Yé-yé meets bossa nova. 

This is a cover of a cover. Emilie-Claire Barlow and her troop saved me from doing a boring rendition of this song. I was stumped about how to revamp this, to make it not so boring(www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HR1OTjXkF8). This version is a jazzy-bossa-- half jazz and half bossa nova. 

But the arrangement I came up with is more bossa-nova-y. That was my goal. I may or may not have achieved that...

I made some changes to the chord progressions and melody, but this permutation of this song, originally by Sylvie Vartan, did not come to me on my own. I am not worthy of that credit.  I'm proud of this. The mix too.

La Plus Belle Pour Aller Danser(Sylvie Vartan Cover)

Canción a mis sobrinos de 2 años de edad Matias y Marco que la crearon ellos, yo le hice arreglos

Matias

Many years ago, the Mayor of Florence, the city where I was born, had ordered that all students could access without limits to the Uffizi Museum that is located around the corner from my house.
There was a time that I would go every day to admire the wonders of that gallery.
Among the hundreds of paintings exhibited one in particular I liked very much. I was 12 years and  I fell in love with Botticelli's Venus. Perhaps the recent loss of my mother took me to idealize that wonderful female figure. I was so fascinated by Venus that my stationed in front of that picture, one day after another came to the attention of  Roberto, a keeper of the museum, who wanted to give me a Polaroid photo, which he himself made me with the background of the beautiful blue-eyed Venus. I do not know where is now this photo that I cherished, but the memory of those afternoons will remain indelible in my mind.
I recommend everyone to see at least once in their life the works of the Uffizi ... there is no place in the world where there is such a concentration of beauty.
With this track, I have tried to interpret, in the first part, the wonder, the marvel of who enters for the first time in a magical place like the Uffizi Gallery, and in the second part, a tender and moving declaration of love "a little man" as I was, to an ideal woman / mother...!

Venus I will always love you !!!

Thanks for your attention …good listening!

Paolo…an hopeless romantic... 


Venus I Love You !

The Cornelia B. Windiate was a lake schooner named after her owner Thomas Windiate's daughter.  She hauled grain and other goods throughout the Great Lakes until she was sent on one too many voyages, too late in the season, overloaded with grain, and she was lost in a winter storm.  A search failed to find her or her crew.  It is believed she sank under the weight of her cargo and accumulating ice and snow from the storm. The lake had frozen over, and her crew probably died trying to walk across the ice to shore.  She lay almost fully intact on the floor of Lake Huron for nearly a century until she was discovered by divers.  This is a sketch of a song recounting that final voyage.  

Cornelia B. Windiate
(c) 2025 Brian Junker

A:
The Cornelia B., she's the queen of the Lakes 
Biggest haul from town to town
Load her high and we'll be on our way
with the mightiest ship around 

B:
From Michigan to Huron and Erie too
it's an easy Summer run
If November weather smiles on us 
we'll be the richest ones

A: 
Thanksgiving we're bound for Buffalo 
Riding low with Milwaukee grain
Winter settled on the lakes that day 
Snow squalls mixed with ice and rain

B:
The weather turned from bad to worse
Cold winds whipped against our necks
Snow and sleet encased the masts 
The waves crashed and froze upon the decks

C:
Heave ho, my boys, we'll be there soon
Steady on, we can't be late
There's profit there in old Buffalo
For old man Thomas Windiate

A:
Stuck in the ice she began to sink
If we stayed our lives would soon be lost
No open water left to sail the yawl 
So across the ice we did walk

B:
As she sank down below the ice
We trudged away through winter's frost
A false step here, thin ice there 
One by one all nine were lost

A: 
Last seen in the Straits of Mackinaw
Where Michigan gives way to old Huron
Nine men lost and nine men mourned 
Cornelia never sailed again

B:
While she rested silent in her grave 
The old man built another one
Another crew signed up to sail that ship
Thinking that they'll be the richest ones

C:
Walk on, my boys, we'll be there soon
I think I see the coast
There's no more profit to be made
For Cornelia, she's a ghost

(photo of the wreck of the Cornelia B. Windiate by Becky Schott / Liquid Prodictions, published in the Manitowoc Herald Times Reporter, https://www.htrnews.com/story/entertainment/2020/05/05/great-lakes-ghost-ship-cornelia-b-windiate-built-manitowoc/3068548001/)


Cornelia B Windiate (sketch)

(as posted recently on FAWM: my first entry ever and only one this year)

Liner Notes

This is not quite a first draft, but it's still very rough. It feels too long, but maybe this could resemble the album version :) and I can try for a much condensed "45" version?

I have a friend in mind to sing the verses, but we haven't managed yet.

I've worked on what I want to be harmonies in the choruses and a higher, funky guitar on the later choruses; hoping more ideas will come too.

I also have some doubts about the verses:
- are they too introspective and tentative for a truly committed stop-the-steal-er?
- I have thought about Bb7-bluesy instead of Gm (which leaves the whole thing pretty minor).

Finally: the "bass solo" (thanks MuseScore! :) is just a suggestion for what I imagine. The horn (also thanks MuseScore) at the beginning and here and there reflects the combo I play in, though I'm not sure we would ever perform this song. We'll see.

Lyrics

(largely, I think, the version I sing in this uploaded version)

(Verse 1; think Jan 6 rioter)
On that fateful day a glorious crowd assembles
To make the people’s voice be heard 
Take back our country from those who claim our guy has lost it
Who cares if anyone gets hurt?

Things got out of hand and peaceful turned to reckless 
Doors were broken, people stormed the halls
But we couldn’t stop the steal and, worse than that, we were convicted:
Brave patriots made to take the fall.

Chorus/Refrain 1 (in the tradition of the choir in an ancient Greek drama)
It was a heh-day for scoundrels
For rioters and thieves
Watching them ransacking our country 
Who can help feel angry shame and grieve?

It was a good week for pranksters,
A holiday for fools
High times for autocrats and plutocrats and gangsters,
Oligarchs and sycophants and tools

(instrumental Bridge )

(Verse 2; back to Jan 6 rioter)
Mine had been a tough life, marg’nalized and silenced,
Elites and experts crossed my every move
We fought so hard — how could our guy have lost it?
When everyone I know approves?

Then came four dark years of floundering failure,
Viewed from a lonely cell — how cruel!
But at last the true and sovereign people have spoken 
Soon our man again will rule!

(Choruses/Refrains)
Between deluded and brainwashed 
Half the country taken in by lies 
How could this be another coin flip
When the difference is right before our eyes?

Announcing good times for hucksters 
And a jackpot for thieves
Put the lying bastards back in power 
Give the rascal rioters reprieves 

(modulate up a half step?)

Vaccination skeptics,
Climate change deniers:
What an unfathomably bad choice
Tearing down our future with their lies

It’s been a good year for jesters,
Jubilee for fools
High times for autocrats and kleptocrats and gangsters,
Demagogues and sycophants and tools



Good Week for Gangsters

Psychedelic variations on Chaos Theory, an original composition for solo clarinet by Hayden Iskander

Cornelia B Windiate (sketch)

Brian Junker

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