Shadow Puppet Storyteller

Perhaps Walkinbird is a Lark?

Soundtrack of my Life

This is the point where you'll start to realize that I was brought up by Choir geek parents with a collection of vinyl covering all the musicals from the 40's through the 70's, then they had me, and couldn't afford to spend cash at the record store anymore. In the first decade of my life I spent hours with a reel-to reel tape player microphone and my parents albums on a portable turntable. And despite my young age, I was a careful curator of those albums. My first mishap with an LP wouldn't happen until I was on the cusp of puberty and left a record on the turntable all day, not realizing the sun hit that window powerfully for several hours, warping it -- I blame the hormones and or my baby sister who came around about that time, for distracting me -- At least the casualty was one of my own albums...but why WHY! did it have to be one disc of my Star Wars Soundtrack double disc album?

I divert from the original point -- The production, Carousel, combining in my mind: the "Life is Good" messages of A Wonderful Life or A Christmas Carol, or the death comes to everyone messages of Man of LaMancha or West Side Story are powerful teachers in the form of dramatic music. It does not matter to me when music actually presents itself in our timeline, or actual time of the world -- to me, some songs have existed much longer than that time in which they become noticed and are birthed into consciousness.

So, You'll Never Walk Alone speaks to me from many angles as one that has existed long -- even the recollection of it in the final movie scene puts forward the idea that it is a parable that has carried on generation to generation. It is a short, sweet easy to memorize set of lyrics and eventhough its tempo is almost exactly like breathing, it can be technically difficult to perform. My own mom surprised me by saying she wants it sung at her upcoming retirement, and I am going to do just that.

I love Shirley Jones, but it's less heartbreaking to listen to Claramae Turner as Cousin Nettie starting at 1:19, or jump to the end scene of the 1956 Carousel movie (Richard Rodgers, lyricist)



Then there's this type of staging; I am assuming this is the entry song the heavenly choirs sing...