Blow Out The Candles, by Schneckenburger/ March
You flew in on a plane from Korea, to Anchorage, to me 
You wore pink and blue elephants, and then you reached out your hands
You left the airport in my arms, snow in the air
That’s the day, that is the way I brought you home

I always knew where I came from, I never had any doubts
We celebrated my coming day, with little presents and songs
You’d say “happy adoption Sadie, blow out the candles for another year”

Remember us out on the water in a boat when the wind came up so fast and fierce
I looked at you my little daughter your resolve shone in your eyes, hands on the oars
And even though you were so small we rowed we pulled with all our might right back to shore
That’s the day that is the way you make me proud

You told me once that I had a twin, she didn’t live very long
We were together in the orphanage, she never had a home
You said “Sadie, she’s gone now sweetheart, blow out the candles for another year”

All the things you used to say that made me smile and that brightened up my day
I think of all your little ways now that you’re grown and moved away I think of you
And no matter where you are no matter how near or how far you are
Every day this is the way that I love you

I think of the Alaskan sky in winter, I think of the northern lights
My arm around you, love wrapping us like a blanket in the night
I think of you, daughter, I think of gratitude.
I think of the Alaskan sky in winter, I think if you

Thunder in My Arms

09 Blow Out The Candles

I’ll Stick Around 
When my mother left me it was for my own good
She knew my father’d raise me just like a father should
A father should, a father should

In the nights that followed I held on to what I could
I wrapped her ghost around me just like a mother would
A mother would, a mother would

I see her from time to time
Peaking out from my son’s eyes
I stick around

In the dead of summer with the twilight coming on
The noise of TV mixing with the thumping of my heart
Thump of my heart, thump of my heart

The heat is suffocating I am standing at the sink
I hear my father calling to bring another drink
Another drink, another drink

I see him from time to time
He hides in my daughter’s smile
I stick around

All is dark now, angels sleep
Breathing quiet memories creep
Kiss them softly on the face
“I will be here when you wake,
I will be here when you wake”

08 I’ll Stick Around

They Sent Me a Picture, by Schneckenburger/ Erelli
They sent me a picture of my little girl the other day
She was so beautiful, she’d grown so tall
She was laughing with her hair brushed from her eyes
She looked right at the camera but she didn’t see me
Her smile went straight through me but she didn’t see me

CH
I’m no good to you, oh honey
I’m no good to me, you know that
I’m no good to anyone at all
I’ll never be around

The day that she was born the heat felt heavy and my body low
The air was steeped with sweet honeysuckle
I held on to the porch railing in the sun 
Counting contractions waiting for my little one
Way back when I thought that she would be my little one

CH

They say if you feel sad and low you get to acting bad, I know
That if it’s true then I have plumbed the depths
I can watch myself from far away outside
It wasn’t me that did it, it was someone else
I’d never stoop so very low it must be someone else

CH

And so I tuck her photo back behind the books up on the shelf
Her smile haunts me as I leave the room
I move into the kitchen looking for a place to hide
The light above the sink is glaring at me in the night
I turn my face away and I sink slowly in the night

07 They Sent Me A Picture

Feel Better
When I am black and blue, and twisted inside
When I am wretched and need a place to hide
I creep into a closet that is dark and cool and quiet
I lie still in the darkness and I breath

CH 
Till I feel better

When I am pushed and shoved and hurt in this place
When I blink back the tears and want to hide my face
I need the solace of a womb I seal myself inside a tomb
I sink under a blanket and I breath

CH

When I am troubled by the memories I keep
When the newsreel in my mind will not let me sleep
I think of those that I have lost, the details of my sins
Until I gather up my mind and breath

CH

breath in, breath out

06 Feel Better

I Need Us Together
I can calm my body when I sit beside you  
I can calm my body and do like you do
I can calm my body when your body’s calm  
Woah, two birds on a wire

CH 
I feel fine when you feel fine   
I feel strong when you feel strong
I feel love when you feel love
I need us together, to keep it together

I can slow my heart when I sit beside you 
I can slow my heart and do like you do
I can slow my heart when your heart beats slow
Woah, two birds fly side by side

CH

Sometimes the colors and sights and sounds they spin around
They wind me up and I can’t wind down
The people and faces and noises and places 
All melting together cloud my sight
I need you to help me feel right

05 I Need Us Together

The 11th Labor of Hercules, by Schneckenburger/ Nethercott
I’ve traveled through the wasteland,
slain the hydra and the boar.
For atonement I have labored
and I’m bound to labor more

But what turn of fate confronts me now
this being by my side
I’ll embrace him as he changes
into beasts and brutes and dangers
I pray I’ll make it out alive
oh out alive

You were mothered by the Adriatic Sea
every squall, every storm, troubled through your body
Now you shake and you twist
into talon, fang, and fist.
Do you know what it is to be held
the way I hold you now?

First you become a mighty whale
then you become a shark 
as all the violence you’ve endured
turns thunder in my arms

Oh you change into a lion,
a viper, and a ram
but beneath you’re just a child 
with your hair grown long and wild
I’ll care for you the best I can
oh best I can

04 The 11th Labor Of Hercules

Since the Day We Met 
You can run away, I love you
You can cry all day, I love you
You can kick and scream and shout,
Turn your insides inside out, and I love you

When the night is long, with demons coming on
I can help you find your peace, I will sing you back to sleep

CH
Everybody makes mistakes and 
We get up and try again
But make no mistake you were no mistake
I’ve loved you since the day we met

You can change your name, or you can stay the same
You can be the one you are, I never will be far

You can deviate, stay out way too late
When you’re a rebel with a fight, I’m your anchor in the night

CH

When my footsteps slow, and you are up and grown
Someday when my hair is grey, you will hold my hand and say

03 Since The Day We Met

On My Own
I used to have a father once
He doesn’t live like me
He’s sitting back where he started
Simple life, simple hearted
He doesn’t live like me, he is primitive

And my mother she stopped coming round
She doesn’t love like me
Always yelling and leaving
Pushing and pleading
She doesn’t love like me, she is venomous

CH
But I have the sky, I have the sky
And I have the earth, I have the earth
And I have tonight, I have tonight
And I have this life, I have life

I used to have a sister once
She doesn’t look like me
You would never know it
Her face doesn’t show it
She doesn’t look like me, she is beautiful

I never liked my face 
I am a bastard child
Purely mean on the inside
Blackened, dissatisfied
I’m nothing but a bastard child, I’m not beautiful

CH

In the evening in the summer time
All the sky is an open wound
A car door slams, voices in the distance
I breath beneath the stars
My heart beats, on it’s own
On my own

02 On My Own

Look Away
On that afternoon the sun was in the sky
It made little sparkling diamonds in the snow
I had a heavy fist of fear that gripped my stomach
And it wouldn’t let me go

I could see the lady’s breath in little clouds in the air
She lead me up the walk and rang the bell
That was the day the fist of fear became an animal
And broke out of it’s shell

CH
I know, you can not fool me
Nobody wants me
And I don’t want you anyhow
I know, you’ll never see me
Nobody sees me
Look away.

I am a stranger in a house that’s full of strangers
I am afraid to turn the lights off in the night
And they say “child don’t you worry” but if you had known what I have known
Then you would worry

Nothing they give me ever tastes right
And their house just doesn’t smell like home to me
And I know that where I came from didn’t feel good but then nothing feels good
Maybe it is me 

I am an animal, my name is fear
My teeth are anger, my eyes severe
I am power, I will destroy
So do not look at me like I am just a little boy
And the fire that burns in me will devour me until I fade away
So look away

The was a time in summer I went fishing at the creek
My grandma showed me how to cast a line
We sat together on the bank and let our bare feet dangle
Everything was fine

And now they want to take me out to see the game 
They buy me little presents all the time
They say next summer we’ll go fishing, we’ll have fun
But all I want to do is cry

01 Look Away

The first year of the pandemic was a deeply creative time for Vermont based fiddler and singer Lissa Schneckenburger. When everything shut down (including her touring schedule) there was so much struggle and tragedy world wide along with so much difficulty at home, that writing music became an essential outlet. Schneckenburger explains, “I had to write music to process my experience of living through such a difficult time, it was my life line”. The result was what Schneckenburger jokingly calls “overflowing bucketfuls of music” and enough new material for several albums. The first in the queue, Falling Forward, is a collection of Schneckenburger’s original fiddle tunes and two traditional New England songs, scheduled for release on March 3rd. 

“I have a modest home studio, and do a lot of remote recording and engineering myself” Schneckenburger explains, “but after the isolation of living through a global pandemic, I knew that recording in person was the only way to bring this new music to life”. Falling Forward was recorded in Springfield MA with some of the most influential musicians in traditional music today, including producer/ fiddler Katie McNally, pianist Rachel Aucoin, bass player Mali Obomsawin, cellist Natalie Haas, and accordion player Karen Tweed. “These women are my heroes” Schneckenburger gushes, “they are leaders in the acoustic music world, and it was such an honor to record with them.” The tunes range in tone from that of a riotous fiddle party where you imagine floor boards thumping, bow hair flying, and instruments and dancers in every corner, to more somber and introspective. It is music for both meditation and release, all of which feels appropriate in processing our collective experience as a society over the last few years.

Over the last several decades Schneckenburger has made music that showcased everything from traditional New England dance tunes, to original songs inspired by her experience as a foster and adoptive parent. Falling Forward has blended her love of traditional music with her love of writing, in her first fiddle forward album in over a decade.

Lissa Schneckenburger

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