Wednesday, January 05, 2005

Wish you were here

this is an audio post - click to play


Song by Pink Floyd, sung by me. Yeah.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

A lovely and intelligent interpretation of this song. As it turns out, about 6 months ago, I also envisioned (in my mind's ear) an acoustic version of "Wishing You Were Here" so I downloaded the chords and worked it up on guitar for awhile. Mine didn't evolve as well as yours has but I've been a trumpet player all my life so what can one expect? (Trumpet players, et al, never have to learn the words because they can't sing and play at the same time.)
I'd love to hear you sing this song with a bit more soul, a bit more bite, a bit less ballad. It's a sad song, but I think it needs more of an accusatory tone to it, more sense of need on your part. You need to squeeze the exquisite longing/hurt/pain feeling out of your soul and sell it in the music. Do you really 'wish you were here?' (I know everyone's a critic.)
And if I can be so bold to make a request, how bout working up "Hallelujah" a la Jeff Buckley? And I'd love to hear you sing "In The Wee Small Hours of the Morning" a la Sinatra.
Keep working baby. Oh the places you'll go!
R.

Braidwood said...

Well, thanks for listening to my song, R, with a critical ear or otherwise. Confession: I didn't work out the chords. I can't remember where I learned the intro. My guest artist from another post, Lisa Pearl, created and taught me the ending.

Yeah, my voice was very halting on that song- I got nervous just singing for the blog! So... I'll try and find those songs you mentioned. Hey, my first song requests via blog! I'm glad to know someone was listening.

Ok, note about the song: I'm not singing it as a love song to someone. I'm kind of singing it to myself and others who sometimes take the easy way out and don't really fully live. That interpretation of the song is more powerful for me than as a personal love song. (although I do interpret the fish bowl part personally.)

Braidwood said...

R, are you a trumpet player that I know?

Anonymous said...

I'm pretty sure we don't know each other. I don't even know what country you live in. There is also an age difference. Wish we had a better way.

The Dec 9th issue of Rolling Stone magazine is devoted to their list of the 500 Greatest Hits of All Time. Wish You Were Here is number 316. The little summary says:

"While Pink Floyd were recording this elegy for burned-out ex-frontman Syd Barrett, he mysteriously appeared in the studio in such bad shape nobody recognized him. "He stood up and said, 'Right, when do I put my guitar on?'" keyboardist Rick Wright recalled. "And of course, he didn't have a guitar with him. And we said, 'Sorry, Syd, the guitar's all done.'"

Just a little trivia for ya. I agree with your interpretation, it matches my own. Regardless, I just feel from a delivery standpoint, we (musicians) must dip down into wherever the music's meaning is inside of us and try to focus on bringing that up and out in the performance.

You've got good pipes. That's your medium. Now deliver your message. Live it.

R.