Shiny Grey Suit is now on Soundcloud…Awarded the Golden Pineapple Award for the most original Hawaiian Blues tune of 2024
My old friend Andy McClelland is a brilliant performing artist and a highly skilled singer/ songwriter with his own studios in northern Ontario. Check out his voluminous body of original, complex, and highly creative work and his lengthy performing history here:
https://soundcloud.com/andy-mcclelland
He has been so kind as to turn several of my poems into musically rich and lyrically witty tunes that are featured on his SoundCloud site, linked above.
Our most recent collaboration – fresh off the press – is a Hawaiian Blues version of a poem that I wrote last week about my Grade 8 graduation of June 1964.
Here’s the tune, with lyrics:
https://soundcloud.com/andy-mcclelland/the-shiny-grey-suit-blues?
And here’s the original poem that Andy adapted:
Boy in a shiny gray suit – Robert McBryde (robertmcbrydeauthor.com)
I’m the kid seated second to the left in the photo by the way.
If you go to the SoundCloud link there will be an icon on the left under the picture for sharing. There is an option for Facebook there which will post the link with picture on Facebook. It’s a square with an arrow painting right on the top.
Here’s what Andy recounted about the creative process leading to the gestation of the tune:
“This screamed blues at me both in lyrical content and the fact that there are six lines per verse. Two bars every line for a total of 12 bars per verse – the classic 12 bar blues.
I changed the order of the lines in the verses to have three rhyming couplets. I swapped the fifth line for the third line. I don’t think it changes the “intent” of the lyrics. I also changed the spelling of “grey” to the English spelling!
And I added a chorus of 8 bars.
There’s Chicago blues, Memphis Blues, Texas blues, and Mississippi blues. I call this particular variation Hawaiian blues because it has a uke and a Hawaiian guitar. I don’t think it’s a well known or popular genre. I may be the only guy that has ever played it. 🥴
“The words were huge fun to sing.
The whole second verse is a wonderful use of what I call “hard consonants” – (p, d, t, c).
“…clay in the hands of a malevolent potter” – what a great image!”
“By the way,” continues Andy, “the only graduation I ever attended was grade 8. I can’t remember what I wore though and I don’t think any pictures exist. There was no grade 13 graduation because we were in Neuchâtel Junior College in Switzerland [where we met], and there was no Neuchâtel graduation. I’m not sure why I missed the BA, (there may not have been one – they just mailed the diploma). I missed the MBA because I broke my collarbone and dislocated my shoulder the day before (bicycle accident).”
“But I think some gigs I’ve done ‘graduated’ me to another level. I’ve played with some wonderful “inspirations.” That is, performers that were ‘way better than me.”
In my ripe old age, I feel so privileged to collaborate with this clever, accomplished artist.
Thanks so much, Andy McClelland.
Your friend,
Robert
More on Andy’s music coming up tomorrow!
https://robertmcbrydeauthor.com/