Christine Lavin

Here's a new song from my work-in-progress album. It's called "Mercury & Mars" and is the kind of song I am writing from a much older point of view. I could never have written it at the time, and you'll hear why.

"Mercury & Mars January 28, 1977)"

https://studio.youtube.com/video/ypN4PAj_eqw

The song is not about Robin -- just want to make that clear. I've worked with him since 1986, when he produced my album, "Beau Woes and other problems of modern life." He's my favorite violinist that I have ever worked with, and his playing here is so beautiful. If you ever need a violinist, who you gonna call?

Happy Holidays,

Chris

p.s. In the NYTimes on Feb. 8 2024, Frank Bruni wrote this in his column, "For The Love Of Sentences). It gives you an idea how the song came about, even though I guess it was percolating 47 years.

I've never given an F.T.L.O.S. nomination its own discrete showcase, but the following one was too long to be incorporated into the usual omnibus section but short enough to share nonetheless. I love both its mood and its message, and I like making this exception not for words that a journalist wrote but for ones that a reader sent in to a publication — in this instance, The Times - as a response to an article.

It's from the singer-songwriter Christine Lavin, who took issue with a takedown of "Rhapsody in Blue," the George Gershwin classic:

"All this sniping and yapping at music! 'Rhapsody in Blue' could be the soundtrack to one of the most romantic moments in your life, too, if you let it sweep you away.

It was a freezing cold night in January. Big fat snowflakes whipped through the air while the skyline surrounding Central Park stood in silent vigil as Gershwin's music pierced that inky darkness, emanating from the speakers that ringed Wollman Rink.

My new boyfriend and I rented skates and joined the throng, at first tentatively circling, then with more vigor as the music propelled us. It felt as if we were flying — beneath the snowflakes and the stars — and look!

Over there's Venus.

And over there, Mars.

Whenever I hear that glorious music, I'm instantly transported to that moment in time when his gloved hand held my gloved hand and the world was full of possibilities.

What I wouldn't give for the chance to circle just once more, in the cold and the dark ... enveloped by 'Rhapsody in Blue' .."