J.A.M.

Archive for the ‘Music’ Category

Last weekend I attended a Song Writing Workshop in my favorite City in the whole world – Port Elizabeth. I left East London around lunch time on Friday by bus and arrived on Friday evening in PE. I stayed at The Chapman and enjoyed a room with a view of the ocean over the following 4 nights. It was a very enjoyable short break away from the demands of ‘normal’ life – whatever that is.

The Workshop had been advertised by Kyknet on DSTV. I have, for a long time now, felt that the Afrikaans Music Industry is much more alive and in many ways more creative than the English Music Industry, so jumped at the opportunity to attend a Song Writing Workshop aimed at introducing songwriters to an Afrikaans Song Writing Competition based on the concept of the Eurovision Song Contest. The ‘Afri-Visie’ Workshop was presented by Pierre Rossouw, well known South African Song Writer and Heidi Edeling, a sought after professional in the SA Music Industry. It was held at Cherry Place in Walmer in Port Elizabeth and was a most enjoyable day learning more about the South African Song Writing Community from those on the inside. Getting into the Industry really is more about ‘who you know’, which is sad as there is so much untapped talent out there, but this initiative is hoping to open that door to many more Song Writers. It was explained that there is a drastic shortage of Song Writers in the Industry and new talent is being looked for through this competition to grow the Song Writing pool. So – all very exciting!

The competition officially launches on 1 August this year and will run until 31 August. The best songs will be identified in the different regions of our Country and this will all culminate in a gala evening broadcast live on DSTV where the winner will be announced. There are large cash prizes up for grabs and a ‘foot in the door’. I have never written songs in Afrikaans but have been writing in English for a number of years now so am really excited at being faced with this new challenge.

More details can be found here http://kyknet.dstv.com/2014/04/14/afri-visie-skryf-n-treffer-kompetisie/

Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unreleased_ABBA_songs

ABBA - Just Like That

• Just Like That” is the title of one of Swedish pop group ABBA’s last songs, and has caused a lot of interest and hype among ABBA fans as it has not yet been released in its entirety.
  ABBAs composers Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus wrote “Just Like That” sometime in the springtime of 1982, and the group started recording sessions with this and a handful of other new songs in the beginning of May that year. The composers however lost interest in the track after several attempts at recording it, and decided in early June to put the “Just Like That” tapes aside. Journalists visiting ABBA in their studio during these sessions wrote about the new material, and fans thus heard of the new ABBA songs to come. Two titles were mentioned: “Just Like That” and “I Am The City”. Just Like That was also mentioned in an official Polar Music Press release in the summer of 1982. It stated that the song was completed and would be released on the next studio album. However, the outcome of these last recording sessions during the summer months of 1982 was two singles released in August and November 1982 respectively: “The Day Before You Came”/”Cassandra”, and “Under Attack”/”You Owe Me One”. The a-sides were included in the new ABBA release The Singles: The First Ten Years, a double LP celebrating ABBA’s singles from 1973 until 1982. Although the foursome stated the group would continue work in 1983, this eventually did not happen.
  During 1983, demo versions of later unreleased ABBA songs were circulating amongst London’s theatreworld as being possible melodies for the up-coming Rice/Andersson/Ulvaeus musical Chess. These then became bootleg versions circulating among fans during the 1980s, and as such there has been a growing interest for their official release. Benny and Björn allowed for a snippet of “Just Like That” to be released in a ‘medley’ track in a box set released in 1994: Thank You For The Music, but this became nothing but a teaser for the avid ABBA fan. The “Just Like That” ‘snippet’ released in 1994 revealed the chorus of the track only, and not only did it include an unmistakenly shared vocal by Agnetha and Anni-Frid, but also a saxophone solo by Raphael Ravenscroft, who worked on Gerry Rafferty‘s hit “Baker Street” in 1978 (one of the few times that ABBA used a musician outside the usual ABBA circle).
  In June 1982 the song was shelved, but after ABBA split up, Benny and Björn looked at the song again, and in 1984 decided to rework both composition and lyrics and ended up with two new songs. The first, which kept the original “Just Like That” chorus, was recorded by Swedish duo Gemini when Benny and Björn wrote songs and produced their first album in 1985. “Just Like That” was even released as a Gemini single in the UK. The other part of the song, composed around the original “Just Like That” verses, had the demo title “When the Waves Roll out to Sea”, and as such was one of the songs tried out (by both Elaine Paige and Tommy Körberg) as “With The Stars Shine In The Sky” during sessions for Benny and Björn’s work with Tim Rice for the Chess musical, but it was once again put aside.
  The ABBA version, with its composition of verse and chorus, was left unsatisfactory by Benny and Björn in June 1982. They have stated this first version sounded ‘wrong’: verse and chorus did not fit together, and that is why it was scrapped, and the two admit this happens regularly in their way of writing music: a mediocre song can become a bridge or a riff in another song, and a good melody line can lie around for years until it surfaces in a composition.
  “When the Waves Roll out to Sea” surfaced when Benny was working on the Swedish staging of Chess – Chess På Svenska – in 2002, as the 1984 musical by now had a new libretto and new material was needed. The verses to the old “Just Like That” were added to a new chorus in 1984, and now it found its place in Chess – almost 20 years later – as the number “Glöm Mig Om Du Kan”, a ballad sung by the Russian character Molokov, with Swedish lyrics by Björn.
  There are at least two known bootleg demo versions of ABBA’s original version of “Just Like That”. The first attempt at recording the song has become known as the ‘slow’ version, or ‘dream’ version. This version has a simple instrumental melody in between the verses and the choruses. Also apparent is a guitar riff that eventually made its way into the verse melody of ABBA’s last official single release, “Under Attack” (“Don’t know how to take it/don’t know where to go/my resistance’s running low…”).
  The second version of the song is known as the ‘na na na’ (or ‘la la la’) version. The song is essentially the same as the first; the same backing track and arrangement, but this time, with Agnetha singing emotional ‘na na na na’s on top of the instrumental melody.
  The final and completed version of the song has become known as the ‘saxophone’ version. This is the official ‘final mix’ of “Just Like That”. This version is very different to the first two, with a different arrangement and a new backing track. In place of the previous instrumental melodies/’na na na’ vocal overdubs, there are lengthy saxophone riffs (courtesy of Raphael Ravenscroft). This version of the song is the only version to be released, albeit not in its entirety.
  Michael B. Tretow, ABBA’s recording engineer throughout their whole career, did the editing of the released version of the track for the 1994 box set, and did a fine job in cutting and pasting the track, leaving the chorus to repeat in a loop (and thus not ‘releasing’ the melody in the verses).
  Carl Magnus Palm, author of the ABBA biography Bright Lights, Dark Shadows” in 2001, states in his 1994 book ABBA -The Complete Recording Sessions on this last version that this “…is what would have reached the listener’s ears had the track been released”.
  Agnetha said in 1994: “I haven’t heard it in several years, but I remember it as a very good song and recording. It is one of my big favourites, and I hope it’s going to be released one day”.
  The lyrical theme seems to have been transferred from the shelved “Just Like That” in June 1982 to the lyrics for “The Day Before You Came“, which were recorded in August the same year: “Until that day/My life had been a river/Following the same/pre-destinated course/Suddenly detouring so unexpectedly/With uncompromising force/My strongholds broke down all too easily/I remember well/How it did embarrass me/I hung on to his every smile/Marveled at his style/ […] /Just like that…/And once again/the river’s flowing slowly/Following the same and uneventful course/Now the tears have dried/it’s become a pleasant break/I recall without remorse/But now and then/I wonder where he is/And I will admit/he had something that I miss/I guess he was a rolling stone/The only one I’ve known…”

The song was originally intended to be featured in the ABBA musical, “Mamma Mia!“, sung as a love duet between Sophie and Sky, but was removed during rehearsals, as it did not progress the story.