Category: Music

Celebrate Each Day with a Song ~ Southern Cross

Celebrate the magnificence of the seas. How long ago, how many lifetimes passed before our ancestors evolved out of the waters and learned to navigate on land. Mariners have taken to the sea in rafts, barques and sloops moved by the winds and tides to destinations far beyond the horizon. How small we are out there and outrageously brave to ride the waves and steer by the stars. It must be the call of the old self that draws us to sail. We may have evolved into a land species, but never lost the mesmerizing love of being at sea.This song, recorded by Steven Stills and Graham Nash in 1982 captures the glory of the sea in it’s melody. The lyrics tell the adventures of Music and crew as she sails through the southern seas. Life is turbulent for the sailor, love has come, love is lost. Solace is found in star light.

Crosby, Stills, and Nash are so fine and rare a musical group. It’s easy to feel Stills enchantment in his voice. What flows through them is the kiss and hiss of surf. Southern Cross rolls with the lightest acoustic instrumentation. The chiming guitars are the wave crests. The harmonies are mellow, comforting and marvelous. Why is it when I hear their songs, I feel at home?

A song that celebrates the human effort to realize we are a part of it all, “Cause the truth you might be runnin’ from is so small, But it’s as big as the promise, the promise of a comin’ day”

Hail the great seas, the great Crux, and the greatness of Crosby, Stills, Nash (and Young).

The Southern Cross

Got out of town on a boat goin’ to Southern Islands
Sailing a reach before a followin’ sea
She was makin’ for the trades on the outside
And the downhill run to Papeete

Off the wind on this heading lie the Marquesas
We got eighty feet of the waterline nicely making way
In a noisy bar in Avalon I tried to call you
But on a midnight watch I realized why twice you ran away

Think about
Think about how many times I have fallen
Spirits are using me, larger voices callin’
What Heaven brought you and me cannot be forgotten
Around the world (I have been around the world)
Lookin’ (lookin’ for that woman girl)
Who knows she knows (who knows love can endure)
And you know it will

When you see the Southern Cross for the first time
You understand now why you came this way
‘Cause the truth you might be runnin’ from is so small
But it’s as big as the promise, the promise of a comin’ day

So I’m sailing for tomorrow my dreams are a-dyin’
And my love is an anchor tied to you (tied with a silver chain)
I have my ship and all her flags are a-flyin’
She is all that I have left and music is her name

Think about
Think about how many times I have fallen
Spirits are using me, larger voices callin’
What Heaven brought you and me cannot be forgotten
I have been around the world (I have been around the world)
Lookin’ (lookin’ for that woman girl)
(Who knows love can endure)
And you know it will
And you know it will

So we cheated and we lied and we tested
And we never failed to fail it was the easiest thing to do
You will survive being bested
Somebody fine will come along make me forget about loving you
And the southern cross

Songwriters: Michael Curtis / Richard Curtis / Stephen Stills
Southern Cross lyrics © Music Sales Corporation

Celebrating Each Day with a Song ~ Catch the Wind

Music is sacred when voices and instruments blend with perfect pitch and harmony. The mind is such a complex and riveting place, generating new thoughts, fears and ambitions by the second. How it loves to lead. Music, it is in music that the spirit asserts its forlorn self. The soul rises to carry us away from the darkest hours.

The sweetest sound ever heard may well be a performance by Joan Baez and her sister Mimi Farina, singing Donovan’s “Catch the Wind”. Hail the grace of women and the simplicity of pure, beautiful music.

“Catch the Wind”

In the chilly hours and minutes
Of uncertainty
I want to be
In the warm hold of your loving mind.
To feel you all around me
And to take your hand
Along the sand,
Ah, but I may as well try and catch the wind.

When sundown pales the sky
I want to hide a while
Behind your smile,
And everywhere I’d look, your eyes I’d find.
For me to love you now
Would be the sweetest thing,
‘T would make me sing,
Ah, but I may as well try and catch the wind.

Diddy di dee dee diddy diddy,
Diddy diddy diddy dee dee dee.

Celebrate Each Day with a Song ~ La Gatta

In May of 2017 I took a second trip to Italy staying for two weeks in Lucca old town. Lucca is in Tuscany Province near Pisa and about an hour from Florence. The Tuscan hills can been seen all around the city and bring cooling breezes every afternoon. The aromas of roasting coffee and jasmine in bloom will forever remind me of this spectacular region in Italy.

During the first week in Lucca, I took Italian lessons and we learned the “imperfetto” verb tense. This tense is used to express things that happened many years ago. This song by Gino Paoli, was used to teach imperfetto.

Cats are a favorite companion and what fun it was to bring this “souvenir” back home.

Here are the lyrics with English translation.

La Gatta (Italian)

C’era una volta una gatta
che aveva una macchia nera sul muso e una vecchia
soffitta vicino al mare con una finestra
a un passo dal cielo blu.
Se la chitarra suonavo
la gatta faceva le fusa ed una stellina
scendeva vicina vicina
poi mi sorrideva e se ne tornava su.

Ora non abito più là tutto è cambiato,
non abito più là ho una casa bellissima
bellissima come vuoi tu.
Ma io ripenso a una gatta
che aveva una macchia nera sul muso a una vecchia
soffitta vicino al mare con una stellina
che ora non vedo più.

La Gatta (English)

Once upon a time there was a cat
with a black spot on her muzzle and an old
attic by the sea with a window
steps away from the blue sky.
If I would play my guitar
the cat would purr and a little star
would come down really close
then it would smile and go back up again.

Now I don’t live there anymore everything has changed,
I don’t live there anymore, I have a beautiful house,
beautiful, as you want.
But I think back to a cat with a black spot on her muzzle, to an old
attic by the sea with a little star
That I don’t see anymore.