MAGICAL MUSIC MISTAKES
By Dan Miller
March 15, 2007
The days when a recorded song would be released with an off-key note left uncorrected is something Merle Haggard says he misses.
Merle was quoted in an article by John Gerome as saying, "It's unacceptable now to be slightly out of tune."
He added, "A lot of the records I made, and Ray (Price) made, and Willie (Nelson) made -- a lot of those were out of tune."
Nowadays, with synthesizers.... and digital editing of multi-track recordings.... and computer correction or enhancement of sour notes and missed beats.... everything ends up sounding perfect.
Any word, or phrase, or note can easily be rendered flawless.
And sometimes that perfection eliminates a human touch that might just make a song truly memorable.
Who can forget when Denny Doherty of the Mamas and Papas jumped in too early with... "I saw her"... on the last chorus of "I Saw Her Again Last Night"?
Wisely, they left that mistake in when the record was released.
And that fuzzy, bluesy guitar in the musical bridge of Marty Robbins' hit record "Don't Worry".... that was the result of a busted amplifier.
But it helped make that recording a classic.
And listen to Stevie Wonder's first big hit "Fingertips".... you'll hear one of the musicians calling out "..what key? what key?"
It's now part of the fabric of that song.
In the old song, "Baby, You've Got What It Takes", Brook Benton not only jumps in on top of Dinah Washington's line, he actually apologizes on the recording.
And they left it in.
And it was a huge success.
Every time I hear Tom T. Hall sing his charming #1 hit song "Old Dogs, Children and Watermelon Wine" I always listen to make sure he still refers to the TV show "Ironside" as "Ironsides" with an unnecessary "s" on the end.
If I'd been the producer of that recording session, I probably would've said, "Hey Tom, there's no 's' on "Ironside".... and I would've been wrong to do so.
In the mid-1970s, singer Larry Jon Wilson -- a too-often overlooked musical treasure -- and a person I've known since we were both students in Augusta -- released his first album.
It was titled "New Beginnings".
Larry once told me that, during the recording session, they needed one additional song -- and they asked him to do "Bertrand My Son", a very personal song he had composed for his young son who, at that time, had a physical problem with his feet.
Larry reluctantly agreed to do it.... but said he would only perform it once.
When they got through the one take, it became apparent that the "B" string on Larry's guitar was slightly out of tune.
The producer asked for another take.... but Larry said no, that was it.
So when they mixed in strings and other instruments, they had to adjust everything to match up with Larry's "unique" tuning of his instrument.
Well, that beautiful, poignant song became probably the most successful 'single' of Larry's career, and had a nice ride on the charts during the 1970s.
I never hear it on radio anymore, but perhaps Larry still sings it in concert.... and, if so, I hope he does it with that string slightly out of tune.
Here's the bottom line....
If I makes a grammatical error while writing this essay, I'm leaving it in!
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