Remember that song?
If you do, then you’re probably a “Boomer”!
Written for the opera “Porgy and Bess” – which is a good story by the way.
Per Wikipedia.
“Gershwin began composing the song in December 1933, attempting to create his own spiritual in the style of the African American folk music of the period.[5][6] Gershwin had completed setting DuBose Heyward’s poem to music by February 1934, and spent the next 20 months completing and orchestrating the score of the opera.[7]
The song is sung several times throughout Porgy and Bess. Its lyrics are the first words heard in act 1 of the opera, following the communal “wa-do-wa”. It is sung by Clara as a lullaby. The song theme is reprised soon after as counterpoint to the craps gamescene, in act 2 in a reprise by Clara, and in act 3 by Bess, singing to Clara’s now-orphaned baby after both its parents died in the storm. It was recorded for the first time by Abbie Mitchell on July 19, 1935, with George Gershwin playing the piano and conducting the orchestra (on: George Gershwin Conducts Excerpts from Porgy & Bess, Mark 56 667).
The 1959 movie version of the musical featured Loulie Jean Norman singing the song. That rendition finished at #52 in AFI’s 100 Years…100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.”
I used to sing it to my kids when they were little. That and “Ghostriders in the Sky” by the man in black, Johnny Cash.
Now I’m really dating myself aren’t I?
While I don’t enjoy mowing the lawn…God bless those people who do…I do love the fact that I can sit on our front porch or the swing in the front yard and keep working while enjoying God’s creation.
In the winter…nah, ain’t happening. Especially in Wisconsin winters. 😀
The writing is going in bits and starts, but I’ve got a plan. I typically write into the dark, which is fun and scary, but slow. In an effort to speed up the process I am going to try something new.
I’ve written a bare bones outline for my story Visitor to Blue Lake: A Jazz and Slade Story (working title) going forward from where I finished writing.
This is a “how they meet” story. I didn’t put a lot of work into the outline because I’m hoping that once I get started writing according to the outline the creative part of my brain will push me forward and I’ll probably veer off the outline into who knows what kind of direction.
Then, I’ll probably need to scrap the outline, write up a new one according to the direction the outline is going and work from there.
It’s a crutch which I may or may not need going forward, but the thing about writing, especially fiction which requires the creative part of the brain, is that you have to practice.
Like anything else it takes practice. The more you do it, the better you get at telling stories.
So anyway…off I go to get client work done so that I can try my little experiment (thank you, Dean Wesley Smith for the idea).
