PLACES OF DREAMS

My father was already in the hospital when I received the call. I lived 1,500 miles away but I had to get back to him. Back to the city I grew up in. He was dying.

Shortly after I arrived, we realize how fortunate we were to have this time together. We told stories, shared memories and gave thanks for this opportunity.

Each evening I would leave his bedside and drive to his house where I would spend the night. And each time I made this trip, I would take a different route to visit my old neighborhoods and experience places that were once important to me.

One morning when I arrived at the hospital, I was told my father had been moved to a different room. After we greeted each other, I notice he had this terrific view out his window of Gesu Church down the street. I asked him if he was able to see the church and he told me he was and then proceeded to tell me this story.

When my father was a small boy, his father owned a roofing business and his dad had won the contract to re-roof Gesu Church. He would stand on the street below, holding his mother’s hand, while gazing up at his father high above swinging from steeple to steeple making his repairs.

What makes this story so remarkable is that my father only lived in this city a very short time while as a young boy. He grew up in a different state entirely. He only came back many years later and married my mother. And now, after all these years, he was once again in the exact same spot where he once stood with his mother gazing at this church.

My father passed away.

When I arrived back to my home, I picked up my guitar and this song was waiting for me. It’s about places we remember. It’s about PLACES OF DREAMS.

Listen to:
PLACES OF DREAMS

Song Title: PLACES OF DREAMS
Track Number: 2
Album Title: OUT OF THE BLUE
Artist: Old Blue
Record Label: Namesake Music
UPC/EAN Code: 884502 466836
Released 01 June 2008
Composed and Produced by: RB Smith
Copyright (c) Namesake Music, BMI

http://NamesakeMusic.info/
http://OldBlue.info/

All rights reserved

LONELY ONE

Have you ever had one of those days when you’re just in a funk and you don’t know why?

I think everyone has had a few of those days. For me when this happens, I usually just pick up my guitar or sit at the piano to put myself in another place – a better place.

There was this one time in particular when I was feeling a bit low and while playing my guitar, this song started to expose itself to me. I worked on it and worked on it until it was done. And before I knew it, instead of me feeling down, I felt uplifted with a great sense of accomplishment.

I called my friend so that I could play the song for her. And after I played it, there was this uncomfortable silence - and then she started to cry.

You see, she thought the song was about her. Nothing could have been further from the truth. I was working out my own problems.

(Which brings me to another point. Different people will interpret a song or any other piece of creation differently. That’s the power and beauty of art. But I’ll save that discussion for another time.)

It’s enough to say, that at that moment, both my friend and myself felt like we were the LONELY ONE.

Listen to:

LONELY ONE
 

Song Title: LONELY ONE

Track Number: 5

Album Title: SEE ME THROUGH

Artist: Old Blue

Record Label: Namesake Music

UPC/EAN Code: 884502 436365

Released 01 June 2007

Composed and Produced by: RB Smith

Copyright (c) Namesake Music, BMI
 

http://NamesakeMusic.info/

http://OldBlue.info/
 

All rights reserved

THE STORY OF BLACKIE AND LITTLE ONE

When I was a young child, one of our family members was a beautiful cat we called Blackie. (You’ll never guess what color she was.)

Blackie was instrumental in me learning about the birds and the bees because while still at a very young age we discovered that Blackie was about to deliver kittens. My mother found herself in the untenable position of having to answer all my never-ending questions on the subject.

Soon we had a house full of playful kittens and we needed to find good homes for them. But there was this one kitten – the little one – that I had grown particularly found of. So I started my successful campaign to convince my parents that he needed to stay.

This is the origin of the names Blackie and Little One. I always liked those names and I thought one day they might make a good song title.

And then it happened. The music fell out of the sky and the words fell out of my head and many decades later I experienced the second birth of THE STORY OF BLACKIE AND LITTLE ONE.

Listen to:
THE STORY OF BLACKIE AND LITTLE ONE

Song Title: THE STORY OF BLACKIE AND LITTLE ONE
Track Number: 10
Album Title: OUT OF THE BLUE
Artist: Old Blue
Record Label: Namesake Music
UPC/EAN Code: 884502 466836
Released 01 June 2008
Composed and Produced by: RB Smith
Copyright (c) Namesake Music, BMI

http://NamesakeMusic.info/
http://OldBlue.info/

All rights reserved