Describing the American singer-songwriter Tom Waits is not an easy task. I am thrown between calling him controversial, bizarre, or brilliant (Lady Gaga move aside…). And I still haven’t decided whether or not I like his music. I believe, it may be an acquired taste.

Well, this yet another adventure tour through the fairyland of musical history. For many, many years I do have a CD containing the greatest hits of Ralph Mc Tell, and, besides his most famous song, Streets of London, there was one song that caught my attention, and that song was Hesitation Blues.

January 30th marks an anniversary in recent Irish history that most people living outside of Ireland and the Northern Provinces recognize only through a famous U2 song, Sunday Bloody Sunday. Unfortunately, the song is still misinterpreted as a “rebel song.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The band was aware of the controversial nature of Sunday Bloody Sunday, that its lyrics might be misinterpreted as sectarian, and possibly jeopardize their personal lives.

Whenever I hear Lonestar’s song on the radio I can’t help but yell, “You gotta turn off that air-conditioning!”, very much to the dismay of my wife, who loves country music. Now, she can’t listen to the song without thinking about air conditioners, which is even worse.

Growing up as a teenager in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and loving contemporary pop music, I saw the release of a great number of songs that have not lost their popularity up to this day. One of these songs is Catch The Wind by Donovan Leitch.
Donovan (Donovan Phillips Leitch, born 10 May 1946,
[continue reading...]

Imagine a young boy of sixteen, working in a factory in Germany, listening to a song on the radio, a song he had heard before, but not sung by a young woman. She had a beautiful, slightly smokey, but strong voice. “Who is this?” he asks another young worker. The answer comes quickly and briefly,
[continue reading...]

I remember the story of an inexperienced TV show host who was about to have Elton John as a guest. Somewhat nervous about meeting such a celebrity he asked some TV veterans for advice. “What should I do with him?” he asked. The answer was easy: “Just give the man a piano.”

Loreena McKennitt does write her own songs, but she also adapts traditional songs or turns historic poems into music. One extraordinary example is her adaptation of The Lady of Shalott, a Victorian ballad by the English poet Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809 – 1892).

I have to admit I get easily bored with the repetitive music of the local radio stations. What’s even worse is the totally mindless babbling of the various morning show hosts. There are exceptions, of course, but only very few. One morning, during a drive to the nearest Panera Bread, I discovered a tape in
[continue reading...]

Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
‘Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again
No, don’t get excited! This is not a previously undiscovered poem in the Harry Potter series. But…what is the connection between Albus Dumbledore and the above shown, silly
[continue reading...]