Once Upon a Summertime

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Composer’s comments:

I’ve heard it said that a woman’s signature sense of style (in fashion, hair, makeup) takes shape about the time she “comes of age” as an independent adult. Even our preferences in interior design and popular music are indelibly influenced by the prevailing cultural trends during the years when we graduate from college, or first move out on our own. That’s not to say that we aren’t all creatures of both habit and evolution, combining and refining our tastes as we mature, and the world presents us with ever new looks to like – or not. But certain influences imprint, and even define us.
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A newly-minted college grad in 1979, I acquired an enduring fondness for flowy peasant skirts, chunky boots, and denim jackets. But as a classically-trained professional musician, glamorous concert attire still makes my heart beat a bit faster. Likewise, although my first and truest musical idols will always be Copland, Prokofiev, Britten, and Ravel, I also confess to taking immense guiltless pleasure in the greatest hits of James Taylor, Bruce Hornsby, Steve Winwood, and the Eagles.
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In between semesters studying the canon of Western music and scaling my personal heights of pianistic virtuosity, I spent summers as an accompanist for a professional summer stock musical theatre. There, I was enchanted by yet another great genre of American music, generally frowned upon by the occupants of my familiar ivory tower. I fell under the spell of Broadway shows like “Brigadoon”, “West Side Story”, “My Fair Lady” – and a certain young actor playing Arthur in “Camelot”. Not yet 20 years old, I lacked the sophistication to recognize a mere summer fling for how fleeting it was to be. But the bittersweet memories that haunt me now and again, are but shadows of an episode that shaped and influenced me as a child of the 60’s, a sadder-but-wiser woman, and a proudly versatile musician and lyricist.
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Since composing this semi-autobiographical song, I’ve imagined it as an unexpectedly poignant 1st-act Broadway ballad, in which we learn just why the ingenue’s older, protective, wise-cracking friend is so sarcastic and walled off when it comes to the subject of “true love”. I hope I’ve captured and conveyed the poignancy of her private musings in the unpretentious musical style of “Once Upon a Summertime”. 

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