Music & More

Waikiki Cowboy

I have committed a serious error. I recently wrote about cowboy songs (my post of April 2, 2011) and failed to mention Waikiki Cowboy. The President of the United States was born in Hawaii, and he was born there after Hawaii became a state. Hawaii became a state on August 21, 1959. Mr. Obama was born there on August 4, 1961. I really meant no disrespect by my omission. I actually discovered the song after writing the cowboy post.

Back to the song. I mean how many songs are written about Hawaiian cowboys? Kudos to the songwriters, Victoria Shaw and Gary Burr, for originality. I was looking into Victoria Shaw songs on i-Tunes since I really liked her last album "Bring On the Love". Anyway, I bought a bunch of songs from her first two albums including Waikiki Cowboy. It's not a new song. It comes from her "Old Friends New Memories" album which I see was released on January 1, 2000. Guess it has to be at least tied with someone for being the first album release of the 21st century, a Y2K cd.

In the first verse, Waikiki Cowboy tells the tale of a Texas cowboy who took a trip to Hawaii and decided to stay after checking out the girls in their short grass skirts. He must have been really taken with these girls because in addition to unloading his chaps and 10 gallon hat, he sold his gun, bought a ukelele and learned this song which has a particularly infectious although crazy chorus. I can't provide the lyrics to the chorus or the verses since there's a note after the lyrics on Victoria Shaw's website that reads "lyrics may not be reprinted or used in part or in whole without the permission of VLS Management". So I'll just tell you about the song without directly quoting any lyric. You can read the complete lyrics online.

I've mentioned in other posts about how sick I am of country artists name-dropping Hank, Waylon, Cash and the Hag, etc. It's certainly been overdone by country star wannabes trying to establish their country creds. But no one could accuse the songwriters here of that. There are many folks out there who never heard of Don Ho. Nobody namedrops Don Ho to advance their career or even to be thought of as "cool". The name just really fits in with the song. When anyone asks someone my age to name the most famous  Hawaiian singer, the first name to come up has to be Don Ho. (My next guess would have been Robin Luke of "Susie Darlin" fame but he wasn't born in Hawaii and may not even be of Hawaiian descent.) Don died in 2007 at the age of 76 and probably enjoyed his greatest success in the 1960's.

Back to the chorus again. In addition to Don Ho, the first line also mentions "Mahi, Mahi" - a fish. Was Don Ho an angler? On the second line they mention some Hawaiian food called "poi" which has been barbecued. I don't know if anyone ever barbecues poi. I've never been to Hawaii. In the third line, it appears that our cowboy is also a surfer. In the fourth and last line, he confirms his identity twice as a Waikiki Cowboy.

In later verses he tells of falling in love with a brown eyed girl, not the one Van Morrison sings of, but he couldn't pronouce her name so he called her Sweetie Pie. He agreed to try the local fruits and she reciprocated by learning how to square dance. At the end of the day he would serenade her with this song in the light emanating from a volcano. At times, he thinks about going back to Texas but thoughts of the joys of Hawaii convince him that it would be a crazy thing to do. Fabulous fun song.

 

 

 

Burr-Schlitz

Back on the 18th of March I saw a terrific show at the Bluebird featuring two of my favorite songwriters, Gary Burr and Don Schlitz. Although both have performed many times at the Bluebird, this was the first time they appeared there together. I didn't write anything about the show because I've already written about both of these gentlemen in previous posts. (see post of 8/9/10 for Gary and Don on 7/8/10.) Gary's girl Georgia Middleman and Don's wife Stacy were an added bonus, each singing a song or two.

In addition to being Hall of Fame songwriters, these guys have a really good sense of humor. Don's breakthrough hit was "The Gambler" which Kenny Rogers made famous. Gary's first big hit was Juice Newton's "Love's Been a Little Bit Hard on Me". Gary said that the critics called it "dumb but infectious" which he said was how he was known in college.

At the show they mentioned something about writing together. It has finally happened. Although I'm not a Twitterer (is that right?) or a Facebooker, I found out following Don's Twitter that they have finally gotten together. Here are some of the Twits or tweets or whatever discussing the event.

from Don:

I get to write w/ @Garyburr today. Huge thrill. This kind of opportunity can make or break a writer in this town. Will be done by noon.

@Garyburr just called, suggested writing at his house. obvious power play. will do it, but bringing my own water.

made it to @Garyburr 's house. he's just sitting there, pretending to tune.

@garyburr just sits there. Mentions famous person occasionally. His chair taller than mine.

I'm not saying anything until he does. I can look like I'm thinking too. Who is Helen Darling?

@Garyburr had an idea. For a verse line. New high water mark.

@Garyburr now using his other melody.

Told @garyburr I needed 2 min break. Going through his medicine cabinet. Found 3 capos & stockpile of ace bandages.

Finally leaving @garyburr 's. Only 3 songs. He's so slow. Booked June 31st. He went for it.

told @Garyburr it was three Fords and vermouth. last sentence he heard accurately was at Woodstock. he was in the front row. (really)

@gmiddleman which dead guy was I? Just for the record...

@gmiddleman writing w/ @Garyburr we skip the talking to each other part. we communicate by facial tics....

From Gary:

@don4adollar gets to write with me today. Got to be a huge thrill. This kind of opportunity can make or break a writer in this town.

I haven't wanted to punch a co-writer this much since I wrote with Helen Darling. Is it the gum popping or the blank stare?

New no shirts rule seems to calm us both down. @don4adollar and I are rocking now!

@don4adollar says key to country writing is three chords and the truth. Naive ignorant bastard It's anagrams.

From Georgia Middleman:

Walking in on @Garyburr and @don4adollar writing a song was like walking in on Picasso and Monet...they both looked dead.

@don4adollar you were Monet. Smooth...but dead. However, when you two had your phones out doing tweet wars...oh, sure, then you came alive.

I think Don won the the first battle. Hope there will me more and I hope to hear the songs they wrote together. Pairing superstars doesn't always work in sports. Wonder if it can work in songwriting? If the songs don't sell, maybe we'll at least get to hear them at a future Bluebird show. At most shows they do a song or two that has not been recorded and they're often so good that you can't believe no artist is interested. I'm thinking of Gary's "A Thousand Wild Horses" which he wrote with Sam & Annie Tate, "Dare to Dance Alone" with Georgia and Karla Davis, "That's Not Her Picture" with Bill Anderson and "I Thought He'd Never Leave". Not sure of the last title because I couldn't find it on ASCAP, BMI or SESAC. Don did a song I liked called "Guys My Size" but I haven't been able to find it anywhere on-line.

Gary's Twitter bio: Hall of Fame Songwriter. Works w/Ringo & Carole King. Discoverer of the element Cadmium. Member of Blue Sky Riders w/ Kenny Loggins & Georgia Middleman. 

Don's Twitter bio: I write songs. I'm married. I'm happy. who knew?

Digressions:

Gary and Georgia Middleman have been enlisted by Kenny Loggins to form "Blue Sky Riders", a country/pop trio. They had their debut April 2nd at the Rutledge here in Nashville. My wife bought the poster for the show. Looks good. The trio are working together writing songs and making demos for a new album which I presume will be offered on their tour with Kenny. They will be Kenny's opening act for his solo dates this summer. Go to their website, www.blueskyridersband.com, to hear five new songs so far and read their blogs.

My wife and I saw Loggins & Messina at the Capital Center in Landover, Maryland in 1976. We had all their albums. Remember songs like "You're Mama Can't Dance", "House at Pooh Corner", "Danny's Song", "A Love Song", "Brighter Days", etc. The opening act that night was Fleetwood Mac. We were so glad when they finished so we could hear L&M.

I thought of a Don Schlitz song as I was watching "Sixty Minutes" a few weeks ago, a Lesley Stahl segment about American corporations moving their headquarters overseas to avoid paying taxes on a major part of their profits. We know that unlike those greedy teachers, police, firemen, sanitation and other public sector workers who have caused our huge budget deficit crisis, corporate America puts America first and only heads overseas out of a sense of responsibility to their shareholders. They're not blackmailing the country when they send profits and jobs overseas and will continue to do so unless their tax burdens are reduced.

In his 2010 album "Allergic to Crazy", Don Schlitz with wife Stacy on background vocals gets down to business on track 5, "About the Money". The song begins "They say what's good for business, is good for America, provides the incentive, to keep the wheels turning". It's good for the poor and sick folks. But he's not fooled. The first two lines of the chorus go "When they say it's not about the money"; line 3 merely substitutes "it ain't" for "it's not" and line 4 concludes "It's about the money". He then talks about changes needed "cause there's foxes in the hen house". He says "I believe good business, is good for America, as long as folks are honest, and don't get greedy". In the last verse, after saying that Jesus is a poor and a sick folk and he loves his country, he say he's  "gonna keep singing". We then hear the chorus twice. For the last line of the second singing of the chorus he whispers, "It's about the money". The song concludes with Don's wife Stacy singing "It's about the money" a half dozen times til the end. 

 

Civil War's 150th Anniversary

The 150th anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War occurred a week ago on April 12th. On that day in 1861 the Confederates fired on Fort Sumter to begin a war which would ultimately claim over 618,000 lives. In the past fifteen years, I've read a fair amount of history and historical fiction about the Civil War and related events. Before then, the only Civil War books I can recall with certainty reading were Stephen Crane's "Red Badge of Courage" and Bruce Catton's "This Hallowed Ground". I vaguely recall reading a book about Robert E. Lee but can't remember the title.  Most of us know the basic facts about the war but are a little hazy about the details. For a lot of us, it's been many years since we took American history in high school or college. What follows is a list of books I've read about the war that can fill in some of those details. In parenthesis I've included the year of publication and length. There are plenty of reviews on line that you can read rather than just take my recommendation.

Although I've been a resident of a southern state for the past 4 1/2 years, it hasn't changed my opinion about the conflict. I'm reminded though of a former co-worker and fellow New Yorker who moved to Georgia. One of his young sons asked him one day "Daddy, why did we lose the Civil War?". Shortly after moving to Nashville, I decided to read historian Shelby Foote's three volume history, "The Civil War: A Narrative", to get a southern perspective. I had read reviews that credited his work as fair minded and I think it was. Foote's history is a long read but well written. Volume I is called "Fort Sumter to Perryville" (810 pgs - 1958), Volume II "Fredericksburg to Meridian" (966 pgs - 1963) and Volume III "Red River to Appomattox" (1,060 pgs - 1974). Foote became well known when he appeared on the Ken Burns PBS documentary, The Civil War.

Stephen B. Oates began a Civil War Trilogy called "Voices of the Storm". Volume I, "The Approaching Fury, 1820 - 1861" (512 pgs - 1998) provided the events leading to the war; Volume II, "The Whirlwind of War, 1861 - 1865" (864 pgs - 1999) covered the war itself. The third volume  was supposed to cover the reconstruction period but has not appeared as yet. The first two volumes were excellent. Oates has the characters - John Calhoun, John Brown, Lincoln, etc. - speaking in the first person about their lives and events. Oates was also one of the commentators on the Ken Burns documentary. He had previously written the excellent full length biography "With Malice Towards None: A Life of Abraham Lincoln" and "Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion".

Speaking of Lincoln, I would also highly recommend "Team of Rivals, The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" (2005 - 754 pgs) by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Lincoln's team of "Rivals" included William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edwin M. Stanton and Edward Bates.

"Lincoln" (1995 - 599 pgs) by David Donald is another great read. It's a cradle to the grave bio but mercifully doesn't dwell for long on the front end.

Michael Kauffman's "American Brutus, John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies" (2004 - 398 pgs) is very interesting. Kauffman's take on the responsibility for the assassination makes a lot of sense.

"LIncoln at Gettysburg, The Words That Remade America" (1992 - 189 pgs) by Garry Wills is a Pulitzer Prize winner about the Gettyburg Address.

Since we're talking Gettysburg, Michael Shaara's historical novel "The Killer Angels" (1974 - 355 pgs), also a Pulitzer Prize winner, has been called the best historical novel about war. 

Michael died in 1988 but his son Jeff Shaara has taken up where dad left off with books like "Gods and Generals" (1996 - 498 pgs), the prequel, and "The Last Full Measure" (2000 - 640 pgs), the sequel, to his father's "The Killer Angels".

"Cloudsplitter"  by Russell Banks is a historical novel about John Brown (1998 - 758 pgs). The story is told from the perspective of Owen Brown, the last surviving son of John Brown. Banks has written many novels and also writes short stories. "Trailerpark" is my favorite collection.

Harriet Beecher Stowe's  "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (1852 - 447 pgs) needs no commentary.

Ambrose Bierce's "Tales of Soldiers" are short stories of an anti-war nature, emphasizing the horrors of war. Bierce, also the author of the Devil's Dictionary, served as a soldier in the Civil War. Good stuff.

Jeffrey Wert - "General James Longstreet" (1994 - 528 pgs) After reading about Gettysburg, a book about Lee's second in charge seemed like a natural followup.

Other Civil War books I would recommend in roughly descending order:

Stephen Sears - "Chancellorsville" (1998 - 640 pgs)

Geoffrey Perret - "Ulysses S. Grant, Soldier & President" (1997 - 542 pgs)

Brian Steel Wills - "A Battle From the Start: The Life of Nathan Bedford Forest" (1992 - 457 pgs)

John Bowers - "Stonewall Jackson, Portrait of a Soldier" (1990 - 360 pgs  )

Roy Morris, Jr. - "Sheridan: The Life and Wars of General Phil Sheridan" (1992 - 542 pgs)

Stanley Hirshon - "White Tecumseh, Biography of William Tecumseh Sherman" (1998 - 475 pgs)

Robert Hicks - "The Widow of the South" (2005 - 432 pgs)

Charles Frazier - "Cold Mountain" (1997 - 449 pgs)

Laurence Hauptman - "Between Two Fires, American Indians in the Civil War" (1995 - 304 pgs)

Jack Coombe - "Thunder Along the Mississippi, River Battles that Split the Confederacy" (1996 - 260 pgs)

William Fletcher - "Rebel Private: Front and Rear: Memoirs of a Confederate Soldier" (1997 - 240 pgs)

James Street - "The Civil War, An Unvarnished Account of the Last but Still Lively Hostilities" (1953 - 144 pgs)

Richard Harwell (editor) - "The Confederate Reader: How the South Saw the War" (1989 - 416 pgs)

I should read:

Number one on my "to read" list is the Pulitzer Prize winning "Battle Cry of Freedom, The Civil War Era" by James McPherson, a one volume history (862 pgs) published in 1988. I bought the book over 10 years ago while I was still working. My lame excuse for not reading it then was that it was too heavy to lug around. I did much of my reading back then on the LIRR to and from Penn Station. As a retiree, I no longer have that excuse.

George R. Stewart - "Pickett's Charge" (1959 - 384 pages). I read and really enjoyed two other Stewart books, "Names on the Land, A Historical Account of Place-Naming in the United States" and "The California Trail".

What books about the Civil War would you recommend?

When my wife and I visited Gettysburg in September of 2005, one of the things that stood out for me was the site of Pickett's charge, the confederate assault on Cemetery Ridge. Imagine being one of the soldiers leading the charge. You're moving across an open field, uphill toward a well barricaded enemy. I would have been terrified. It was nothing less than a suicide mission.

 

 

Cowboy Songs

 

I was listening to Don McLean's "Bronco Bill's Lament" which made me think of "Ride 'Em Cowboy" by the late Paul Davis which made me think of Gene Watson's "All Hat and No Cattle" which made me think of ... writing about my favorite songs about cowboys, real, rodeo or movie type. This post, however, will not deal with traditional cowboy songs like "Home on the Range", "Back in the Saddle Again", "Tumbling Tumbleweeds", "Red River Valley", etc. Some of the songs really don't have much to do with cowboys but "cowboy" is part of the song title. Others are real cowboy songs but don't mention cowboys in the title.

Although the last herd headed north well over a hundred years ago, the romance and myth of the cowboy is still strong. In 2003, Kevin Millar of the Boston Red Sox challenged his teammates to "Cowboy Up", get tough. While I watched many a western as a kid in the 1950's and into the 60's, I always wanted to be a baseball player, not a cowboy. Sleeping on the ground with the herd, worrying about snakes and fording raging rivers and streams I could do without. Even rivers and streams that are not raging, are not for me. I can't swim. Then there's cactus. I spent the fall and winter of 1969-70 at Fort Carson, Colorado which is near Pikes Peak and Colorado Springs. On one rather cold night we were out in the boonies somewhere for gas mask training. The gas didn't get me but a cactus did. I stumbled into one. There I was standing in front of the headlights of a jeep around midnight with my fatigue pants down around my ankles, trying to pull cactus needles out of my legs. 

While a cowboy's life would not have been for me, I do love cowboy songs:

The Bronco Bill song, solely written by Mclean, tells of an old washed up movie cowboy. The studio owned his horse and saddle. He lamented that "the lawyers could put you where they choose with the language that they use  and enslave you 'til you work your life away" and "He could beat those desperadoes but there's no sense fighting time, the singing was a ball cause I'm not musical at all, I moved my lips to someone else's voice".

In "Ride 'Em Cowboy", solely written by Paul Davis in 1977, the tone is gentler, tinged by sadness rather than cynicism. He used to be the best in the rodeo but now he's too old. "I only ride wild horses in my dreams". The only bronc he couldn't ride, Midnight, is blind and "rides little children for a dime".

Written by Lee Bach, Billy Troy & Leroy Anderson, Gene Watson's "All Hat No Cattle" is a fun warning in western swing to a girl falling for a phony cowboy. "He shoots a lot of bull but he's never milked a cow."  "He'll  break your heart just for fun and ride off in the setting sun".

"Should've Been a Cowboy" started out Toby Keith's career with a bang in this song solely written by TK. The chorus begins: "shoulda been a cowboy, should've learned to rope and ride, wearin' my six shooter, ridin' my pony on a cattle drive". Loved the references to Gunsmoke - Marshall Dillon and Miss Kitty - as well as Gene and Roy, Jesse James and the Texas Rangers.

"Night Rider's Lament" was written by  Michael Burton and most notably performed by Suzy Bogguss. The chorus: "He asked me, why do you ride for your money, why do you rope for short pay, you ain't gettin' nowhere, and you're losin' your share, you must've gone crazy out there". Great yodeling by Suzy.

"When Cowboys Didn't Dance" was an album track from Lonestar's debut cd, written by Richie McDonald and Kyle Green. The opening music sounds ominous as Richie sings "seven hundred head of cattle on an old forgotten trail, six cowboys and one old man and another day of hell" ... "sleepin' 'neath an open sky with just the stars above their heads, a saddle for a pillow and some sagebrush for a bed." The chorus: "when cowboys didn't dance, didn't wear designer shirts, when their hearts were filled with memories, their bodies filled with hurt, they would sit around a campfire, exchange a piercing glance, back when the west was really wild and cowboys didn't dance". It might be one of the best cowboy songs nobody knows about.

"Whatever happened to Randolph Scott", written by Harold and Don Reid of the Statler Brothers, names quite a few TV cowboys from the 50's including Tex Ritter, "Gene and Tex and Roy and Rex, the Durango Kid", Johnny Mack Brown, Allan "Rocky" Lane, Lash Larue (the guy with the whip), Smiley Burnett, Tim Holt and Gene Autry. I remember them all except for Holt and Lane .

"Rodeo" was a Larry Bastian song that became a hit for Garth Brooks. Just out of curiosity, I went to the ASCAP and BMI websites and searched by song title using "Rodeo". I got 672 hits on BMI (the first was the Garth song) and 280 on ASCAP. You can also search these sites by the name of the artist or songwriter. The Garth "Rodeo" song gets you down in the dust and mud, the feel of rodeo, the roar of the crowd - the bulls and blood, "the white in his knuckles, the gold in the buckle he'll win the next go 'round". He even gets into the cowboy outfit and equipment - boots and chaps and cowboy hats, spurs and latigo, the ropes and the reins. (I had to look up "Latigo". It's a strap for tightening a saddle girth.) "Rodeo" is one of many cowboy related songs in Garth's repertoire.

"I Want to Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart" was originally released as a single in 1935. It was written and sung  by Patsy Montana. I have it by Suzy Bogguss. The lyric continues "I want to learn to rope and ride" and, later "I want to pillow my head near the sleepin' herd." More great yodeling from Suzy.

James Taylor penned and recorded "Sweet Baby James" whch begins "There is a young cowboy he lives on the range, his horse and his cattle are his only companions, he works in the saddle and sleeps in the canyon,  just waiting for summer, his pastures to change."

In "I'm at Home on the Range" by Suzy Bogguss, the title begins the chorus and continues "I'm a queen on the plains, way out where the west is wild, from Billings down to Laramie, the cowboys take good care of me." The song was written by Verlon Thompson, Doug Crider and Suzy.

John Denver's "Cowboy's Delight" was written by Bob Carpenter and David Holster. Since this song is about the mountains rather than the plains, maybe it should of been called trapper's or prospector's delight.

"Cowboys Are My Weakness" from Trisha Yearwood was written by Karyn Rochelle & Jim McCormick. The girl likes cowboys with their sunday suit wranglers and pickup trucks. I'd like a new album from Trisha.

"God Must Be a Cowboy", written and recorded by Dan Seals who opined that "I think God must be a cowboy at heart, He made wide open spaces from the start."

"Cowboy Take Me Away", written by Marcus Hummon & chick Martie Seidel, sounds like an ode to the wide open spaces.

Collin Raye's "Latter Day Cowboy" is a truckdriver in this Hugh Prestwood song. The only horse in his life is horespower. "He don't wear no spurs that go jingle".

In John Denver's "I'd rather be a cowboy (lady's chains)", solely written by JD, the chorus goes "I think I'd rather be a cowboy, I think I'd rather ride the range, I think I'd rather be a cowboy, than to lay me down in love and lady's chains". He also doesn't want those canyons of concrete and steel.

Lonestar's other cowboy song, "Like a Good Cowboy", written by Greg Barnhill and Holly Lamar, tells of a modern day counterpart of a cowboy, "ridin' in our steel broncos" in a "wildwest neighborhood" and "the new frontier is a freeway".

Elton & the Eagles had complete albums with a western theme:

Elton John - "Tumbleweed Connection" (1970) with "Ballad of a Well Known Gun", "My Father's Gun", etc.

Eagles - "Desperado" (1973) also had a western theme with the title track from Don Henley and Glenn Frey and songs like "Doolin Daltons" by J.D. Souther, Jackson Browne, Don Henley & Glenn Frey.

Since I'm talking cowboys here I may as well mention a few books:

"Lonesome Dove" by Larry McMurtry published in 1985 is the greatest cowboy novel ever written. Do not be intimidated by the length - 945 pages. Before you know it you'll be wishing it was longer. I read it twice and intend to read it again.

"A Texas Cowboy" (or Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony - taken from real life by Charles A. Siringo) published in 1885. 

"The Log of a Cowboy, A Narrative of the Old Trail Days" by Andy Adams (fiction but based on his experience on a cattle drive from Texas to Montana in 1882 - first published in 1903.)

The last two are not as well known or nearly as long a read as "Lonesome Dove" but give the reader a feel for what it was really like to be a cowboy.

Cowboy Up! What are your favorite cowboy songs?