Name: MELANIE Some Say LIVE AUSTRALIA '76 by Melmanian in melanie3
Duration: 3 min 45 s
Description: A precious remnant. We have only this and one other song in professionally recorded form from the '76 Australian tour. Melanie accompanied by David Doran (guitar) and Jay Woolfe (bass). Venue uncertain. Thanks to Oldshore for making this available: "Some Say (I Got Devil)" by the great Melanie Safka.

Melanie, this is a masterpiece performance and song

melanie3

MELANIE Do You Believe

The recording session as it used to be:

I would prepare as for a stage performance with more emphasis even, on my voice. Vocal exercises teas and elixirs. If an evening session my last meal eaten would be at noon. An afternoon session hardly ever for me, nothing except maybe broth. Then I’d get there usually before the musicians, and they’d come in with shop talk and jokes. Session musicians. These were my songs. They were about to be flushed out and embellished for the purpose of reaching the masses. The first sessions were painful mostly. There was usually a session leader; union guys, arrangers (Roger Kellaway), charts, an engineer. Through these people with me as focal point, (sometimes), as we are talking a lot of male in the room. All the musicians were union; had all graduated from Berkeley or Julliard. Roger had worked with Ballanchine. Labels were loose with funds. The return on investment being greater than the investment, or so easily recoupable by keeping the Artist “in the red”!

I digress. The point is it was me having to defend, protect and keep pure my songs. Peter was the defender of my voice, but had his idea of my next “hit”. Hit? Me? For me it was to communicate the songs from my intensely personal feelings to “out there”.
Who knows what or where it will land “out there“. In the spirit of releasing the trapped thing ~ and always up to a higher place where it could be heard by others, lift spirits or share pain, amplifying itself to the God ear and so on. Later on, sessions became more about the drug of choice, depending on the times and what was cool, and what was not.

Present Day 

Now a sessions is ~ “Mama, do you feel good? I need you to do a vocal” “On what?”
“I Tried To Die Young” (Now in it’s third incarnation.)

“I’m going to chop this broccoli first, and then I’ll be up in about twenty minutes.” And in less than a month: There it is ~ And it’s finished! Right up to the God ear and more. It is my personal sway. As if it were all me. It is my second heartbeat. The true soul of the songs. The life I’ve sworn to protect and release; Keeping intact the ever so delicate essence, the heart and soul of it for you, my dear ones. Immaculate ~ The best recording ever made. Thanks to Beau-Jarred, my child’s brainchild, George Wurzbach and Peter.
I’ve got to go and cook the broccoli… Neuvorganic

-Love, Melanie

I Tried To Die Young

Achingly beautiful, live in London, '75...

MELANIE Leftover Wine (live '75)

A precious remnant. We have only this and one other song in professionally recorded form from the '76 Australian tour. Melanie accompanied by David Doran (guitar) and Jay Woolfe (bass). Venue uncertain. Thanks to Oldshore for making this available: "Some Say (I Got Devil)" by the great Melanie Safka.

MELANIE Some Say LIVE AUSTRALIA '76

Breathtaking performance of a song that has become an anthem for the people of South Korea. From the album 'United Kingdom Live', originally entitled 'Live in Morecambe UK '08'.

MELANIE SAFKA The Saddest Thing (LIVE '08)

Unreleased, unrestored session recording  from Fidelity Studios, Los Angeles, 1977. Words by Paul Campbell and Music by Huddie Ledbetter

MELANIE SAFKA Sweeter Than Wine

Amazing unreleased cover of a song by Carole Bayer Sager and Peter Allen, recorded in '74 during the 'As I See It Now' sessions

MELANIE SAFKA Shy As A Violet

A favourite of many fortunate to have heard this unreleased recording from the Suntreader Sessions, Sharon, Vermont, 1978. Written just before Melanie's Carnegie Hall appearance in June that year (she aired it at that show) and later included as part of her musical, 'Ace Of Diamonds'. We hope that this, along with a lot more wonderful unreleased material, will be officially released, at last, in the not too distant future.

MELANIE Some Say LIVE AUSTRALIA '76

Melmanian

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