When Kelly Kravitz contacted me about doing a review of the posthumously released CD of Dan Fogelberg songs, I jumped at the chance. It was afterward I realized how difficult this task would become.
Let me back up, in 2007 my husband came home after work, after listening to the NPR on his drive home and told me that Dan Fogelberg had died. As a woman born in 1958 and reaching my teens in the 70s, I grew up with Dan Fogelberg, with his songs anyway, so I mourned his passing from a distance – that safe zone.
The CD, “Dan Fogelberg: A Retrospective Interview (with Fred Migliore of FM Odyssey Radio)” arrived in the mail and I felt charged and excited about… well, everything. Mostly for selfish reasons – that I somehow landed this fabulous opportunity was forefront in my thinking – selfish reasons. I set the CD on the dining table and circled it. I circled it for three days.
Feelings that were once filled with excitement and opportunity were replaced with feelings of apprehension. I knew I wasn’t up to the task.Last night, at 8 o’clock I finally took a breath and unwrapped the plastic cover, opened the CD and placed it into the player. The first chord sent me reeling back to a hot summer. We had just moved into a house on East Granada Avenue in Phoenix, Arizona. The first song that played is off the second CD, titled “Tucson, Arizona.”My worry now heightened into something greater. I normally review books, not music. Would I know the proper music industry lingo to articulate the quality of the CD? What would I write at all? How could I tell a story about Dan Fogelberg? Words like orchestration and composition flashed into my head and I began to calm down. I knew those words. But, I was blocking what was really happening.
The music was quelling my fears, like an old friend who calls to say “everything will be all right.” Then the first CD began, the first song “To the Morning” – a song that sounds like light falling rain, the piano – the beautiful piano by the hand of Dan Fogelberg. His perfect tenor saying “there’s really no way to say no to the morning” in a song about letting go and living, freeing yourself and giving in. At least, that’s what the song means to me. Mr. Fogelberg’s music was taking over.
This isn’t just a CD set. It’s a memory. But more than a memory it’s that core feeling one gets from a sensory perception, like smell, music memory will place you back to an exact spot, a place in time, when you first heard a song. Dan Fogelberg was everywhere when I was a kid, well, his music was and so he walked with me from the house, to the school bus, through each class and back home again. He was everywhere.
So, what will his CD mean to someone who didn’t live in the years Dan Fogelberg reigned? Well, who can answer that but I do know they will thoroughly understand the music – an integral piece to falling in love with any music.Right now, “Same Old Lang Syne” is playing, a reminiscent song about two old lovers who meet after many years of separation. It breaks my heart it’s so yearning and it makes me wonder how he did it. How do you write something so precise, so to-the-heart, that it can make people cry.
Fred Migliore interviews Dan Fogelberg between each perfectly selected song. His style is unforced and fun. Dan is delightful as I’m sure those who knew him intimately, his friends and family, expect him to be. However, we, the listener, get to know Dan a little better. He’s real, he’s human which makes his loss even greater.
As I circled the table my subconscious must have been stalling me, keeping me from feeling a truer sense of loss. In 2007, my feeling of loss was far off and now, in 2009, not so. Mourning the loss of Dan Fogelberg is renewed and close this time. However, how fortunate that his music lives on. My memories - my youth and growing up - are found in this collection of Dan Fogelberg music. This CD set is an exquisite tribute and representation of Dan Fogelberg’s life and body of work. How fortunate to be selected to review Mr. Fogelberg’s CD set. I’m awestruck by the honor.
Dan Fogelberg died from prostate cancer in 2007 and three dollars from every sale of this CD will go to the Prostate Cancer Foundation (pfc.org).
April 23rd- Joyce Anthony at her two blogs.
April 28th- Ash Joie-Lee at her two blogs.
April 29th & 30th- Marvin at: Free Spirit blog at http://inspiritandtruths.blogspot.com/
ANDHippie Days blog at http://tiedyedtirades.blogspot.com/will review the CD
Kelly Kravitz- Blog Tour CoordinatorFollow me on Twitter- http://twitter.com/groovybooksFollow Promo 101 Virtual Tours on Twitter - www.twitter.com/litekeprVisit www.virtualblogtour.blogspot.com for all tour information
Let me back up, in 2007 my husband came home after work, after listening to the NPR on his drive home and told me that Dan Fogelberg had died. As a woman born in 1958 and reaching my teens in the 70s, I grew up with Dan Fogelberg, with his songs anyway, so I mourned his passing from a distance – that safe zone.
The CD, “Dan Fogelberg: A Retrospective Interview (with Fred Migliore of FM Odyssey Radio)” arrived in the mail and I felt charged and excited about… well, everything. Mostly for selfish reasons – that I somehow landed this fabulous opportunity was forefront in my thinking – selfish reasons. I set the CD on the dining table and circled it. I circled it for three days.
Feelings that were once filled with excitement and opportunity were replaced with feelings of apprehension. I knew I wasn’t up to the task.Last night, at 8 o’clock I finally took a breath and unwrapped the plastic cover, opened the CD and placed it into the player. The first chord sent me reeling back to a hot summer. We had just moved into a house on East Granada Avenue in Phoenix, Arizona. The first song that played is off the second CD, titled “Tucson, Arizona.”My worry now heightened into something greater. I normally review books, not music. Would I know the proper music industry lingo to articulate the quality of the CD? What would I write at all? How could I tell a story about Dan Fogelberg? Words like orchestration and composition flashed into my head and I began to calm down. I knew those words. But, I was blocking what was really happening.
The music was quelling my fears, like an old friend who calls to say “everything will be all right.” Then the first CD began, the first song “To the Morning” – a song that sounds like light falling rain, the piano – the beautiful piano by the hand of Dan Fogelberg. His perfect tenor saying “there’s really no way to say no to the morning” in a song about letting go and living, freeing yourself and giving in. At least, that’s what the song means to me. Mr. Fogelberg’s music was taking over.
This isn’t just a CD set. It’s a memory. But more than a memory it’s that core feeling one gets from a sensory perception, like smell, music memory will place you back to an exact spot, a place in time, when you first heard a song. Dan Fogelberg was everywhere when I was a kid, well, his music was and so he walked with me from the house, to the school bus, through each class and back home again. He was everywhere.
So, what will his CD mean to someone who didn’t live in the years Dan Fogelberg reigned? Well, who can answer that but I do know they will thoroughly understand the music – an integral piece to falling in love with any music.Right now, “Same Old Lang Syne” is playing, a reminiscent song about two old lovers who meet after many years of separation. It breaks my heart it’s so yearning and it makes me wonder how he did it. How do you write something so precise, so to-the-heart, that it can make people cry.
Fred Migliore interviews Dan Fogelberg between each perfectly selected song. His style is unforced and fun. Dan is delightful as I’m sure those who knew him intimately, his friends and family, expect him to be. However, we, the listener, get to know Dan a little better. He’s real, he’s human which makes his loss even greater.
As I circled the table my subconscious must have been stalling me, keeping me from feeling a truer sense of loss. In 2007, my feeling of loss was far off and now, in 2009, not so. Mourning the loss of Dan Fogelberg is renewed and close this time. However, how fortunate that his music lives on. My memories - my youth and growing up - are found in this collection of Dan Fogelberg music. This CD set is an exquisite tribute and representation of Dan Fogelberg’s life and body of work. How fortunate to be selected to review Mr. Fogelberg’s CD set. I’m awestruck by the honor.
Dan Fogelberg died from prostate cancer in 2007 and three dollars from every sale of this CD will go to the Prostate Cancer Foundation (pfc.org).
April 23rd- Joyce Anthony at her two blogs.
April 28th- Ash Joie-Lee at her two blogs.
April 29th & 30th- Marvin at: Free Spirit blog at http://inspiritandtruths.blogspot.com/
ANDHippie Days blog at http://tiedyedtirades.blogspot.com/will review the CD
Kelly Kravitz- Blog Tour CoordinatorFollow me on Twitter- http://twitter.com/groovybooksFollow Promo 101 Virtual Tours on Twitter - www.twitter.com/litekeprVisit www.virtualblogtour.blogspot.com for all tour information
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