sawng

[fflo]

(as in "with a sawng in my haht")

A few weeks ago I found, in the CDs in this house, a burned copy of the soundtrack to a movie (not out on DVD) called Niagara, Niagara. I didn't recognize the handwriting on the disc; probably somebody gave it to Holly. Anyway, I listened, and there was good stuff there.

At first I wasn't sure I liked this one cut. He's almost whiny in the nasally tone, especially in those first few intervals, in the first couplets of each verse---they hit a note on the scale (the 5th, I reckon), at a point in his range, that's practically asking for it that way, somehow or another. And on my little stock Mac speakers, some of the lower guitar notes come out a little muddy-muddled.

But the melodically simple little number has gotten to me. Maybe those lower lines/couplets after the higher ones are a relief/release of tension. Maybe it's partly the lazy but liltingly bouncing beat of his plucking those strings. And maybe, okay yeah, I dig that lyric. And I do like how, singing along, I get to go just about to the bottom of my own range.

Anyway, I keep playing it, and singing along:

.mp3  -->   "Bring Your Sorrow Over Here" -- Jason Morphew (1997)

Why does pain fade? Where does it go?
It's less permanent than Southern snow.
Why do I weep but once a year?
Bring your sorrow over here.

Why do we wish happiness
On the ones we love the best?
Our troubles will draw us near;
Bring your sorrow over here.

All my laughter is rounded by
Yearning to cry.
Our love is deeper, and more dear.
Bring your sorrow over here.

Comments

[paperkingdoms]

Hmm. I like the lyrics, I even like the song... but I don't think I could get attached to this particular performance. The nasal thing... and what gets me is that's *so* totally fixable -- transpose the thing! You're on a guitar! ::breathes deeply::

[fflo.livejournal.com]

I don't suppose some chick in Kansas with a guitar would be willing to cover it, just for me... ?

[(Anonymous)]

I like it.

[paperkingdoms]

It's possible. I have no idea how I'd record it, though. But still. Possible.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

It does make me think of you. ;)

"sorrow"

[(Anonymous)]

funny comments--since this recording is the only way you know this song, you can't like the song without liking the performance. it's as if you were in an art museum and stopped and said "i like this painting, just not how this painter has done it." a recording isn't an audition; it's what it is, how it sounds, nothing more. and, by the way, there's no "resolution" in the melody of this song--that's why i, and quite a few other people, like it so much--that eerie refusal to resolve.

Re: "sorrow"

[fflo.livejournal.com]

well, it does end on the tonic, doesn't it? not to quibble. just it may technically resolve in the kind of music theory sense of the melody. but i can allow as how the whole combo, lyrics & all, contains a certain unresolve.

i don't agree, though, that there's no song apart from the recording at hand. the recording/rendition is what it is and how it sounds, but if there weren't a song that isn't tied to that, how could there ever be a cover version of any number? surely you like some versions of a song and not others. seems especially easy to think of this song as a song vs. only a recorded performance cuz it's simple, folky, has guitar, could be transcribed pretty easily, has discernable lyrics, etc.

i mean we could get into semantics, what's a song, what's the unit named thereby, but that seems silly. as does your painting analogy, to tell you the truth.

and also hello, whoever you are.

Re: "sorrow"

[(Anonymous)]

that you can transcribe this recording and write the lyrics out like a (bad) poem, etc., doesn't make any difference. if the singer of "sorrow" aspired to impress listeners as a "Singer" or "Composer" he could've studied opera or musical theory or voice, at least, which he clearly hasn't. it does seem to miss the point, to impose musical standards on a recording like this, which, it seems pretty obvious to me, appropriates elements of music and poetry in order to create a wholly distinct form of expression. it wants to be heard neither as music or poetry, and criticizing it according to irrelevant (and culturally obsolete) standards seems like a mistake to me.

so much of it does have to do with semantics, unfortunately, because we're stuck with this woefully inadequate language, an english language for an american people, an american culture. whatever is beautiful about "sorrow" is in the ether--if you were to learn the chords and lyrics and/or write it down, you could walk around calling it something with potential that you've rescued from a poor performer--but, as far as i know, all it is is a recording and should be discussed accordingly.

i'm assuming a lot about the singer's intentions, but so are you, truth be told. we dont' know if this song were "written" at all, or if the singer transcribed it before recording it, or if he's an opera singer with the widest singing range in the history of humanity who nevertheless decided to sing the song in precisely this manner.

and hello to you, too.

Re: "sorrow"

[fflo.livejournal.com]

hunh. well, you yourself call it a song, and refer to the possibility of the singer having transcribed it before recording it--- a possibility that cannot exist if there is no "it"---no song---apart from the recording. seems a little like you did yourself in there in terms of your original point.

my point about semantics was in anticipation of a kind of reduction to absurdity that i thought might be in the works if you came back to comment again. and that didn't exactly happen.

the thing about the artist's intentions, to me, is that the cultural milieu can be taken into account such as we know it, as can aspects of audience, and all those other types of factors various forms of criticism consider, but the formalists had a thing---busted though it may've been---about the work itself, and close reading, and giving it a go. maybe my old sympathies to that sort of thing have something to do with my assertion that there is a song.

that stuff you bandy about about standards by which i/we/one judges this thing that's a wholly distinct form of expression is, gotta say, hard for me even to try to get behind. and i don't think that's cuz i'm hungover.

so, do i know you? other than from this little talk we're having?

Re: "sorrow"

[(Anonymous)]

yeah, i don't want to call it a song--it's another unfortunate symptom of the disease of the english language. "recording" is probably more accurate. it's too bad that people get miscontextualized--if either of you two were interested in investigating this singer's work, you'd find that he's not really "folky," though the starbucks-sounding Niagara Niagara soundtrack certainly contextualizes him that way. whatever. folk music is just so boring. everyone needs to feel superior to at least one other group--you seem to feel superior to "bad" singers, or to songmakers whom you suspect lack your knowledge of musical theory, and i feel superior to folkies. everybody's gotta look down on someone.

Re: "sorrow"

[fflo.livejournal.com]

i really don't know where you get that. are you jason morphew, by any chance? i can see how he might, if he's very sensitive, feel attacked. but c'mon. i just said something about that one pitch getting the nasal treatment, and then my not-anonymous lj friend said she also liked his song (which does exist) but was itchin' for him to take it down a step or two so's that top note would be less strained.

on the other hand, i do feel that you have rather a gift with this business of making other people feel superior.

Re: "sorrow"

[(Anonymous)]

well, if i do, it's because i feel superior all the time, and inferior for doing it. i'm not morphew, but i am maybe a lil too sensitive. see ya.