Tonight I was in the bathroom surrounded by tile walls and before I knew it I was singing Joan Baez’s Silver Dagger:
“Don’t sing love songs, you’ll wake my mother She’s sleeping here right by my side And in her right hand, a silver dagger She’s says that I can’t be your bride.
All men are false, says my mother They’ll tell you wicked, loving lies Then the very next day, they’ll find another and leave you home to pine and sigh.
My daddy is a handsome devil. He’s got a chain five miles long. And on every link a heart does dangle of a woman loved and a woman wronged.
Go court another tender maiden, and hope that she will be your wife. For I’ve been warned and I decided to sleep alone all of my life.”
This song was from Joan Baez’s first album in 1960, which I listened to for hours when I was a kid, memorizing almost all the folk songs. My musical taste is deeply influenced by those ballads, and when I decide to hide in the bathroom and sing, then that’s where I go usually.
I am also a lover of the voices and lyrics of Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Judy Collins, Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, The Beatles, Carol King, James Taylor, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, and Simon and Garfunkel. These have been my people with James Brown, Otis Redding, and Marvin Gaye thrown in for good measure. Aretha, too, and Janis. I also have had a thing for Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, and Cream. While I now recognize the brilliance of the Allman Brothers, ZZ Top, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin, at the time, the truth is I was still entrenched with earlier music. And, I have only become aware of country music in the past five years. Before that time, if it wasn’t Hank Williams or Pasty Cline, then I had no idea who was singing.
I serenaded my daughters every night before bed with songs by Carol King, Leonard Cohen, and Joni Mitchell. My girls know almost the entirety of the Tapestry album by heart along with Songs of Leonard Cohen and Blue. Recently, my daughter Sarah asked me for the songs that I sang to her while growing up so she could sing them to baby Luna when she arrives. One of the sweetest compliments I’ve ever received was from my daughter, Liz, who after hearing Joni Mitchell sing her song Green, told me that she thought my version was better.
I have always loved to sing, but am aware that I have forgotten that love over the last few years. Bursting into song in the bathroom reminded me that singing is part my history and how I have defined myself in the past. Maybe it’s just time to get out the old songbooks and have a little refresher. Or I might even learn a little “newer” music – I might start with John Mayer, Allison Krauss, and Hank III.
Either way, tonight I was glad to discover that my voice is still intact. I might have struggled here and there to find a note or two, but never mind. I was in the bathroom, after all, and I don’t think anybody else was listening.
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