A free woman in Copenhagen.

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Joni Mitchell, My Old MAn, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, songwriting

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland is a lot of things – a collection of music memorabilia; a monument to the power of songwriters, performers, and record label executives; a pile of history that exits through the gift shop.

During my recent visit there with Shawn and his mom and uncle, I saw many objects, like Michael Jackson’s Thriller jacket; Bob Marley’s hat; Ray Charles’ sunglasses; Gregg Allman’s B-3; Joe Strummer’s Tele; Roger Daltry’s microphone; stunning photos of Aretha Franklin and Stevie Wonder taken by Bruce Talamon – you get the idea.

My favorite things, though, were the tiny windows into the worlds of the songwriters as living, breathing, creative humans moving across the Earth’s surface in pursuit of what is true – lyrics handwritten into college ruled notebooks or onto hotel stationary – the looping and scribbled cursive of Kurt Cobain, Billy Joel, Randy Newman, and many others. One that deeply moved me was this foreshadowing of Joni’s ‘My Old Man’.

Seeing this 50+ year old piece of paper sure got my mind moving:

I pictured a 20-something Joni at the Palace Hotel in Copenhagen, guitar in her lap, pen and hotel stationary on the bed or desk beside her, one lamp on, digging in the post-performance Danish air for the gem that would become one of the most beloved songs on what is arguably her most beloved album.

And she ultimately took out if I’ll come for the recording session, but it persists here, not scratched out. Was she in doubt about Graham Nash, and herself, from the very start of their relationship?

And I wanna know more about what happened that time in London, and about those rock n roll children on that rock n roll Sunday.

And was it in that room where she first sang one of my favorite lyrics of all time? We don’t need no piece of paper from the city hall keepin’ us tight and true.

And look at how the paper was folded, but not neatly – maybe she was checking out of the Palace and in a rush, and the idea was hastily stuffed into her purse or guitar case.

I’ll keep pondering, I’m sure, and I’ll keep digging in the air around me for more questions and answers and hypotheses.

Feeling grief and awe in one’s nose.

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grief, life, songwriting, winter

It’s been really cold here in my neck of the woods lately, and it’s been reminding me of some moments from throughout my life, particularly from childhood:

• the radiator in my second floor bedroom that never worked all that well (despite all of Dad’s earnest tinkering)
• sledding and tubing in ‘The Bowl’ on the Hebron Academy campus and making that trek up the hill again and again and again after every sun-soaked, thrilling ride down
• watching the chickadees hopping about in the snow and feeding on the seed that fell from Mom’s beloved feeders (usually from the crafty hands of the squirrels)
• my feet and face and hands getting so cold from playing outside that stepping into the bathtub or the shower seemed like a form of medieval torture
• nose hairs freezing with every inhalation

This last image is one I remind myself and others of regularly when I introduce my song ‘Starlight’. It was a bitterly cold night that inspired me to write the song, and it’s a story that I’ve told from stage many times—still living in Maine and standing in the driveway and staring at the impossible dome of stars sparkling in the crystal clear night sky, pondering the words of Carl Sagan: ‘We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.’ It was a beautiful moment that I’ll never forget.

The part I’ve always left out of the banter is the circumstances of my life at the time. What my particular part of the cosmos knew at that time was grief—paralyzing grief over the loss of my mother and, with her, the hope that she and I would ever reconcile our deep and devastating differences. I was getting to know grief quite well in those days—because Mom and I had been estranged in the last couple of years of her life, I didn’t know that she hadn’t done anything with any of Dad’s, well, anything. All of his books, clothes, tools, his eyeglasses on the living room table—every last thing he left behind, along with everything of Mom’s, was awaiting my shaking hands and broken heart as I made my way through the impossible task of being the only heir sorting through it all, buttoning up their lives and life together, and cleaning and preparing the house for sale.

Throughout that whole ordeal, I was still working multiple jobs, including my job at the hotel playing piano. I was also grieving something that felt like a long, slow fall into losing my own hopes and dreams—I was longing desperately for expression and sharing of my deepest and most authentic creativity, and at that time, aside from brief glimmers at the hotel or at Norway UU, there was none of it, save for those rare evenings at home when I could work on songs like ‘Starlight’. The night I stood and felt the wave of awe that inspired ‘Starlight’ was a hotel night, and despite my state of utter exhaustion, I allowed myself a moment to put it all down before walking into the house.

And the driveway in which I stood was the one I shared in Fryeburg with an abusive partner who was slowly squeezing the air and the joy and the life right out of me. I’ve blogged in the past about this, so I won’t belabor it now, but the writing of that song—and the rare solitary moments I had to work on it and the others that would become my 2010 Make It Mine album—kept the flame of hope alive in my heart during that dark time.

About three years after that moment in the driveway, I broke free from those tethers of abuse and self-doubt with my heart full of songs and the overwhelming drive to, as I sing in ‘Starlight’: ‘let [my] light shine now for every woman, child, and man’. And though the grief is in remission most of the time these days, the cold January air freezing my nose hairs can bring me right back to that one starry night, drinking in that grief-stricken awe inspired by a world that can so easily and so completely both break your heart and fill it back up achingly to the brim.

Saturday Morning Musings – Remnants of stars reuniting.

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gig, gigs, life, music, musician, singer, singing, song, songs, songwriting, touring

Writing from the road again.  This morning I am in Northampton, MA at my friend Carrie Ferguson‘s house.  She’s a wonderful soul and songwriter.  I fell in love with her songwriting at NERFA in 2012.  Her song “Paris” is an aching ode, mourning the obsession that often overtakes the mind when your lover leaves you.  The first time I heard her sing it, I was hooked.

We became quick friends that weekend.

Last night, we played a show together in Becket, MA at a wonderful gem of a place called The Dream Away Lodge.  We swapped five-song sets all night.  Attentive crowd, snapping fireplace, glowing smiles, full bellies, beaming hearts.

I tried out a brand new song last night.  “Like You’re Already Gone.”  It’s dark and it’s heavy.  The moment that I strummed that last E7 and the applause came, a man said, “Wow, is that your song?”  I told him it was.

It really got to him.

Two nights ago, Shawn, Davy and I saw The Stray Birds in Portland.  Incredible night of music.  For me, my love for them began the first time I ever heard their “Dream In Blue”.

What is it about a song?  The emotional power of just a few chords, a melody and, sometimes, some words; an instrument in the hands of a performer; voices echoing; vibrations rising in the air; ears, minds and hearts to receive it.  All of it remnants of stars reuniting.

All of us singers and songwriters are after that special bit of stardust.  Joni sang about it this way: “The lights go down / And it’s just you up there / Getting them to feel like that.”

Carrie and I captured a little bit of that tonight.  Tonight, we’ll go after it again in Portland, ME, then tomorrow night in Portsmouth, NH.

Then.. in the intervals between gigs, I’m sure we’ll each, in our own way, seek to capture that lightning bug in the jars of our hearts, kindle the flame long enough to set another heart ablaze in another room somewhere, sometime.

I love my job.