Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I’m gathered safely in
Touch me with your naked hand or touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love
Leonard Cohen, “Dance Me to the End of Love”
I have no idea how anyone could live a life that didn’t include music in one form or another. I respect all forms of music, but confess an affinity for the human voice and for well written lyrics. I have listened to all types of music and like each in its place, but I return again and again to the poetry of a well written phrase that causes me to marvel at a succinct statement capturing something deep, convoluted and enigmatic and to wonder how the artist found the means of expressing such complexity with amazingly clarifying simplicity.
Those who do this well withstand time, no matter what one says about their voice or their instrumental musicianship. Take Leonard Cohen, for example. The man is in his 70′s and still performing to sold out venues. His voice will never rival that of another favorite of mine, Tony Bennett, but it is inextricably associated with his beautiful music. As beautiful a tune as is “Hallelujah” and as beautiful as it can be when rendered by the likes of Jennifer Warnes or the many others who have recorded it, I always come back to his version as definitive. The song is simply not complete without his growling passion, and it seems to move him as much as it does his audience – in other words, it is still fresh for him after God knows how many performances. If you have doubt, go to his website – http://www.leonard-cohen.com/– and watch the video of “Hallelujah” performed last year in London during his current world tour.
I certainly mean no disrespect for the likes of Jennifer Warnes whose interpretations of Cohen are beyond compare. Her voice is simply gorgeous and she has recorded far too little during her career. Her album of Cohen’s songs, “Famous Blue Raincoat,” should not be missed by anyone who cares for glorious renderings of masterful lyrics. It was recently remastered and re-issued and is now far more wonderful than in its first incarnation. I return to this album several times a year and marvel in its clarity and soaring music, but, in the end, I always return to Mr. Cohen’s versions to reflect upon the meaning of his music – husky, meaty versions growled, chewed up and spit out as only he can.
Paul Simon is another such poet. His voice is more musical and his lyrics less straightforward, but no less thought provoking for their sometimes frustrating ambiguity. His is the expertise of saying things in an off center manner that challenges the intellect to wonder what he truly means – even while knowing that he is saying something significant. Consider this stanza from “An American Tune”:
We come on the ship they call the Mayflower
We come on the ship that sailed the moon
We come in the age’s most uncertain hours and sing an American tune
Oh, and it’s alright, it’s all right, it’s all right
You can’t be forever blessed
Still, tomorrow’s going to be another working day
And I’m trying to get some rest
That’s all, I’m trying to get some rest
Within this lyric is a celebration of the span of American history coupled with the weariness of the ordinary American working stiff who makes such glory possible, inch by sweaty inch. How anyone, in one stanza, can capture anything so complex while reducing it to instant recognition and understanding is beyond my comprehension. I can only stand in awe, admire the reductive intelligence, and wish I had the ability to have said and left it, as Mr. Simon has, for the rest of humanity to enjoy and ponder.
And then there is Bob Dylan, the master of poetry with a voice even more fractured and broken than Mr. Cohen’s. His focus is more on human emotion than the sweep of history or the grand idea, but the poetry is no less immediate. I am very partial to the lyrics of “To Make You Feel My Love”:
The storms are raging on a rolling sea
Down the highway of regret
The winds of change are blowing wild and free
But you ain’t seen nothing like me yet
There ain’t nothing that I wouldn’t do
Go to the ends of the earth for you
Make you happy, make your dreams come true
To make you feel my love
I doubt Dylan will ever quit writing lyrics or music and that he will go to his grave with just one more song waiting to be written.
Lastly, there is Richard Thompson, an Irish folk rock musician who has been around as long as Dylan. He writes lyrics that he is challenged to sing since he is not blessed with the best singing voice, but his voice will grow on you with time. He is, however, a consummate guitar player who ranks among the best in the word. Most importantly, however, he is an excellent songwriter who is also a poet. His “Dimming of the Day” has been recorded by many fine artists:
This old house is falling down around my ears
I’m drowning in a river of my tears
When all my will is gone you hold me sway
I need you at the dimming of the day
The lyric is coupled with a haunting melody and, if you know the song, all you have to do is read the lyric to hear the music play in your mind – a hallmark of a successful song.
There are other gracefully aging musical poets, some of them unlikely and uneven in their output. Consider Dion Dimucci – yes, the 1950′s Dion of “Runaround Sue” and “The Wanderer.” Many don’t know that he is still recording and making wonderful music even today – music that is stronger and more adventuresome than anything he ever did in the 1950′s. Find and listen to “I used to be a Brooklyn Dodger,” a song about having been a phenomenon that is not filled with remorse and is beautiful to the ear. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVFkO6xTpX4 Dion may seem an unlikely choice to you for inclusion in this pantheon, but take a listen and take a chance on much of his later music. You will be well rewarded. There is little out there to compare with “Deja Nu,” his 2000 album of doo wop, complete with wonderful covers of two Bruce Springsteen tunes. The first song on the album, “Shoo Bop” is a glorious return to the 1950′s, even if not poetry in the sense of that I am trying to celebrate.
Even Tony Bennett, that most marvelous of interpreters of the classic American songbook, writes the occasional song that is well worth your time and effort. Consider “Antonia” from his album “Astoria: Portrait of the Artist” – a hard-to-find album, but well worth the effort and well worth listening to even if just to hear this rare composition by Mr. Bennett.
Of course, none of these artists would be complete without the music that accompanies their words. Don MacLean’s lines from Vincent, for example, would never ring as true without the beautiful melody that comes to mind inevitably upon reading these words:
For they could not love you
But still your love was true
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry, starry night
You took your life as lovers often do
But I could have told you Vincent
This world was never meant for one as beautiful as you
I only wish Mr. MacLean would return to writing instead of producing covers.
For me, the truth and the beauty of music is in the lyrics, especially in any lyrical turn of phrase that is sharp, clear and remindful of personal matters or emotions. That is why the works of Messrs. Cohen, Simon, Dylan and Thompson stand out. While there are younger writers that give me hope for the future – Gretchen Peters, for example* – these elder statesman of the popular song give me rest, comfort and constant enjoyment both with respect to their body of existing work and their anticipated future production.
It is hard to imagine these men without music in their life. I expect each of them to dance all the way to the end. They continue to write and perform even as the dance slows for the rest of us. I imagine that they are incapable of doing any thing else.
* Her “On a Bus to St. Cloud” always takes my breath away:
On a bus to St. Cloud, Minnesota
I thought I saw you there
With the snow falling down around you
Like a silent prayer
And once on a street in New York City
With the jazz and the sin in the air
And once on a cold L.A. freeway
Going nowhere
