Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story Read Online Free PDF Page A

eventually moved to Oregon, and I didn’t see him again until I was twenty-one. I mourned the loss of my little brother and eventually wrote him a song called “Nikos.” In later years, and after much healing for everyone involved, our families have had the opportunity to be closeagain.

three
    you don’t outrun pain
    M y dad had left behind his social work, and now we supported ourselves on music alone. I took my mom’s place in the act, but we no longer performed in fancy hotels, singing instead in honky-tonks, juke joints, restaurants, lumberjack haunts, and veterans’ bars. There was no more variety show for tourists; in these places we were required to do five-hour sets of covers and my dad’s originals, supplying the background music while people ate and drank. I was probably the only fourth grader who went from elementary school straight to the bar. I was still adjusting to a new school on weekdays, and on weekends I transformed into a barroom curiosity. School politics and social graces were confusing, but onstage I was confident and secure—look at that cute girl yodel! Most gigs were local, but eventually we toured across the state, sometimes with a band, but mostly it was just my dad on guitar singing lead, me doing harmony. My dad was a great entertainer, personable and professional, and could not only play and sing thousands of cover songs but wrote originals as well.
    I was learning harmonies to the classic songs and popular covers my dad included in our set lists. “Brown-Eyed Girl,” “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Free Fallin’,” “Hotel California,” “The Circle Game.” I had never heard the Rolling Stones sing “Wild Horses” or the Beatles sing “Yesterday,” only dad’s acoustic interpretations. For the most part my musical influences were songs, not the artists. Singing five-hour sets every night of all the best songs ever written taught me about storytelling. I didn’t see the cult of personality attached to the songs, only the pure power of the words and stories. I never heard Elvis sing until I was in my late teens. I never heard Jim Croce sing . . . it goes on. I didn’t have access to much pop culture. I do remember Odetta, Maria Callas, and Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Songbook . As I grew older and MTV was all powerful, I knew of Cyndi Lauper, although I didn’t gravitate toward Madonna when she first came out. She was too far from my world. Nor did I get the Beatles at the time. It took me years to appreciate pop music. My dad was my biggest musical influence, and then as I grew up, I listened to old folk songs from Ireland and England. I listened to old blues artists—some obscure and some more well-known. My lack of music history has vexed me for much of my life. At the same time, I think having the silence in which to develop my own sound was priceless.
    To develop my singing I spent hours alone. I wouldn’t call it practicing as much as I would exploring. Experimenting and getting to know my voice and its limits, and how to push them. Later I learned more about tone and breath by listening to great singers. I was a good mimic and learned a lot by studying artists with specific colors. Nanci Griffith for her bright sweet ironic tone. Ella was an endless teacher for me, and still is. Sarah Vaughan is one of the finest voices in history—her tone almost operatic, and her breath control staggering.
    I had no tape player or cassette tapes until I was a teenager, and TVand radio were just not habits we seemed to be into. I wrote my first song after learning about Martin Luther King Jr. in fourth grade. I was so touched by his life story it inspired me to write the lyrics for “I Have a Dream.” It was not a long or lyrically complex song, though it had some interesting melodic choices for an eight-year-old.
I have a dream that people can be free
I have a dream that people can be friends
Ever since I was a little boy
I wished I could be free
    Singing two nights a