r-u-n-n-o-f-t

This is the seventh in a series of articles I’m writing about the songs in apocrypha, a compilation album I am publishing on DMusic. It is meant to complement my Jamendo album, evolution.

If you’ve seen the movie Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?, you know where the title to this song came from.  It was recorded July 21, 2005, and has more to do with the 1970s than the that movie.  Still, when I composed it, the sound of it made me think of someone running away through a bunch of obstacles.

The real story of this song is the keyboard work.  I practice my tunes and refine them before recording them.  There’s this weird “red light effect” where, once the recording button comes on, suddenly things that were simple and easy get difficult and start causing stumbles.

I say that because, on this one song, I practiced, set up the recorder, then nailed it on the very first go.  Even the ending, that cascade of notes at the end, was improvised–but came off perfectly.  I was so happy I actually leapt off my bench and started chugging around the room like a locomotive (which earned me a barkdown, as my dogs tend to regard that sort of behavior as playing, as opposed to sitting in front of some object tapping keys, which is not).