.
Today is also James Taylor's 73rd Birthday. One gem by James is Mona. Poignant song about a pet pig.
 
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This kind of makes me laugh. We just had this exact thread show up yesterday on the Linda Ronstadt fB page I follow. I listened to a few new ones and there was so much auto tune I went screaming lol. Auto tune is a device from satan to cover bad voices.
 
My Roadtrip/Oldies playlist - Eagles, Stephen Bishop, Bonnie Raitt, Boz Scaggs, Cat Stevens, Earth Wind & Fire, Kathy Mattea, Loggins & Messina, James Taylor, The Allman Bros. Band. This past summer I made an all day trip from Salt Lake City up to Corn Creek/Salmon River in Idaho. I arrived hoarse from singing along to this playlist, but so darned happy!
 
I'm reminded of "Yesterday", the recent movie where everyone but a select few forgot the Beatles. We as musicians have a duty to preserve the oral history that is music.

Yep. Great movie!
 
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