Figment's album, informally known as "Love Song to the Plains" -- song descriptions:
Kathy's Song -- for my wife, of course, who has taught me so much, including the joy of sitting quietly in bliss with love. This song was also inspired by her art -- beautiful landscape pastels that are mesmerizing. Music, Art, and Nature with a loved one -- nothing is better. Lots of metaphors for me in this one.
Buffalo Prayer -- written in the 1990s when I was studying indigenous Americans' history in depth for the first time. It registered at a very deep level what the "white man" had done to the Great Plains: destroyed a vast and rich ecosystem for the sake of greed -- possession and control.
Hymn to a Ghost Town -- I grew up in a small town in western Kansas and found it nearly bereft of anything positive that I could latch onto. But I was not alone and many friends died in tragic ways, often from some form of addiction. This song was motivated by that, but also by the realization that people who die premature deaths in this way are just as precious as anyone else.
Dust Devils -- Obvious inspiration from indigenous cultures, but I think Johnny Cash is an influence here, as well. Heavily metaphorical and a sort of love song to the Great Plains.
Dust Down a Country Road -- I've loved this song by John Hiatt since it came out. I've been playing it ever since and had to record my version of it. Humans and Memory -- it fills the juke boxes -- and internet playlists.
Touch the Heart -- studying history is nightmare inducing -- this was written before I had the outlet of history lecturing, but I'm constantly reminded of the chaos and corruption aspects of existence that we move in -- and yet, we must remember that we can all rally around the focal point of Love in each one of us.
Les Voyageurs (Ritornelle) -- par Jean-Philippe Rameau -- a favorite piece by a favorite composer. I've been reading about the French-Canadian Voyageurs in my historian life. They were prolific in western North America -- this is a recognition of their independent and freedom-loving ways. Baroque music on first mandolin family instruments, then with five (count 'em), five (Taylor) twelve-string guitars (sixty strings!).
Buffalo Jump -- originally composed when I was in a music composition program at University, I had the pleasure of having this performed for our guest composer, John Corigliano. Logan Skelton, pianist at the University of Michigan now, helped keep this alive with a (non-commercial) live recording. The inspiration, again, was indigenous culture, particular the Arapaho people of the High Plains.
