With a Song in my Heart

I first began writing songs in the winter of 1971 while I was lving in my hometown of Marburg an der Lahn, in Germany. I had spent the first five years of my life in Marburg which is located about 50 kilometers north of Frankfurt. I returned there at the age of 24 to reconnect with my roots, and spent the first few months living with my aunt Lucie and cousin Alice. Later on, I moved into a student dorm where I was one of a handful of foreign students, even though this was my hometown.

At the time I was deeply steeped in the folk songs of Peter, Paul, and Mary, Simon and Garfunkel, John Denver, Cat Stevens, Donovan, Judy Collins, and Bob Dylan. I would spend many hours holed up in my little room playing guitar and harmonica. I was still too timid to venture outside to play in public. Most of the first songs I wrote that winter of 1971 were very derivative and angst-filled. Others were simple and childlike. I've recorded a few of these child-like ones on my recent CDs, songs like "Bear with me, my Friend" and "Love is Like"

After I returned to the U.S. in the summer of 1973, I didn't write any more songs for a long time because I first got busy with my studies, and later suffered from frequent, recurring bouts of depression. It wasn't until 1979, after I had joined a residential treatment center for mentally ill adults, that my creative juices started to flow again. In 1980 and 1981, I wrote a whole flurry of new songs. At that time I was also learning to play the autoharp. I was inspired to write more songs when I joined Walker Church in the summer of 1986. At that time, I had begun attending Open Mic nights. Eventually, I hosted a monthly Open Stage at Walker which I did for twenty years. I was also inspired by one of the Walker musicians, Howard Kranz, who often played his own songs. Rubbing shoulders with other musicians helped boost my self confidence, and I finally began playing my own songs as well as cover tunes.

In the spring of 1990, I recorded my first cassette tape of songs with someone with the unlikely name of Armand French. A few years later I recorded two more tapes that contained all-original songs. One of these was called Atom Bomb Baby because it contained a song of the same name. I gave it that title because I was born on August 7th, 1945 between the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Around this time I began composing and singing more and more of my own material, prompted in large part by Howard and other Open Stage musicians.

And in the year 2001, I recorded my first CD of original songs -- "I Remember," thanks to the help of my good friend John, whom, I'd gotten to know at the Walker Open Stage. The title song on that CD expressed my feelings about the 9-1-1 tragedy that occurred on September11, 2001. One of the verses describes the people who jumped from the burning towers to land on the pavement a thousand feet below. Another verse describes the orphanage in Marburg where I spent the first eighteen months of my life before being adopted.

Since that time, I've recorded ten more CDs of original songs that cover all kinds of themes including my feelings about the current political situation in our country, songs about shyness and mental health struggles, job frustrations, love songs, and songs about music. Over the past fifty years, I've gained a lot of confidence in my songwriting and performing. I enjoy playing my own songs at Open Mics, Walker Church, various coffeehouses in town, and other venues. For the past twenty years, I've had a chance to do a lot of performing with my good friend Mary with whom I have a great rapport, who is very talented, and has a wonderful voice.

About ten years ago, I also discovered a wonderful community of songwriters called MAS (Minnesota Association of Songwriters) who support each other through workshops, song critiquing sessions, and round-robin performances. Yes, I think I've come a long way from that shy twenty-four-year-old who wrote his first songs back in Marburg in 1971.