TAPES FROM THE ATTIC CD
Tapes From the Attic (Volume 1)
By Dave Colvin
©2005 by Arnybarn Audio a Division of Arnybarn Music
for these and other songs, visit my web site at www.arnybarn.net (all are MP3 unless otherwise noted)
July 2005
As I approached turning 50 years old (which is August 5th by the way) I got to thinking about all those audiotapes I created over the years that are stored up in the attic. (Actually they’re stored in our Bonus Room upstairs – but in the Attic sounds more interesting)
It was necessary to always have a tape recorder going when I was writing a song. I would rewrite and edit over previous recordings – mostly editing out the “not so good” verses. Usually though, the final product was saved to playback later.
My goal now is to transfer all of the tapes to CD as some are very fragile already. What you are about to hear are actual recordings from those tapes some as old as 35 years ago.
In listening to these tapes it became clear that they aren’t just about me, but rather they are about the music and those individuals who along the way have influenced what I have been able to create, and what we were able to create together.
This first piece is a pretend interview where in early 1972 my sister Judy, reporter for Eyewitness News, interviews me, Dave Colvin, singer songwriter. Not only is it somewhat biographical, it demonstrates how we used to entertain ourselves back in the day before X-Box and Nintendo, and believe it or not - we only had 4 TV channels to choose from!
* Judy Interview
I started making up songs in 1965 at the age of 10. To say I was “writing” songs at that age is stretching the meaning of the word, they were mostly little melodies with easy to remember lyrics. The reason I started making up songs was because my friend and neighbor, Lance Ringel, who was 3 years older than I was, had started making up songs. Well, I could not let Lance be better than me! So I made up songs like “Walk Over The Rainbow” and “Coal Mines of Kentucky”. This next sound clip is from 1970. Lance is performing a song I had written called “People In The World”
· People In the World clip
Well, you get the idea – what is interesting for me now is to hear how very late Sixties/Early 70’s that song sounds. That fall Lance went on to college and he and I never sang together after that recording.
Another person who had a big influence on my music was my friend Vince Thomalla. He re-introduced me to the folk music of Peter, Paul and Mary. Here are the only recordings I have of Vince and I singing – The first song is “Very Last Day” followed by “The Christmas Dinner”.
The Christmas Dinner proved a turning point for the MacArthur High School Choral Department that had always performed traditional choir music only occasionally stepping out of bounds to sing a Gershwin or Irving Berlin tune.
As we practiced The Christmas Dinner for the 1972 Christmas Program Vince and I would get side tracked singing other songs and basically had a pretty good list of songs going. “The Christmas Dinner” performance was a success, and when it came time for ideas for a Spring Program – that list of songs we had made became the foundation for a choir show we called…
Musical Revolution.
Musical Revolution showcased more modern material for the choirs and ensembles to sing. I even wrote the theme song for it – here is the original “Theme to Musical Revolution” from March of 1973…
Well, Vince went on to college that fall and my longtime friend from grade school, Greg Pryor, and I carried on the “new” musical tradition! Of course, because of the success the previous year of Musical Revolution – all the choir members wanted to do it again! Musical Revolution II was performed over 2 nights March 29th and 30th, 1974.
As part of promotion for the show, six of us, (Greg, me, Terry Stiers, Dianne Monts, Bob Peer and Michelle Gard) were asked to be on a local TV program called “Looking In” which was hosted by Dick Westbrook, who was the father of one of our classmates, Wendy Westbrook. This first song you are about to hear is Greg and I singing a Loggins and Messina song called “My Music”
· My Music
What was interesting was that I was really nervous during the interview part. Greg stepped up and handled it very well I thought. In fact they interviewed him again in 2 other segments. The show had extra time left and they wondered if we could do another song. Greg said, “Dave could do his song”
I don’t know if I ever thanked Greg for suggesting that but I got to perform “I Got a Name” by Jim Croce with Bob Peer backing me up on lead guitar. It turned out to be one of the performances I am most proud of.
I wrote the opening Theme Song to MRII as well as the Finale – Unfortunately I can’t seem to find a version of that second theme song on any of my tapes. I did find the short Finale….you will hear 2 verses but we ended up only using the 2nd verse for the show.
· MRII Finale
In the Fall of 1974 I went to Illinois State University and was no longer the big star I felt like in high school. But I still wrote a lot of songs. While I am the songwriter in our family, the writer in the family is my older brother Fred. From poetry to short stories to novels he is a Master Wordsmith.
That same fall he had sent me a very long poem he had written. As I read it however – some verses jumped out at me and I pieced together a song lyric and some music that you are about to hear called “Alone Is Never Quite Real”
The next year at ISU, my sister Judy had a class project where she took a poem Fred had written, snapped some corresponding pictures of our 1year old nephew Jay R. to use in a slide projector and had me put the poem to music.
The song is called “Small Child”
Also in1975 Mike Horton became my roommate. While Mike later was very successful in the business world, back then he had a hidden talent of writing poetry. Here’s a clip of a song I wrote using lines from one of his poems called “More Than Too Much”.
· More Than Too Much
Getting back to 1965 it was around that time I met the love of my life, Debbie when she and her family moved into the house across the street. As life separated us with its twists and turns, on Ocotber 8th, 1975, I saw her again for the first time in five years. This song was written about that encounter – it’s called “Aging Soldiers”
I’m going to close out “Volume 1 of Tapes From The Attic” with a song I wrote for Debbie before we had started dating again.
I sang this song, “Find Love Once” at our wedding May 27th, 1978,
and now you have, as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story!
1) Judy Interview
2) People In The World
3) Very Last Day
4) The Christmas Dinner
5) Theme to Musical Revolution
6) My Music
7) Interview Greg & Dave
8) I Got A Name
9) Finale to MR II
10) Alone Is Never Quite Real
11) Small Child
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