Every day, so they say, is a school day. And so it was this morning when a line in a novel led me to that wonderful Danny Kaye song The Inchworm, written by the great Frank Loesser . Then, as luck would have it, Spotify rolled on and I found myself encountering the songs and poems of Molly Drake for the first time. If you too have not discovered Molly Drake, Frank Loesser or even The Inchworm there are wonderful things to find for you out there.
I remember reading a preface to a book on the French Impressionists which opened with an apt slogan. ‘The world is full of such wonderful things, we should all be as happy as kings.’ It seemed to me then, a fairly serious youth, to make sense of how painters could keep painting and beautiful art could continue to be made even when the world around the artists is in self-destruct mode. It is often worth remembering , and not difficult on one of the most beautiful days of early winter here on the west coast of Scotland, that there are always great things to celebrate.
My Molly Drake discovery however also fills me with FOMA worry. What have I been missing all these years? Molly was the poet and songwriter mother to the late, and very great Nick Drake whose music was also discovered by new genertaions of people decades after his early death. No one I knew talked or listened much to Nick Drake as I was growing up but somehow the music found an audience to make him a posthumous folk hero. How comforting all of that could have been to his poor mother we shall never know but given she died a good twenty years on from the loss of her only son gives hope that she may have enjoyed how much his music came to be lauded.
I can’t think of why any of this matters to this week’s AC other than I hope you manage to find some music that will make your own life a little better over the next wee while. Isn’t that why we listen and listen again? We will be in reflective mood this week too as we think back over the last year in country and look at what the Country Music Association has recognised in their awards cermony last week. For some people this is the biggest night of the year and for mainstream country artists and the industry it is certainly bigger than any other gongs bash. We’ll play some winners, losers and worthy contenders this Tuesday evening.
We shall also play some new things too by The Barr Brothers, Sierra Ferrell and even Jon Batiste! We will also pay tribute to Tod Snider who died recently and was affectionately known as ‘The King of East Nashville.’
It’s a packed two hours of country music, our way from eight o’clock this Tuesday evening on BBC Sounds or BBC Radio Scotland. Join me if you can.