June 28, 2023 (Song #2006): “I’m Lucky” by Joan Armatrading (1981).  No lyric video today; instead click on “more” below the video to see the lyrics and sing along. T-36* brings me to the 1986-1987 year and a summer visit to Moab, Utah, where Cassie & Marcus & I went hiking and I couldn’t stop singing this song; it’s definitely my theme song. 

Very soon after coming home from Utah, I tried to get a job at Columbia Records, but, since I couldn’t type, I never made it past the introductory interview (but thanks to Colgate graduate Paul MacCowatt, Tom’s dad, for trying to help me out).  Soon thereafter, I went to a music business head-hunter (she was a blonde version of Susie Meyerson on “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” complete with cigarettes and pigeons on the windowsill); she asked me if I would take a job as a receptionist at a jazz label in Hell’s Kitchen.  I said yes and went outside to call my parents from a payphone to tell them that, if I didn’t come home, they might find me somewhere around 11th ave and 57th street.  When I got to the interview at GRP Records (555 West 57th Street), Mark Wexler gave me a cassette of Dave Grusin’s album with “Mountain Dance” on it; my heart practically stopped on the Metro North train back to Westport when I heard the song: Curtis Beller, one of the kitchen guys at the Alta Lodge, had used it as the background in his end-of-the-year Emp slideshow.  I took it as a sign and took the job; it was an amazing experience. Lucky, indeed.  LYRICS INTERVIEW WITH JOAN ARMATRADING APPLE MUSIC SPOTIFY

June 27, 2023 (Song #2005): “Cracking” (1985) by Suzanne Vega.  T-37* brings me to 1986 when I lived in Alta, Utah for almost a full year (August-May).  I became obsessed with this record and, in between working at the front desk of the Alta Lodge, driving downtown to purchase and arrange the flowers for the dining room, playing guitar and singing in the Sitzmark, hanging out with my roommate Julie and friends Cassie & Marcus and recording with John and skiing as much as possible, I listened to this record (in Tom’s cool room – was it called “the laundry”?? – on his record player). Five years later I started dating Peter Propp (Mr. Sing Daily to you) and then married him on this day in 1992 – Happy Anniversary, honey – ) and did it all again (this time with him at the front desk and me up in the reservations office with the iconic Mimi Muray Levitt, trying to use what I’d learned at Columbia Business School to help computerize their systems – I was passionate about Merge Letters and Spreadsheets.) LYRICS & SONGFACTS APPLE MUSIC SPOTIFY

July 1, 2023 (Song #2009): “Ain’t Life A Brook” (1980) by Ferron. LYRICS & CHORDS APPLE MUSIC SPOTIFY

T-33* Instead of focusing on 1990 (the year Caroline left New York to go to Kellogg and I applied and got into Columbia Business School) I’m going back to the 1970s (you’re welcome, Russell) when the Shermans and the Addarios joined forces in friendship, fun and our mutual love and devotion for family.  Sundays at the Addario house on North Ridge Road were filled with inlaws and outlaws and swimming and running and laughing and eating and singing (and drawing on the walls);  it was a magical time and they are magical people (I’m still wearing the necklace that they gave me for my Bat Mitzvah in 1977).  To get a sense of this wonderful family with whom we shared a big chunk of our childhood, listen to this: SIBLING REVELRY with Kate Hudson & Oliver Hudson featuring Lynsey & Lisa Addario. Oh, and the connection to this amazing song?  Lisa Addario taught me this one and it still gives me “brain joy” (Lori Hashizume: thanks for this phrase. 🙂  Happy Birthday to Catherine Lewis, my equally beautiful and magical sister-in-law. Xoxoxo

June 30, 2023 (Song #2008): “Once In A Very Blue Moon” (1984) sung by Nanci Griffith (written by Pat Alger)

KARAOKE! Listen to Nancy singing it on “Austin City Limits” in 1985.  APPLE MUSIC SPOTIFY

T-34* (today we should call it: TMI-34*) brings me to 1989, my 3rd year at GRP Records.  Three years before, while singing in the Sitzmark Bar at the Alta Lodge, a man told me that I sounded “just like Nanci Griffith; have you heard of her?” “No, “I said, “Well, I tell ya,  you sound just like her.”  So, I immediately picked up my phone and found Nanci Griffith on Spotify (HAHAHA! This is almost 40 years ago, people!. Scratch that.)  Rather, I drove the thirty miles down Little Cottonwood Canyon in the lodge van (which they let me use because I was buying and arranging the flowers for the dining room) and found a record store in Salt Lake City (I’m thinking it must have been a “Sam Goody’s” or “Tower”?) so I could buy a Nanci Griffith CD. 

The minute I got back to the Lodge and put it on, my world stopped spinning: Nanci Griffith’s voice was nothing like mine, but it was also like nothing I’d ever heard before and I wasn’t completely sure I liked it.

I was confused; the song lyrics, melodies, harmonies and instrumentation were compelling but her voice was high and wobbly (did that guy in the Sitzmark think my voice was high and wobbly?). Still, there was something about her songs and her voice that made me listen to the CD 25 times that first week.  I quickly learned “Once In A Very Blue Moon” and played it constantly; the chord progression became so much a part of me that I still play it every time I sit down at a piano (I may have borrowed it and put it into at least one of my own songs).

At one point in 1986, Nanci Griffith performed in Salt Lake City and, since my brother Russell was visiting, we went to the concert together.  I noticed him looking at me during the concert and I said: “What?” and he said: “Watching you watching her is way more entertaining than watching her….” Yep.

Now, back to T-34* and 1989: I was still working at GRP Records and one day my boss said to me and Alison: “You should take these tickets to this CD Release Party, no one else wants to go.” “Who is performing?” I asked and when he said “Nanci Griffith”, Alison King and I ran out of work and headed to some bar in the middle of Manhattan and down the stairs to a tiny cocktail party where no one was paying any attention at all to the music.  We sat down at a table right in front of her and grinned and basked in her incredible talent while she played the songs from her new “Storms” album just for us.

Later that year, I began to get frustrated by the work/paycheck ratio of my job.  I’d been hired as a receptionist and was quickly promoted when they needed someone to learn “Lotus 1-2-3” in an effort to computerize all of their written production schedules. After learning the program and transferring all the written documents to computerized spreadsheets, my boss, Dotty Kenul, quit (I’ve always felt sad about that.)  They gave me her title (“Production Coordinator”) and soon added “Director of International Distribution” (since I came in to the office at 9am, and, thus, was the only person in the office who could communicate with the foreign distributors when they were at work), and I got raises – which, industry standard dictated, was 10%.

But, when I stepped back and thought of how much work I was putting in (I almost always stayed at work until the art department – who came to work at noon – was ready to go home, usually at about 8pm) and how little I was being paid, I asked my boss to reconsider my salary.  He said no, but they offered to print my name in the CD credits (if you have any old GRP CDs, check it out).  When I asked for more money again a few months later, they changed my job title to “Director of Production”, but still, no money.

I thanked them for the gesture and started looking for another job.  

Around this time, I had been listening to a CD sampler that I loved called “Here It Is: The Music” put out by Rykodisc, which had three songs on it that blew me away: The Red Clay Ramblers’ “Home Is Where The Heart Is”, Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin’s “Henry & James” and, of course, Nanci Griffith’s “Once In A Very Blue Moon”. 

Somehow I got an interview with Don Rose at Rykodisc and they offered me a job with a generous salary and an allowance for moving to Salem (I remember visiting their offices at Pickering Wharf). Though I would be sad to leave my sister, Alison and NYC, I was ready to be fairly compensated. 

When I told my boss, he told the co-president of the company, Larry Rosen, that I was leaving; Larry quickly ushered me into his office: “What is going on???” I told him “I’ve been asking for a raise for months.” and he said: “I did not know that. I’ll give you whatever you want to stay.” He then proceeded to match the Rykodisc offer and then some.   It truly felt like a “Once In a Blue Moon” moment and I always felt that, somehow, I had Nanci Griffith and that song to thank for that raise.