mardi 24 Jul 2007, 15h51m

In the most memorable scene in the 1995 movie “Immortal Beloved”, a young Beethoven flees his abusive father and plunges into a lake at night. There, he lies on his back, calmed and quiet. We see him from above, floating and suspended in the reflection of a brilliant starry sky. Strains from his “Emperor” concerto swell up, as we watch the rising star, a voyager in the firmament of his own genius.

Ever since I saw that movie, I have longed to experience that same buoyancy – longed to know how it feels to create beautiful music. Music appeals to some of the most primitive coils of our brains. I had never written a song. And then last week, I did. I’m no musician. I don’t play an instrument – at least not well. I took a little piano as a kid, and I can play some jigs on the recorder, but that’s about it. First, I got two bits of advice off the Internet: 1. Write about love, and 2) Repeat a couple of lines here and there.

So I wrote “The Girl Called Never” on Wednesday night, and called Ramon on Thursday. Ramon Cadiz is like a giant, poker-playing, soft-chassis iPod. His repertoire of popular music on guitar and piano is amazing. He agreed to meet me at Brock’s Boathouse, the “Launch for Hire” building in Inverness, to which we have access. He brought his six-string and his digital recorder.

We bounced ideas all around Madeline Hope’s art works and her trampoline in the cavernous boathouse, . Tomales Bay slapped its own sloppy beat on the pilings beneath us, and on the mud all around us. Ramon helped me try out different tunes, tempos, and styles for my ode to hope. Finally, we landed on a twangy, Neil Young-style version. It seemed to fit, and we took turns singing verses. My musical contribution was a particular chord that just sounded right for one lyric. Ramon told me to do it again, just like that, and to channel Dwight Yoakam.

I pretty much hate the sound of recordings of my own singing voice. I’m so flat I could press seersucker into silk. Still – it was our song and we had breathed life into it. Sure, there were lug nuts in the thing’s neck and it had visible stitches. But it told a good story. Ramon, may the spirit bless him, was so enthusiastic, and his guitar kept it all together.
Here’s the first verse. Play it twangy, medium-slow:

She wasn’t the fog, but the wind that had brought it.
If heartbreak’s a class, then she could have taught it.
Her name was Italian and she danced like a fountain
She was too deep for one dude by her own accountin’.

The short chorus goes “I said love once, and it was one time too many. She slipped out of town with a drummer named Lenny.” There are some steamy parts later on involving her hairdresser, Penny.

I played it for my wife. And then a funny thing happened: I felt this compulsion to explain how it’s not really autobiographical, only, you know, sort of. I wonder how Barry White’s wife used to feel after hearing all those to-the-bedroom ballads. Did she really believe they were all about her?

I have been riding this musical high all week. I find myself narrating the banal activities of life as if they were song verses. “I’m driving to work. I drive with a quirk, I drive with a pasted-on, Smurf-eating smirk.” Like that.

Now, I’m no Beethoven, and I don’t claim this song is great. But it has something where before there was nothing. The Big Beat has exploded, creating a primordial cosmos of song. So roll over, Beethoven… but get out of the lake first before you drown.