On 28 January 2016, the world lost two of the founding members of Jefferson Airplane. The odd part to me is that I’d never heard of one of them, and I consider myself to be a Jefferson Airplane, and even Jefferson Starship, fan.

It’s hard to describe San Francisco in the 1960s. I certainly wasn’t there. (Even if I had been, I would have been too young to understand what was going on.) But the Bay Area was THE place to be in the middle years of that decade. Jefferson Airplane,The Grateful Dead, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and occasionally Young, and Janis Joplin all came out of the same area. 1967 gave us the Summer of Love in San Francisco. There are a limited number of cities that I would love to live in. San Francisco is on that list. In the mid-1980s, I lived about an hour inland from San Francisco and visited it as often as I could. There is something special about the Bay Area. 

I will admit that the earthquakes would scare me off, though. I remember the earthquake of 1989. I was doing laundry while the kids had “quiet time.” (This had replaced naps.) The phone rang. It was my mother. She had been watching the World Series when the screen went blank and the announcers said that a huge earthquake had hit the city. She must have gotten her call through just before the lines became overfilled with worried relatives. She wanted to know if we were safe. I was a little surprised and told her that for us to feel the quake, San Francisco would have to have fallen off into the sea. At that moment, I saw the groundswell. It was like an ocean swell, but through the earth. I saw it coming toward me and felt the earth rise several inches and then it passed on by. I got off the phone and had the kids halfway out the door when the second groundswell hit. We spent quite a while outside before I decided that it was over and that the house was structurally sound. That was close enough for me. 

Anyway, back to Jefferson Airplane. Paul Kantner was one of the founding members. His vocals were one of the best parts of the group. He kept things going after the group fell apart, reforming as Jefferson Starship, and eventually as just Starship. Often, he was the only member of the original band keeping things going. He died on 29 January 2016 of multiple organ failure and septic shock following a heart attack a few days earlier. He was 74.

When I think of female lead singers for the band, I think of Grace Slick. Her voice was what rocketed the band to the mega-success they enjoyed. But Gracie was not the first female lead that they had. Signe Toly Anderson was the first female lead they had. Her voice was similar to Grace’s but lacking the laser beam-power that Grace possessed. Signe also died on 28 January 2016. She was also 74 but died as a result of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

As one of the bands who started the psychedelic rock sound, Jefferson Airplane helped define music in the late 1960s. In 1996, the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and 20 years later, in 2016, they received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

One of my personal favorites is “White Rabbit.” When I was a kid, I had no idea that this song was about drugs. According to Grace, the song is a slap at parents who read Alice in Wonderlandto their kids and then wonder why later in life they do drugs, given the drug use that is rampant in the books. Think about it: Alice is continually drinking or eating things that make her bigger or smaller. And just what is the caterpillar smoking in his hookah? (She also took Ravel’s Bolero as an inspiration in how the song starts simply and keeps building and building. She also borrowed some of his chord structure.) I know that she also loved the books and felt that the white rabbit stands for curiosity. Grace refuses to sing in public these days, feeling that Mick Jagger is making a fool of himself and she refuses to do the same. Now, she paints pictures of white rabbits and has a garden filled with ceramic bunnies.

What stories do you have about Jefferson Airplane or Starship? Have you ever been in an earthquake? Let me know in the comments below. I’ll be playing some of their songs this week on my Minnich Music Facebook page, so check them out.

Until next time!

Why do I love opera so much?

I grew up in a very musical family. Mom played the piano and sang. Dad and my older brother, Hal, both sang and played the guitar. Hal had at some point studied both trumpet and piano, but I wasn’t around for those. (While an amazing musician, he never learned to read music.) I was the family overachiever, I guess, seriously studying voice, piano, and guitar. We would gather in the living room and have musical evenings with Mom or me on the piano, the others on guitar and singing in four-part harmonies. I grew up thinking that every family did that. It was a bit of a surprise when I found out otherwise.

The year that I was nine was a busy one. My school announced that they would be doing Hansel and Gretel in the spring. Hansel and Gretel, besides being a fairy-tale, is an opera by Engelbert Humperdinck, the German composer who was born in 1854 (not the British singer born in 1936, real name Arnold George Dorsey). (Hmmm. . . Word knows how to spell Humperdinck, but Engelbert gives it fits?!?) Anyway, my school was planning on a shortened version of the opera, all in English and with spoken parts as well as sung. 

I was so excited! The auditions were going to be open to all kids 3-6thgrades. I went home and told my folks, and Mom immediately pulled out her copy of “Evening Prayer,” one of the songs that the two titular characters sing. (It is actually a duet, but Mom had it as a solo.) We started work on it that evening. The announcement had not said when auditions would be held, just that it was coming up. So, the music started going to and from school daily with me.

I have no idea how long it was between that first announcement and the second, but it felt like months. It may actually have been a few weeks. 

Finally, one morning came the second announcement, saying that auditions would be that afternoon, but they would only be open to 5thand 6thgraders. I was devastated. I remember working very hard on not crying at school, where I knew the others would make fun of me. But the minute Mom picked me for lunch, the waterworks opened up. As soon as we got home, she hit the phone. Given that this was Mom calling the school, and not Dad, there may have been some yelling. But, when she got off the phone, I had an audition scheduled for that afternoon, just after school.

I went into the old auditorium where the music teacher was. She and I were friendly—she knew me from class. I remember her talking to me for a few minutes to make sure I wasn’t too nervous. I think I was too young to be nervous. It had honestly never occurred to me at that point in time that I might not sing well. It wasn’t an ego thing; it was a youth thing.

When I left the audition, I was in the angel chorus that comes in after Hansel and Gretel sing “Evening Prayer,” and basically just repeat the entire thing. But, since I already knew the song, she also wanted me to help teach it to the other kids, all of whom would be older than me. I often got tapped to help teach music to the rest of the class, so it didn’t really occur to me that the older kids might not like that.

Later that evening, after dinner, the music teacher called the house with the stupendous news. I was not going to be in the angel choir, although she did still want me to help teach it to the others. I was now Gretel. One of only two 3rdgraders in the entire production, and I was Gretel. (The other was in the gingerbread chorus.) (Much to her chagrin, Mom was asked to play the piano, something she did not enjoy doing.)

After the first week of rehearsals, I came home with a new ruffle, one that I knew was not going to go over well. We had to provide our own costumes. My mother hated sewing. In fact, she flat-out refused. If she had to sew then I couldn’t be in the play. Dad came home from work to find her in the living room, fuming and me in my room, crying. (A not uncommon way for him to come home.) But he had an easy solution: he would sew my costume. And he did. (Dad actually taught me the basics of sewing, crochet and cooking. He was far more domestic than Mom.)

The play was a huge success. I had a blast and loved every minute. I had thought about being a librarian, but suddenly singing and acting called to me. Musical theatre—here I come!

Then Dad got tickets to drive up to Pittsburgh to see Puccini’s La Boheme. I had a vague idea of what opera was because Mom and Dad would listen to Mario Lanza, Sergio Franchi, Maria Callas, and Beverly Sills, but this wasn’t really something that I paid a lot of attention to. But I studied the plot synopsis of Bohemeand listened to the few recordings we had. Nothing prepared me for that moment when the very short overture rolls up out of the orchestra pit and sweeps you off your feet. (Yes, I know that you are sitting when this happens.) I remember that Mom was really looking forward to Rudolfo and Mimi, who were an Italian husband and wife, playing the young lovers. But I remember nothing about them. The opera started for me the moment Musetta strolled on-stage. She was tall, thin, dripping with furs, and had two afghan hounds with her. The singer was Patricia Wise, and we were to see her in several more operas throughout the years. 

I knew, at that moment, that opera was what I was meant to do. It had everything that I loved about musicals but even more! And there is something challenging in not only learning a part, but learning the original languages, too.

Was the road easy? No. Was it everything I dreamed of? Good heavens, no! Would I trade a moment? No. Well, the kids howling outside the back door as I practiced as a teenager—I could have lived without that.
I have never played Musetta, although her waltz was the first thing I studied. At 9. A bit young for a full aria, but I was determined. I have played Mimi, and I love her. I mean, really, why turn down the chance to die onstage?

Do you love opera, too? Or do you hate it? Tell me in the comments below, share a story about an operatic experience you’ve had. I’ll be playing some operatic music on my Minnich Music Facebook page, so check those out.

Until next time!

I was four when Simon and Garfunkel released their first album, Wednesday Morning, 3 am. I would like to say that my parents owned the album and that I remember it vividly. I would like to say that. I don’t think that they owned it, and I don’t remember hearing it on the radio. In fact, most people were unaware of the album, and Simon and Garfunkel broke up for the second time and went their separate ways. (They had sung together in school.)

Even if you are familiar with the song, as I hope you are, you might not recognize the original. The version that was released on that album was just the two singers and Paul Simon’s guitar work.

A late-night DJ started playing the song, and it gained a following among the college crowd. On the strength of that, a record executive decided to do a remix. Now, it would be unheard of for a record executive to do anything to a Paul Simon song, but he wasn’t Paul Simon then. Okay, of course he was Paul Simon, but nobody knew his name yet. The executive borrowed Bob Dylan’s band, put electric guitar and drums to the song, and re-released it.

And, thus, over a year after it’s original release, “Sound of Silence” not only made the charts, but topped them, beating out the Beatles song “We Can Work It Out”. Paul Simon wasn’t even in the country—he was performing solo in Denmark. Art Garfunkel called him with the news and sent him a copy of the single. Simon was livid at what had been done to his song. Garfunkel was more sanguine, feeling that if that was what was needed to have a hit, it was fine. However, if you listen, knowing this, you can tell that the electric guitar really doesn’t sound like it fits the song.

Then, a year later, once again the impossible happened. Mike Nicholls used the song as part of the soundtrack for the movie The Graduate. It was unheard of to use a song that had already been on the charts at this time. (In earlier days, music was reused on a regular basis in the movies.)

In 1999, BMI named “Sound of Silence” as the 18thmost performed song of the 20thCentury. (“You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” was number 1!?!?! with the equivalent of 45 years of back-to-back airplay?!?!) It—"Sound of Silence”—ranks 157 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. (I would argue with that title, since it doesn’t include anything by Beethoven, Mozart, or Puccini) Anyway, the idea is that this is a massively important and influential song.

There is a lot of debate about the meaning of the lyrics. The opening lines: Hello darkness, my old friend, I’ve come to talk with you again, Paul Simon says refers to the practice that he had of going into a dark bathroom and sitting on the toilet seat with his guitar to write songs there. Why the bathroom? Because of the wonderful acoustics. And the darkness was just his way of focusing in order to compose. How, or even if, he wrote things down is beyond me. The rest of the song seems to be about our inability to communicate with each other:  

Just a few years ago, in 2015, Disturbed put out my favorite version of the song. David Draiman, Disturbed’s lead singer, received a lot of classical vocal training in his youth as he prepared to be a cantor. (Cantors lead the people in prayer in Jewish synagogues. This is a very important job, and the person must be well-trained.) 
In the early 1990s, there was a group called Extreme. (Actually, I think there still is a group called Extreme, with at least partially the same line-up.) They were a metal band that recorded two acoustic ballads: “More Than Words” and “Hole Hearted”. Those were their two most-liked songs and the two that I loved the most. While there are some rougher songs and groups that I like, for the most part I prefer softer, more melodic work without screaming or shouting. 

This brings me back to Disturbed. I tried to listen to some of their hits. I really did. I even tried to listen to Draiman’s other band, Device. I tried. Not my style. I do agree with the Vocal Coach reaction video where she hears his “Sound of Silence” and likes all of his choices. When he applies vocal fry, at least he does it in such a way as to minimize the damage to his vocal cords. (Oh yeah, vocal fry is always going to cause damage. If you are determined to use it, the best you can hope for is to minimize the damage.)

I first heard Disturbed’s version of “Sound of Silence” while I was driving the car. I loved the way the song built from soft and smooth to loud and raw. It left a deep impression on me. And even though the DJ didn’t tell me who was singing, I kept it in mind so that an hour later when I got home, I could look it up on YouTube. The raw emotion that Draiman brings to this song is arresting. 

Even Paul Simon likes it. When Draiman performed the song on Conan, Simon sent him a congratulatory email. That says a lot.

I’ll be playing this song with a few of the others mentioned in this blog this week on my Minnich Music Facebook page, so check those out. And share any stories that you may have on these songs in the comments down below.

Until next time!
 

I remember when this song came out. Karen Carpenter’s voice was so different from everyone else’s. Warm, and silky smooth, she sounded almost like a singer from the Big Band days. I had a terrible time trying to sing along as she went far lower than I could, but I loved her sound anyway.

The song “We’ve Only Just Begun,” began life as a commercial jingle for a banking firm in California. Written by Paul Williams and Roger Nichols, the company had hoped to attract a younger clientele. It worked, but not the way the bank intended. The young people who ended up coming in didn’t have the money that the bank had hoped for. (Duh.) They pulled the ad.

Fortunately, Richard Carpenter had heard the song and thought that it had potential. He recognized Paul Williams’ voice and contacted him. Not long after, Richard and his sister, Karen, were in the recording studio working on “We’ve Only Just Begun.”

While the song was a wedding standard for far too long, it is at heart a song about beginnings. And I think that it works for the new year. There was a long period of time where I couldn’t stand to hear it. It was so clichéd and overplayed. But, now is a good time to pull it out again.

Often, when my students are working on a song that I know she recorded, I recommend that they listen to her. And she usually grabs them, and they become fans. Sadly, she died in 1983 at the young age of 33. Her heart gave out as a result of anorexia nervosa. Her death brought the condition into the public consciousness.

Here are the lyrics: 

     We've only just begun to live
     White lace and promises
     A kiss for luck and we're on our way
     (We've only begun)
     Before the risin' sun, we fly
     So many roads to choose
     We'll start out walkin' and learn to run
     (And yes, we've just begun)
     Sharing horizons that are new to us
     Watching the signs along the way
     Talkin' it over, just the two of us
     Workin' together day to day
     Together
     And when the evening comes, we smile
     So much of life ahead
     We'll find a place where there's room to grow
     (And yes, we've just begun)
     Sharing horizons that are new to us
     Watching the signs along the way
     Talkin' it over, just the two of us
     Workin' together day to day
     Together
     Together
     And when the evening comes, we smile
     So much of life ahead
     We'll find a place where there's room to grow
     And yes, we've just begun
 
Yup. It works for weddings, but it also works for the new year—We’ve Only Just Begun.

I’ll be posting some versions of this song and other Carpenter hits every day on my Minnich Music Facebook page, so visit there to hear them! If you have any stories about “We’ve Only Just Begun,” or The Carpenters and one of their songs, let me know in the comments section. I’d love to hear from you!

I’ll be posting roughly once a week with a new song. So, if there’s a song that you’d like some background on, or questions about what it means, let me know.

Happy New Year!