Some songs take 20 minutes to write – others take 20 years. California Sun is one of those twenty year songs. It was originally written as a slow tempo acoustic song intended to be recorded as such. At some point in time, it took on a life of its own outside of my control. Recorded at the infamous Sound 80 studios in Minneapolis in the early 1980s, I admit that I never liked this version. It was too fast and too overproduced for the mood and expression of what I originally intended. It goes without saying that the arrangement, recording and musician performances were all stellar and very much a reflection of where the industry was at the time. Looking back I can appreciate all that went into it.

Jump ahead a few decades and California Sun became The Letter on my CD Blue Companion. In the intervening years, I wrote a final verse which really closed the chapter on that part of my life and completed the story of that song. My friend and musical compadre, Lonnie Knight, completely understood how this song should be treated and arranged and performed it as I had originally envisioned. He was able to interpret the song’s intention through his extraordinary acoustic guitar work and supporting vocal.

I’m grateful to have both versions of this song, and to the musicians that contributed to each rendition. I’m also grateful for having time and distance to reflect on the evolution of this song.

CALIFORNIA SUN

Living in the California sun, waiting to be born again
Waiting for the strength you thought would come
Ah, but you’re just tired and worn again
Even Mother Ocean she can’t help you now
And the change of scenery doesn’t matter after all
Feelin’ like a Shepard who has lost his only sheep
You are lonely
You tell me that you’re older now and you don’t need to weep
Hey, you don’t fool me

Starting out anew you leave behind the Minnesota winter
But memories still linger in your mind
So you think you’ll write a letter
Even if I wanted I can’t help you now
But the feelings that I have don’t matter anyhow
Time has left us standing on our own two separate shores
We are strangers
I have my own life to live and I know that you’ve got yours
It’s for the better

I see the lights within your city
Fading from view
And now I wonder do you see me
The way I see you

Living in the California sun…

©Crocus Hill Music 1980

My father lived to be 94 years old. He was a man far ahead of his time with a vision for what could be rather than what was.

The first thing you noticed when you drove up to Joe’s home was that it was not shaped like any other on the block. In fact, it wasn’t shaped like any other on almost any block. Joe divided the world into round house people (those that lived in a geodesic dome) and square house people. For him, round house people were different because they could see the world from another vantage point; one where people lived their lives with concern for our environment, using our precious resources judiciously; one where everyone has the healthcare they need, and food to eat; but equally importantly to him, a world where everyone could afford to own their own home. He said that owning your own home instilled a sense of pride in oneself.

Our dad was a man who was born 100 years too early and wanted to live another hundred more. He wanted to build one more dome, read one more book and share a meal with one more friend. Joe left us all with a legacy of passion, independence, Irish stubbornness, and a philosophy that we all should treat each other with kindness and love. He loved us all. He gave to me strength of will along with that Irish stubbornness, and taught me that no matter who you are in this life, if you live what you believe in, treat one another with respect and share your gifts with the world, you will have lived a good life. Our father was a good man who indeed lived a good life.

The chorus for this song was born on a night when the wind was whipping outside my window and lightening was cracking open the sky. My father had just been hospitalized and I knew what lay ahead for him in his final days and I did not want to face it – either for him, or myself. He was my father, but he was my friend and my inspiration. Like so many songs of mine, it took it’s own turn, but the seeds were born of the pain that we all experience from having to face inescapable loss: loss of family, loss of freinds, loss of loved ones.

This song features the beautiful guitar and vocal work of my co-producer and musical compadre, Lonnie Knight and the stunning mandolin work by Peter Ostroushko.

REFUGE

Late at night I see the lightning flashing
‘Cross my eyes it burns into my brain
Hold me down and keep my faith from crashing
I need a way to face this rain

Once I had a true companion
Like a nested bird within a tree
But in time all things abandon
What it is that sets them free

And there isn’t any refuge, there’s no one to rescue me
In the end’s it’s love’s betrayal
That plunges deep beneath
The ocean of my heart and mind
And I cannot find relief
No there isn’t any refuge, no one to rescue me

 You can never tell how love will happen
Right between the eyes or soft and slow
Draw a line and it becomes misshapen
Through traces of the afterglow

I close my eyes and I can almost hear it
If I listen only with my heart
I know in time I’ll find a way to bear it
But leaving is the hardest part

And there isn’t any refuge, there’s no one to rescue me
In the end’s it’s love’s abandon
That plunges deep beneath
The ocean of my heart and mind
And I cannot find relief
No there isn’t any refuge, no one to rescue
You and me again
There is no refuge  there is no refuge
Outside of me
There is no refuge

Refuge is available as a single digital download and on the CD Blue Companion.

It’s always a gift when the feeling instilled by another songwriter’s composition inspires me to write a song based solely on my emotional response to that song. It’s hard to explain, but that was the case with Galileo.

While on a writer’s retreat in northern Minnesota, I was introduced to the music of singer/songwriter Patty Larkin by another writer from New York. I was immediately taken with Patty’s music – especially her lyric content and wonderful acoustic guitar work. One of her songs was a haunting story about a sailor who dies at sea. I was drawn to the hypnotic feel of her guitar work and found myself experimenting with finger picking patterns in open tunings that engendered that same hypnotic feel.  However, instead of trying to create a rhythmic roll of the ocean, I found my patterns projecting me into space.

I had just finished reading a biography of Galileo and his life story was still very fresh in my mind. Despite his brilliance in mathematics, physics and astronomy, the Catholic Church placed him under house arrest for the last eight years of his life for what they considered to be his heretical position that the earth was not the center of our universe.

I took 359 years, but In October of 1992, Pope John Paul II issued a formal apology on behalf of the Catholic Church for their wrong doing.

It is truly amazing to me that despite advances and discoveries over millenium, we still have disbelievers in science. I think Pope Paul may have summed it up best:

“An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie, for an excuse is a lie guarded.”

Galileo

I am Galileo and I am earthly bound
While heavenly bodies circle round and round
I feel just like a rock that’s imbedded in the ground

Sometimes when the moon is right
You can see a woman’s face
Illuminating all the hearts in space
While we struggle on this coil in this inhuman race

Haunted by the moon, bound to the sun
Is it written in the stars
Who we are and what we will become

Like Lucifer the Angel
Caught in a graceless fall
The gravity of sin still pulls us all
Weighted by the world, can heaven hear the call

I am Galileo and I am earthly bound
Galileo Galilei, Galileo Galilei…

Galileo is available as a single digital download and on the CD True Heart.

My music has been streaming on several sites for quite some time now, and I’m always fascinated by which songs generate the greatest response from listeners. One of the most consistently popular songs is “Could’ve Had Me”. This was written when I was fairly immersed in the Nashville writing scene, crafting songs that were more commercial than what I had previously written. I’ve always wandered more towards the introspective-singer/songwriter genre, so this was somewhat of a departure for me at the time.

This particular song was intended to be an homage to all those girls (or boys) that had an unrequited love early in life only to find years later that the person of their fantasy had not quite turned out to be who they had imagined. My hope was that this song would be a testament to the personal power and strength that we all possess and to not let anyone else define who we are or determine how we actualize our happiness. It all starts inside.

What I’ve always loved about this piece is the hard drivin’ band, and in particular, the guitar parts by Brad Heck. At the time, my husband Richard Grossman and I owned a small studio in St. Paul, Minnesota where we wrote, produced, recorded and enjoyed creating as much music as we could cram into our daily lives. To our delight, an unsolicited demo tape arrived in the mail one day from a young guitar player from Ogden, Iowa. We were totally blown away by the energy, skill and obvious joy in his playing. It was just the style we were looking for to push forward on our country-tinged tunes. Brad contributed his talents to several tunes on my self-titled first release and was instrumental (non pun indented) in helping me realize my next CD, True Heart. Some of the tracks from that project were recorded at his studio in Ogden. Brad is a great musician and I’m grateful for his talents and continued friendship through the years.

COULD’VE HAD ME

Spendin’ all your time staring at the t.v. screen
While your wife does her nails and reads her Glamour magazine
You can try but you cannot hide behid the football section of the T.V. Guide
And life ain’t what it seems

Now you day dream and dream at night, wishin’ on a star for a better life
Spendin’ all your time thinkin’ what it used to be
You could’ve done better, you could’ve had me

Ain’t it funny how today turns to yesterday
And in the blink of an eye tomorrow slips away
You never had time for me and you, I just couldn’t wait, no I had to choose
And life just passed you by

Now you day dream and dream at night, wishin’ on a star for a better life
Spendin’ all your time thinkin’ what it used to be
You could’ve done better, you could’ve had love, real love
Not just the kind you’ve been dreamin’ of

Now you day dream and dream at night, wishin’ on a star for a better life
Spendin’ all your time thinkin’ what it used to be
You could’ve done better, you could’ve had me

Could’ve Had Me is available as a single digital download and is also included on the CD True Heart.

Timothy McConnachie: oil on canvas

I had the pleasure of being introduced to the work of Australian artist Timothy McConnachie through a talented local artist and friend, Trish Toro, some years ago. Trish and her husband Bill, along with myself and my husband Richard, sponsored a gallery exhibition for Tim in Minnesota. Tim was a relatively new artist and his work had an enormous impact on all of us; I was especially taken with his paintings that featured women and music – no surprise! Blue Companion was one of the pieces shown in his exhibition. What struck me most about this piece was the intimate relationship between the subjects. I felt the seeds of a song the first time I saw it. I wanted to create that same sense of intimacy through music that this painting evoked in me.

During his visit, Tim and I took a walk in the beautiful regional park near our home. The sun was filtering through the trees and for some reason the line “filagree of light and shadow” popped into my head. I started working on this song, most of which was written while I was driving in my car. As a result, I had an a capella song – lyrics and meldoy, sans instrumentation. I tried several versions on my guitar, but never felt that my chord progressions supported the melody line. That’s where my friend Lonnie Knight came in. Lonnie was the co-producer, along with my husband and myself, of a CD we were working on at that time. I asked him if he had any arrangement ideas and of course he took that ball and ran with it. He felt his arrangment called for the unique classical guitar stylings of Michael Johnson, a world renown musician and friend who had moved back to the Twin Cities from Nashville. The recording session was absolutely magical with Michael on the classical guitar and Lonnie playing his haunting electric. After the session I knew that this was the title cut for my CD.

Both Lonnie and Michael passed away in 2017, leaving an indescrible hole in the music community as well as in the hearts of all who knew them. It was a priviledge to work with them both and I will always treasure this song.

I’m also fortunate to have the art work for Blue Companion in my home. I look at it every day with great fondness and think of my dear friends Lonnie and Michael, and of course, my talented mate, Tim.

Blue Companion

The summer trees outside my window, filigree of light and shadow
Fall across my face and leave a melancholy trace of madness
I watch the moon begin to rise now, all too soon, it sets before my eyes close
I see another day begin it brings my solitary friend

And you are my blue companion
Take me far beyond the rainbow’s end
Fly with the heart’s abandon
On wings of my blue companion

A single flower of summer fading into dusk, the light receding
Shadows whispering surrender of a heart so bruised and tender
The autumn sky gives way to the winter, we’ll survive facing together
Every love that’s been untrue, we’ll find a way to start anew

Cause you are my blue companion
Take me far beyond the rainbow’s end
Fly with the heart’s abandon
On wings of my blue companion

Facing fear and never knowing what tomorrow is unfolding
Tender touch upon my shoulder sharing secrets growing older

With you as my blue companion
Take me far beyond the rainbow’s end
Fly with the heart’s abandon
Far beyond this world of sorrow lies the promise of tomorrow
You are my blue companion
Yes, you are my true companion

Blue Companion is available as a single digital download and on the CD Blue Companion.