Category: Music

A Grand Day Out

Spacecats played our first brunch gig at The Grand in Croton yesterday, and it went great.  The Grand turned out to be a really nice place, with a good stage and good acoustics, and the people who ran it were really friendly.  They provided a backline of equipment including drums and amps, which was nice.  When we were setting up, the manager suggested I wouldn’t need a mic for my sax, and he was totally right.  We didn’t even use the P.A. but it sounded great.

It was a really good crowd too; the place was pretty much full.  A bunch of friends came to see us, including Leah and Dan from my old job, and their families.  And the food was really good.  They gave us complementary drinks and breakfast.  So it was a great vibe overall.

Best thing was the band was really on.  We didn’t do our usual set, which is a mix of jazz, funk, rock and pop songs, and originals.  Instead we focused mainly on jazz standards, mostly on the mellow, mid-tempo side.  It gave us a chance to really get into this material and shine with it.  Often I took an extended number of choruses on my solos, just kept on blowing, cuz everything felt so good.  The ideas kept on flowing and the band kept on feeding me energy and things to respond to.  I think everyone in the group felt the same way.

Our set list was mostly songs from the real book, with just three originals.  To make thing easy, I ordered them alphabetically, with a block of songs from book two comprising the first half of the second set.

Alice in Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland
All of Me
All the Things U R
April in Paris
As Simple As It Gets
Black Nile
Black Orpheus
Dolphin Dance
Easy to Love
Giant Steps
Green Landings
Have You Met Ms. Jones?

I Hear a Rhapsody
Killer Joe
Moose the Mooche
Mr. Magic
Panonnica
St. Thomas
Jordu
Little Waltz
Minority
My Romance
There’s Snow Tomorrow
West Coast Blues

Best of all, they invited us back for a regular gig!  So look for the next engagement soon.  

Meanwhile, next up is The Side Hustle playing horn section funk, dance and party music at the Shrine in Harlem next Friday.  Detail coming soon.

Full Fathom Five

First off, the Spacecats gig at the Green Growler last Friday went great.  We had a bunch people come out to see us, including some music friends from other groups.  Also, Lizzy was in town for the weekend, staying with Michelle in the city, so the two of them came up to see us.  Afterwards we all went out to a diner for a late dinner.

There’s a bunch more gigs coming up, including a Spacecats jazz brunch at the Grand in Croton on November 1, and a couple weeks after that my first gig with the horn section funk band Side Hustle, Friday November 13at the Shrine in Harlem.  This is my first gig in Manhattan since the pandemic.  And every night this week I have a rehearsal with one group or another.  Ah well, be careful what you wish for.

Meanwhile, the Spellbound record is proceeding nicely.  I finished the first three sections of the epic The Sailor’s Saga.  The last take of the guitar solo turned out to be really good and easy to put down (I guess practicing really works!) and from there is was straight on to mixing.  This is the first song I mixed since I read that book on mixing over the summer, and even though it’s a complicated song with lots of sections and lots of layers, the mix went pretty quick and I was really happy with how it turned out.  In fact, I went back and did a fresh mix of all the other songs on the record.  Mostly it was just minor tweaks, but enough to make a difference and elevate things.  I’d say now most of the songs are sounding really close to perfect.

So now I’m working on Part IV, which is a long, slow instrumental jam called Heaven Awaits All Men.  It’s basically a coda.  The original inspiration came from Würm by Yes, but I decided to change it around a little to apply some of what I learned making this album and bring in some new ideas.  I added a transitional section to set it up, I bit of quick riffing to introduce some motivic ideas which harken back to the first part (Prison Sails) and get developed during the main section, which a long build to a big finish.  I also changed to meter to 5/4 and revoiced the chords to emphasize the major tonalities.  Now I’m beginning to layer in the instruments, starting with the rhythm guitar the serves as the spine of the track.  Before I go to much further I’ll probably flesh out the drum part to give a sense of where the accents and dynamics lie.  Hopefully it’ll come together pretty quickly.  I’m nearing the end of the record and am getting excited to finish and release it.  

In D&D, we’ve finished the bonus module White Plume Mountain Level 2, which I wrote back in high school.  The big boss at the end is the Lich which somehow does not appear in the original module.  The thing about playing a Lich is that, even though they’re very powerful, they only get to cast one spell a turn, compared with spell and weapon attacks from six party members.  As luck would have it, the party dispatched the minions (both monsters and undead) that were supposed to come to his aid before the final encounter, so he was fighting solo.  His first attack was a fireball, which was supposed to take out half the party, but I rolled all 1’s and 2’s and a single 4 for damage.  He did a good job bopping around with dimension door, invisibility and the like to confuse the party, but once they had him pinned down they slew him with relative ease.  If I had to do it again I would have had him activate all his defensive spells before the combat started. Ah well.  If I every publish the module I’ll include a bit on how to effectively roleplay a Lich in combat.  

In any evert, we’ve now started A Palace in the Sky, a D&D module Martin and I wrote together when we were in high school, and was subsequently published in TSR’s Dungeon Adventure Magazine.  The module is centered around a clan of Cloud Giants living in a magic castle on a cloud island.  So far the party showed up and slew the garrison of Bugbears defending the guard house due to a misunderstanding.  They were then befriended by a mysterious wizard and escorted into the castle where there were welcomed by the giants, and are now lounging at the bar.

In other news, the weather remains nice, mainly mild and sunny, even as Hallowe’en draws near.  I’ve been doing a good amount of biking.  Jeannie and I went to the local bike path this Sunday, maybe for the last time this season.  We also finally fixed the screen door to the back yard, a task that’s been on my todo list since the springtime. 

Spacecats Live Shows Coming Soon!

Here’s announcing two upcoming shows for my jazz group Spacecats.  The group consists of John Szinger on saxophone, Josh Deutchman on piano and synthesizer, Ken Matthews on bass and Rick Arecco on drums.  Our music is jazz and funk, a blend of originals, standards, and our own take on pop and rock songs, played with energy and imagination. 

The first gig is at the Green Growler in Croton, our regular haunt and one of our favorite places to play.  They support many kinds of music and have a vast selection of beers.  The second gig is a jazz brunch at The Grand, also in Croton.  This is a new venue for us, and ought to be fun and exciting.  Both gigs should be a great time, so come on down and check it out!

Spacecats – Jazz and Funk

Friday October 23, 7pm
The Green Growler
Croton-on-Hudson, NY

Sunday November 1, 11am
The Grand
Croton-on-Hudson, NY

Kick out the Jams

Been spending alot of time on music these days.  Just as well, it’s been raining cats and dogs here the whole weekend and yesterday, and it’s getting darker earlier too, so it’s harder to spend time outside.

I went to a jazz jam over the weekend up in Armonk, put together by a friend of mine.  Mostly real book stuff, but definitely a step up in the level of musicianship form my Wednesday rehearsal group.  The guitar player in particular, who was also our host, was really good.  Really into the whole Joe Pass bag.  It’s good to meet new musicians, and everyone wants to get together again.

Then last night a sat in on a rehearsal for my friend’s horn section funk and R&B band, because they’ve asked me to sub on sax for a couple of gigs later this fall.  This was a ton of fun.  I didn’t know what to expect, but was pleased that the group is really tight and at a high level of musicianship.  Even the singers were great, and they often tend to be the weak link in the local bar band scene.  They seem like a really nice bunch of people too, friendly and professional, no egos.  I guess when you have a band with eight people you need to have subs or you’ll have to turn down alot of gigs. 

The regular sax player emailed me a bunch of charts the week before, so I had a chance to look them over, and I also made a playlist to listen to.  Most of the songs I’m familiar with, and many I’ve done in other bands (but not as part of a horn section).  All great tunes, fun uptempo horn section music.  I was able to  keep up with the group on the stand, although the charts weren’t always accurate and there was alot to pay attention to.  The big thing in this situation is to blend with the rest of horn section to sound as one, which was not a problem.  One big highlight for me was doing My Old School, possibly my favorite Steely Dan song.  They were are really impressed I nailed the “California tumbles into the sea” riff.  So I’m looking forward to the gigs, and I’m gonna try to see them at their next show in October.

Meanwhile, in my home studio, my epic The Sailor’s Saga is drawing ever closer to completion.  I’ve been focusing on the lead guitar part, which is ten minutes long, and starts with some languid noodling and builds to an epic climax over the course of several rising and falling waves.  I was afraid my guitar playing might not be up to the task and I’d have to bring in a ringer, but it’s shaping up most excellently.

The first thing was to find a sound that’s in the zone, with lots of sustain and a bit overdrive and can go from smooth to biting depending on what dynamics I play with.  I’ll add more effects in the DAW once I’m done tracking.  Then I just started at the front and kinda jammed the whole way thru, stopping whenever I ran out of ideas or played something I didn’t like.  I ended up building the whole thing in two- to four-bar sections, kinda like how I used to write out sax solos when I was in high school and first learning to improvise.  When I got to the end I listened back and started again on a second take.  I learned the riffs I liked from the first take, about half of it, and played new ideas for the rest.  Today I finished the third take, which kept eighty percent or so of the ideas from the second take, and keeps getting better in terms of phrasing and proficiency.  Also each pass goes alot faster than the one before.  I figure another one or two passes and I’ll be set.  Then it’s on to the mixing.

Another Time Around the Wheel

Although summer is not technically over yet, Labor Day has come and gone, and the vibe now is changed.  We ended the season with a nice little vacation down to Ocean City, Maryland, where we hung out on the beach and the boardwalk, went swimming in the ocean, rode our bikes out to Assateague Island, did happy hour at the hotel beach bar, went out to a few nice meals, and listened to tunes on the car trip down and back.

I’m still working on the Global Jukebox as my main gig this fall, as I was over the summer.  It’s coming along nicely, although it’s hard to say when it will be ready for release because there’s still alot to do on the data side.  We’ll probably start seriously planning the launch before the end of the year.  Meanwhile I’m trying to pick up a second gig, helping Origami USA redesign their website and a bunch of associated development work.  I’m low-key looking for a new job, but there’s no hurry as long as the freelance project keep rolling along.  It’d have to be the right project.  Anyway, it’s more relaxing this way and gives me time to work on other things.  And there’s plenty to do.

After I got my saxophones fixed, the next thing on my list was to get the Mustang worked on.  The windshield wipers, fuel gauge, turn signals and stereo all stopped working sometime over the summer.  I figured it was most likely a blown fuse that supplies the dashboard, but I didn’t feel comfortable pulling and replacing the fuses myself, so I took it to the garage.  They found the problem was actually a wire with a flaky connection under the dashboard near the fusebox (it is an old car after all), but I had to bring the car back several times before they actually fixed it fully and completely.  Well at least that’s taken care of (hopefully), and I can start in on the next phase of the plan, which is to get the body painted.  

The major thing with this is to find a place that will work on a classic car, and is reasonably priced.  Lucky for me, there’s a couple guys in my neighborhood (both named John) who like to sit around in the mornings on the patio of my local coffee shop, which is next door to the garage.  We’ve had a “hello, good morning” kind of thing going for a long time, and sometimes I’ll talk with them about stuff.  One of their favorite topics is cars, especially sports cars and classic muscle cars (the Buffalo Bills being another favorite topic).  They each know of a body shop in the local area that they were able to recommend.  Next week I’ll start calling around.

I’ve also made progress on Michelle’s room since she moved out, touching up the walls with some fresh paint, moving furniture around, and getting rid of old junk.  The next step is to get her to come over and organzie and/or throw away the things she left behind. And of course there’s always another yardwork cycle, things are really growing this year (although the wasps aren’t gone yet, that’s another thing), and more organizing the garage and my studio.  I finally put away all the origami paper I bought at July’s convention!

In music, Josh is set to come back to rehearsing with the group this week.  We’re all very excited.  Meanwhile we’re still trying to reschedule the gig that was supposed to be this week, that we had to punt on.  Ah well.

On the Spellbound project, I’ve started rendering our all the midi instruments and transitioning to working on the mix.  I still have the big guitar solo left to do, but that’s the last bit of tracking.  If it turns out to be too much to play the part myself, I have several guitar player friends I can ask to do a guest appearance.  We’ll see.

The weather has been beautiful, although it’s getting dark earlier faster these days.  It remains great for biking, not too hot.  Hopefully it’ll stay that way for a while. 

The Summer of George

We’re getting into the long, lazy end of summer.  Back in May, I made a list of things I wanted to do over the summer.  I did most of the things relating to travel, spending time outside, seeing music and that kind of fun stuff, plus biking and working out.  However, I only got about halfway thru the tasks around home improvement, software, music and origami.  Creative work can take a long time, especially in the early stages, and the same with projects that involve research into buying things or hiring custom services.  Ah well, there’s more time ahead in the fall.

Last weekend was the first weekend I was home since mid-July, and I spent it, as well as most of the week before, catching up on random tasks.  It’s amazing how much time everything takes when you have to do it all yourself.  The week before I went camping I put a huge amount of time into yardwork.

When I got home from camping, number one on the top of my todo list was to get my saxophone fixed.  My repair guy lives out in Nyack, and you have to call and set up an appointment to drop it off and pick it up.  I tried calling back in June but he didn’t pick up the phone.  This time he did, so I dropped it off last Tuesday.  This is my Selmer Reference 54 tenor, my main sax.  The low notes had become messed up to point where they wouldn’t sound at all, probably due to a leaky pad, plus it needed a new cork.  I brought my bike with my so I could check out a biking trail on the shore of Hudson, that runs thru a state park from Nyack up to Haverstraw, the next town to the north.  There and back plus a little scooting around the town around the shore was fifteen miles, lovely and a little hilly, with woods and shores and beaches and great views.  I came back Friday to pick up my horn, and it plays and sounds great.  Nice and fast and responsive, and can play the low notes softly in full tone.  Woo-hoo! I brought my other sax with me, and old Selmer Mark VII tenor that I’ve been playing in the interim, figuring it could use some work too.  Some of the low notes sound muffled and it’s hard to pop some of the altissimo notes (although that might just be the way the horn is).  This was my main horn for many years until I bought the new one.  It’s more than fifty years old, and I bought it in the early 1990’s, after I sold my car and just before I moved to New York (spending the money I was going to live on my first semester as a grad student at NYU).  It’s a great horn and worth keeping it in shape.  Much more of a smokey tone than the Ref 54, great for ballads.  Anyway, I figure an once of prevention while it is still playable. So now I have to go back and pick that up one day this week.

Meanwhile Michelle came back last weekend and asked us to help her move a bunch more stuff, including a big bookshelf, to her new apartment.  Afterwards we had a chance to walk around her neighborhood and get dinner at a Mexican place, all of which was very nice.  Since we were moving furniture around, I noticed a few spots on her wall the needed touch-up painting.  Luckily I still have the remainder of a can of paint from when we did her room years ago.  While we were at it we did a deep cleaning and got rid of a bunch of old stuff.  Another task done.  Now all that remains to put everything back.

An unexpected and rather annoying thing to deal with is I have an infestation of wasps in the soffit above my garage door, right near the front door of my house. I’ve been trying to get rid of them, but the nest is hidden up inside.  This happened once before about ten years ago or more, and I was able to remove a peice of panelling to get at the nest, but this time they’re in a different spot.  I can’t take apart the soffit without cutting, and I don’t want to do that while they’re active.  So I’ve been trying to get rid of them using different sprays and stuff, but so far it’s been ineffective.  I might have to just wait for a cold day when it’s safe and hack up in there.

Meanwhile in my recording project Spellbound, I’ve finished all the twelve-string guitar parts and the last song, and am now adding some sweetening synthesizer parts including some high slow synth strings, and tubular bells.  Last is the lead guitar parts, which might take a bit longer since I need to do two twelve-bar solos plus some interstitial noodling.  Still, hope to be done tracking before the end of September.

And, in the world of Spacecats, we were all set to start recording our next record right after Labor Day, but unfortunately we are delayed yet again.  Our piano player Josh was in a bike accident and hurt his shoulder.  Sounds like he’ll be alright, but it’s going to take him a few weeks to recover, so he’s going to miss some rehearsals, and then it might be a while before he’s back to a hundred percent.  We’ll probably have to postpone our upcoming gig in September too.  On the bright side, we’re having my old friend Gary sit in guitar for this week’s rehearsal.

Island Time

Summer adventure continues.  Jeannie and I spent a whole week up in the Adirondacks with our good friends Mark and Kelly.  It was great to see them and catch up. We spent most of that time camping on an island in Saranac Lake.  This is the third time we’ve done this, and the longest trip yet, four days.  The island, named Pirate Island, is accessible only by canoe, so we had to haul all our stuff out with us: tents, food, water, firewood and all.  This year Jeannie and I bought new lightweight compact chairs and a table and a rain shelter.  Fortunately the weather was great the whole time.  The canoe rides were all very pleasant and hanging around the island was great.  While we were up there I did a nice long bike ride one day on the local rail trail, and we explored the town a little, some bars and restaurants and the local river walk.  Tried to go to the local astronomy center but they were closed.

I’ve been trying to make more time to read this summer.  I brought two books with me.  One was Mixing With Impact, which I mentioned last time, and am now into the the second half. The other was This Must Be the Place by Jesse Rifkin, a music critic and historian who works with me on The Global Jukebox.  It’s about the rise and fall of various music scenes in downtown Manhattan over the last 70 year or so, how they were incubated by cheap real estate, and in turn met their demise by wave after wave of urban gentrification.  Excellent book, highly recommended.  I finished that one, and lent it to Mark.  I found a playlist of the recommended listening at the end of each chapter.

I’ve been away or busy the last six weekends in a row, so it’s nice to be home and able to focus on getting some things done.

Planet Tralfamadore

The summer of John continues with more adventures.  I took a quick trip upstate over the weekend because my brother Jim was in town from New Mexico to visit my parents, along with my nibling Virgil.  I drove up Friday afternoon and arrived in time to go see the band Steam Powered Giraffe, Virgil’s favorite group.  They’re not just a rock band but also combine mime and improv comedy with the music.  The whole act is framed on the premise that the members are actually performing robots, and the songs, costumes and visuals all have a heavy steampunk vibe.  (They started as street buskers.)  The show was really good and lots of fun.  Everyone in the group sings so there’s lots of harmonies, and the two guys who sing lead the most have nicely contrasting styles.  They all switch instruments too, and there’s a pair of dancing girls that are part of the act, and a sexy dancing robot giraffe character too.  Blue hair abounds.  After we arrived, someone gave Virgil three front row seats, so that made it extra fun.

The venue was a place called the Electric City, and it used to be the old Tralfamadore Cafe.  The Tralf was a famous and historic jazz club that closed during the pandemic, so it’s nice to see it back in action as something new.  When I went inside I hardly recognized the place.  The stage is much bigger and fills one whole end of the hall rather than just a corner like it used to.  There’s now rows of seating with risers where there used to be small tables, and I think the bar got moved back.

I stayed with Lizzy and Josh since Jim and Virgil were in the two spare rooms at my parent’s house.  She lives in north Buffalo, not far from the neighborhood I grew up in.  I brought my bike with me, and Saturday morning I took a bike ride up into Tonawanda.  I passed by my old house, elementary school, church, library, and fire station.  Then up to my middle school, the house we moved to later, and my high school.  There’s a bike path running thru the town that used to be railroad tracks.  I hopped on it and rode north to the end, to the City of Tonawanda where the Erie Canal meets the Niagara River, then turned around and took the trail all the way back to the south end and into the city, where it passed conveniently near Lizzy’s house.  Twenty-two and a half miles, a pretty good ride.

Josh works nights at the hospital these days, and by the time I got back he was getting up, so I took him and Lizzy out to lunch at a bar in their neighborhood.  I discovered a new kind of sandwich called a stinger, which is a combination of a steak hoagie and a buffalo chicken sub.  Yum.  In the afternoon Lizzy and I went went down to my parent’s house for a barbecue with the family.

Sunday I met my old friend Larry for lunch at a bar in East Aurora, and we hung out and talked for quite a long while.  It was good to catch up, since I missed him last couple times I was in town.  Larry is a really amazing drummer and percussionist, and Neil Peart was one of his big influences.  I remember the summer between 10th and 11th grade the two of us learning La Villa Strangaito from start to finish.  Rush was playing in Toronto Sunday night, and I almost convinced him that we should drive up and see the show.  Unfortunately, we both had grownup things to do Monday morning.

In music studio land, I’ve been trying to improve the sound of my mixes.  I recently got a book called Mixing with Impact by Wessel Oltheten, and it’s exactly the right book for me right now.  It’s super well written, and goes into a great deal of technical detail about the physics and perceptual aspects of sound in the electronic and acoustic realms, as well as the human hearing apparatus. The first few chapters break down balance, panning EQ, and reverb.  Everything always relates to how the music is heard, and how to make it communicate better, create clarity, space, focus, and all that.  Highly recommended.

We’ll Take Manhattan

Haven’t had much rest since the Origami USA convention last week.  Been going into the city alot lately.  First off, I saw Rush at Madison Square Garden last week.  Jeannie got me tickets for my birthday.  It’s been over ten years since they last toured, the first time since Neil Peart’s death, and the fist time with their new drummer Anika Nilles.  I must say it was a very emotional experience, especially when they did songs like The Garden.  The band was in top form.  Geddy can still sing high, and his bass playing is as dazzling as ever, and has gotten more interesting and abstract in the jam sections.  Alex too, displaying all his virtuosity and tonal and emotional range and having a great time.  Anika’s playing was amazing, she handled all of Neil’s parts and brought her her own energy to the show.  She played the first few songs staring intently into the distance like someone driving a motorcycle in a snowstorm.  In the middle of the first set they did La Villa Strangiato, and when the big drum break came this big grin came over her face, and she totally nailed it.  The place went nuts.  In addition to La Villa they played a number of deep tracks.  They opened the show with Xanadu, did the greater part of 2112, as well as Natural Science and By Tor and the Snow Dog, neither of which I’d ever seen them do live before.  They played for over three hours and did songs from their whole career, including Subdivisions, Freewill, Spirit of Radio, Headlong Flight, Far Cry, Red Sector A, Distant Early Warning, and most of Moving Pictures.  Truly amazing.

Second, over the weekend I helped Michelle move into a new apartment.  She got a place in the upper west side, not too far from Columbia University, with a friend from college who is now a medical student.  It’s quite nice, pretty roomy for an apartment in Manhattan, clean and bright and in good shape.  The building and the neighborhood seem nice too.  Michelle works in the Bronx, so her commute is about the same but now going north in the morning instead of south.  Her current project is coming to an end soon, so she’s trying to get on a new project at the Museum of Natural History, a little ways downtown from her new place, as her next thing.  The move went pretty smoothly, but it was alot of work carrying all her stuff of the stairs.  Luckily when we showed up, her roommate’s brother appeared to help with the schleppage.  After the first round of unloading, I took Michelle to Ikea in New Jersey where she bought a bed, dresser, desk and some other stuff.  The Saturday night and again on Sunday I helped her put together all that furniture.  Now she’s largely settled in, but she’s gonna come back for the rest of her stuff sometime this week.  Anyway, onwards and upwards!

76 For America 250

For my 2026 summer playlist, I had originally planned to do songs from the 1960’s, but then Jeannie came up with the idea to have seventy-six songs to celebrate America’s 250-year anniversary, with themes having to do with America and places in America.  I found that idea more interesting, or at least more timely for this year, so I decided to help her by suggesting some songs.  She got to 76 pretty fast, but there were a dozen or so songs I really wanted to include, so I made my own playlist, presented here.  It’s actually a couple over the limit, but at this point I don’t want to cut any more songs. 

Her rules are different than mine and don’t prohibit repeating an artist, so there are multiple songs by Billy Joel, Steely Dan, John Denver, David Lee Roth, and a few others.  One could probably make a playlist of nothing but Billy Joel songs.  Also no attempt is made to present the songs in chronological order.

76 For America 250

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3cDYwwmh7snPQnRayfwrVN

America – The Muppets
America – Simon and Garfunkel
American Pie – Don McLean
Wakko’s America – Animaniacs
Take Me Home Country Roads- John Denver
Take It Easy – Jackson Browne
American Girl – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Theme from New York, New York – Frank Sinatra
Miami 2017 – Billy Joel
New York State of Mind – Billy Joel
Woodstock – Crosby Stills Nash & Young
American Woman – Lenny Kravitz
American Girls – Triumph
Breakfast in America – Supertramp
Yankee Rose – David Lee Roth
America the Beautiful – Ray Charles
Star Spangled Banner – Jimi Hendrix
Rocky Mountain High – John Denver
Lights – Journey
Californication – Red Hot Chili Peppers
Going to California – Led Zeppelin
California Girls – David Lee Roth
San Francisco – Scott McKenzie
California Dreamin’ – The Mamas & the Papas
Rock & Roll Band – Boston
Philadelphia Freedom – Elton John
Ladies Night in Buffalo – David Lee Roth
Jersey Girl – Tom Waits
Ohio – Crosby Stills Nash & Young
My City Was Gone – The Pretenders
My Tennessee Mountain Home – Dolly Parton
Matthew – John Denver
Private Idaho – The B-52’s
Montana – Frank Zappa
Beautiful Texas – Willie Nelson
Alaska – U.K.
Hawaii Five-O – The Ventures
The Load-Out – Jackson Browne
Truckin’ – The Grateful Dead
My Old School – Steely Dan
The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald – Gordon Lightfoot
Leaving Las Vegas – Sheryl Crow
This Land is Your Land – Woody Guthrie
Pink Houses – John Cougar
Young Americans – David Bowie
America – Yes
America – The Nice
South California Purples – Chicago
L.A. Woman – The Doors
Los Angelenos – Billy Joel
Hotel California – The Eagles
Key Largo – Bertie Higgins
Pearl of the Quarter – Steely Dan
New York Groove – Ace Frehley
Manhattan – Ella Fitzgerald
Englishman in New York – Sting
Daddy Don’t Live in That New York City No More – Steely Dan
Sweet Home Chicago – The Blues Brothers
Oklahoma – (Oklahoma! original cast recording)
Ventura Highway – America
Highway 61 Revisited – Bob Dylan
(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 – Nat King Cole
Last Train to Clarksville – The Monkees
The Night They Drove old Dixie Down – The Band
Georgia on My Mind – Ray Charles
The Devil Went Down to Georgia – Charlie Daniels Band
Stars Fell on Alabama – Billy Holiday
Alabama Song – The Doors
Kentucky Woman – Deep Purple
Mississippi – Cheryl Crow
Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again – Bob Dylan
Graceland – Simon
We’re an American Band – Grand Funk Railroad
Fourth of July – Soundgarden
American Woman – The Guess Who
This Is Not America – David Bowie/Pat Metheny
The Heart of Rock and Roll – Huey Lewis and the News
Amerika – Joco Pastorius

…

Here’s a link to Jeannie’s America 250 playlist.  As you can see, the songs overlap by about eight percent.  I was gratified she included some of my more out-there suggestions such as Montana by Frank Zappa and Alaska by U.K.  There’s a dozen or so songs that made her list by not mine.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6nI7O7LH3Av6b8B0iDKN9A

Under the Bridge – Red Hot Chili Peppers
Take It Easy – The Eagles
Midnight Train to Georgia – Gladys Knight & the Pips
Why Georgia – John Meyer
Nebraska – Bruce Springsteen
Mary Queen of Arkansas – Bruce Springsteen
Stop in Nevada – Billy Joel
Rocky Raccoon – The Beatles
Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey – The Beatles
Walking in Memphis – Marc Cohn
Sweet Rhode Island Red – Ike & Tina Turner
Deacon Blues – Steely Dan
Do You Know the Way to San Jose? – Dion Warwick
Song of Wyoming – John Denver
Empire State of Mind – Alicia Keys
San Francisco Days – Chris Isaak

…

Lizzy was home when we were first brainstorming songs, and she made a playlist of her own and called it The Better America 250. Funny how everyone has their own take on the idea.  There’s some overlap with our lists, and some music I don’t know particularly well, but it’s a good fun vibe good to explore.  There’s a good handful of songs I like and wish I had more space to include on my list. 

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6xkLrhTfnf5kwzPvxPGUd5

Stick Season – Noah Kahan
Dying in L.A. – Panic! at the Disco
New York – Ed Sheerhan
Empire State of Mind – Jay-Z, Alicia Keys
Fairy Tale of New York – The Pogues
Born in the U.S.A. – Bruce Springsteen
Mississippi Queen – Mountain
The Schuyler Sisters – (Hamilton original cast)
Homesick – Noah Kahan
Allentown – Billy Joel
I’m Shipping Up to Boston – Dropkick Murphys