| listen to you
For this edition of "Listen To You" we combed the phone book and asked folks with love-ly names about their favorite lovin' sounds.
I don't really listen to that [romantic music] anymore. Those days are past. But back then, I guess I liked Dinah Washington and Marvin Gaye (Here My Dear and Let's Get it On). I also like his song "Sexual Healing." I think these songs had a lot of meaning. Songs today, you know, they have the beat, but there's no meaning there. I also liked that song by The Temptations, "My Girl." It's romantic because it just talks about this one girl and how much she meant to this one guy.
Prince, Purple Rain: He's kinda a young guy, but I like him a lot. You can really feel the emotion he puts into his work, like you can read his mind. The Platters, "Only You (And You Alone)": This was a really popular song back in my day. Sam Cooke, Sam Cooke at the Copa: He just LOOKS romantic. I feel like I can relate to his songs. My favorite of his is "Twisting the Night Away." Otis Redding: He's just awesome. He was the man, back then.
I don't really listen to that much romantic music. The only album I can think of that I listen to which might be romantic is Enya's Shepherd Moons. I just find this album very uplifting. It gives me a good feeling about myself.
Emmylou Harris, The Wrecking Ball: I like both her lyrics and her voice. She speaks to the real and the ordinary in a very fresh, pleasant, hopeful way. Ravel, Boléro and Ralph Vaughan Williams, Fantasia on 'Greensleeves.'These two albums create a trancelike magic, a visual image. The Boléro is a very romantic dance, and Fantasia on 'Greensleeves' is very serene, [it relates] a beauty in green nature, woodlands, flower gardens.
Arlene Love, artist: Frank Sinatra, Only the Lonely: I came of age with this album. I think its very sad, poignant. Anything by Billie Holiday: I fell in love with her when I was 15. The first time I ran away from home was to go to a Billie Holiday concert, in fact. She's a unique creature. Her voice is an instrument, true and deep. After many decades of listening to her, I still haven't tired of her. You know that it's art when it's truly sustaining, like Bach, like Cézanne, Rembrandt.
- Corinna Zappia |