THE BUDS AND BLOSSOMS
I've been meaning to write you a letter
But I did not know what I would say
I've been thinking about you and your new love
And wishing that there was a way...
And the buds and the blossoms remind me of you today…
This originated as a poem sent to me by Rose Kampton, morning the loss of her father. I turned it into a prayer and put music to it. Then when Brook drowned it became something altogether else.
(c) 1990 Royal T Muaic
This is a beautiful poem sung beautifully by Barbara. Barbara passed on during August 20, 2019. Barbara was no only an extremely intelligent individual, she was ever so sweet and compassionate...always willing to listen to and be there for others who were going through rough water.
My daughter, Wyn, sings
a song I wrote in 1977
while I was doing a gig
at the Ramada Inn in
Laredo.
Harmonies are by her mother,
Barbara Anne Taylor and step
mother, Peggy Ann Mitchell.
The guitar solo and keys are
by my son, Rabyn…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
This is the title song from my first LP.
FEATHERS IN THE WIND by SNOWGEESE.
Snowgeese was my first wife, BarbaraAnne and me. Michael was a new friend we met when we moved to Texas that liked my songs enough to produce and arrange and record…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
This is my adaptation of a poem by Rosemarie Kempton.
"I always felt that it was fitting that you turned the poem I wrote into a poignant hymn that captured the feeling of loss of a loved one. My words sprang from my attempts to understand…
Probably anyone who plays the guitar could write this song....
Someone asked if I was actually in Spain in 2003. Actually, 2000. Working on the movie, THE STONE RAFT with George Sluizer, from a book by Jose Saramago.
Inspired by something Jenni…
MAN THAT I AM - Key Dm
Dm
Train pulls out the station and the shades are all drawn
Cold steel bites my ankles and I am on my way home
G
I would jump out of that window. Risk a bullet in my back
Dm
But I'm shackled to a bunk…
This is amazing. I love this song. I was born in 1961 and was aware of the war as a child. It was a big world lesson for a little mind that if you were a young guy you would be forced to fight and die in a country on the other side of the world, and I saw this on the same tv I saw the GI Joe doll ads aimed at little boys. Later as a teen I had the vision of the guys on stage thrashing out the rock & roll and punk, the living spirits of the dead boys, armed with guitars and drums and skill and rage. Thanks for writing this song. It has a fine groove.
This is a Rick Babb song.
Hey! What's that sound
You're not around
The silence makes me see
Just what you meant to me
It's quiet tonight
Ah, you're not coming back
You drove away
I watched you pack
I can't hear a thing
But the sound…
My last post tonight I promise! Here is the link to the video of James Michael Taylor and Sam The Lion - Shipping & Receiving 06/14/19 LIVE on YouTube PLEASE, somebody else watch this video and either confirm my belief SAM THE LION can own whatever song they want... or tell me I'm full of... ahhh... stuff... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRbr9wj71Nw&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR1a3LFyCzsLpCKu22Szezh220UAsmbq7vMacCVx1lC3GJl1jZWljQnsyLQ
A song that Rick Babb started and I helped finish. (He brought me the first verse and the chorus and the music.)
HERE COMES LONELY
Ronnie says it's over but I don't believe
I'm not willing to give up I'm not willing to see She's made up…
HEY! I just had a GREAT idea! Hey... SAM THE LION... hey, you guys... hey, you, SAM THE LION guys... I watched the video of you guys doing your set of JMT songs... you had JMT on stage with you... (LOVED IT!) How about this... DO THIS SONG !! And have BOTH JMT and Rick Babb on stage with you! Maybe also do "Quiet Tonight" ??? Hmmm... start strong with HCLonely and then go softer with QT ??? Or... maybe start soft with QT and then break out strong with HCL ??? Hmmm... which way... which way... What a nice decision to have to make! BUT MAY I SUGGEST... do them... either, both, or all of them... as SAM THE LION songs! Do NOT simply "cover" the Babb/Taylor versions... own the songs. (that is... "own the songs" period... end of sentence!) I watched you SAM THE LION guys play on that "Songs of JMT" video... and after watching it, it is my firm belief... you guys can "own" any damn song you want!
A song that Rick Babb started and I helped finish. (He brought me the first verse and the chorus and the music.)
HERE COMES LONELY
Ronnie says it's over but I don't believe
I'm not willing to give up I'm not willing to see She's made up…
This is a Rick Babb song.
Hey! What's that sound
You're not around
The silence makes me see
Just what you meant to me
It's quiet tonight
Ah, you're not coming back
You drove away
I watched you pack
I can't hear a thing
But the sound…
Yes, this is a great song. When I was allowed the honor of choosing my own "Best Of JMT" collection, I am proud to say... in that collection, I included another great Rick Babb song... "Here Comes Lonely" You know, Jimmy... I think I have a CD... someplace, in some drawer or box... tossed in with my collection of JMT "Works In Progress" and my collection of... "Hey, JohnQ, here is new song I'm working on!" CD's... well, that CD I am thinking of... I believe it is called... something like... Babb-ylon... ??? Maybe even a Babb-ylon II... ??? Think I'll go look... see if I can find it... see if I can find them...
The Winnowing Wind
I feel the wind blow thru me
Oh, please don't let it undo me
Let it level and true me
The Wind. The Winnowing Wind
And here I stand, alone, against the wind,
And, who am I to think that I
Can stand alone against the…
The Winnowing Wind
I feel the wind blow thru me
Oh, please don't let it undo me
Let it level and true me
The Wind. The Winnowing Wind
And here I stand, alone, against the wind,
And, who am I to think that I
Can stand alone against the…
The Winnowing Wind
I feel the wind blow thru me
Oh, please don't let it undo me
Let it level and true me
The Wind. The Winnowing Wind
And here I stand, alone, against the wind,
And, who am I to think that I
Can stand alone against the…
I love the way this song moves the chords fluidly, appropriate to the subject. Very pretty! And I have felt the winds of change blow through me, as well as atmospheric winds, so I like the metaphor.
“I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.” - Charles Dickens
This song contains the body of the first song I ever wrote. A poem sent to me while I was away to school in Idaho in 1959 by Carolyn Opitz that I sat at an old pump organ and sang a thousand times when I was a junior in high school.
YOU CAN…
SLAUGHTER MOUNTAIN
My mom’s dad was a coal miner. Her mother died of TB when she was a kid. When she was twelve, her dad, dying of black lung, slit his throat with a butcher knife. That left her with a cripple little brother to take care of…
SLAUGHTER MOUNTAIN
My mom’s dad was a coal miner. Her mother died of TB when she was a kid. When she was twelve, her dad, dying of black lung, slit his throat with a butcher knife. That left her with a cripple little brother to take care of…
Candy Davis
I love that album. You gifted it to me a long time ago, and I still think about those hapless men becoming ill and dying, making hickory handled hardware. And "Help!' raises so many emotions in me--that people would just stand on the shore and do nothing while you risked your life alone to save that boy. All of the songs on Slaughter Mountain are ones that are so well written and so memorable!
Randy Brown and I did a little co-write this evening and this is what we came up with...
I MISTOOK IT FOR THE MOON Capo @ 2 Key D (Play in C positions)
I was coasting across West Texas/Had my top down, it was late at night
I caught a coyote…
I just listened to A YEAR IN JAIL. both versions. Yours is much better than mine.
Jeff
Jeff Prince
Thanks. I remember approaching it as a straight-ahead country-and-western song vocally, and the production is good, especially toward the end. Great song. The music is better from the 1st note.
My mom is 91 and still holding on.
The people that help her make it thru
each day have learned that there is no
sense in arguing with her about who they
are or when it is...thus the song.
MAMA HAS A TIME MACHINE key - Em
Mama has a…
You really broke me down on that one. It's like you have been looking into my living room. It took me a second to remember your names is James also. - James Bucannan
Worshiping at an abandoned alter...
Let my breaths be as long as her legs
Let my breaths be as smooth as her back
Let my breaths be as cool as her hips
Let my heart be as still as her tongue
Let my mind be as bright as her skin
Let my…
FOREVER
She stares out the window. That look in her eye
How deep can her heart know life's passing her by
The radio's playing. She holds back a tear
A song she's forgotten
Holds back the years...Forever
And she says,
"I wish I 'd loved…
FOREVER
She stares out the window. That look in her eye
How deep can her heart know life's passing her by
The radio's playing. She holds back a tear
A song she's forgotten
Holds back the years...Forever
And she says,
"I wish I 'd loved…
Well, it's like I went down town last night to see Guthrie playing with Ray and I came home with a song.
NOBODY KNOW ME IN TOWN ANY MORE Capo @ 1 in G
There’s a bird in the gutter that’s so sound asleep
He can’t hear the music that’s sweeping…
The lyrics of this song,
as they pertain to plot,
are my exact memory of the event.
I had spoken to the kid maybe a minute before the "action" started about how the pressure of the water was very strong. He was nestled down with his back…
NAAD -Just read your lyrics and liatend.to the son...w
Very beautiful, very moving...beautiful how you he'd on the rhyme scheme an dmade it work...so love the slave t rhymes as well...they're my favorite...super smooth transitions....tell me a bit about the inclusion of you garden reflections in the middle of the song...counter point? Balancing urgency and reality? Love, love, love thisnone...will.ha r to listen again.
"tell me a bit about the inclusion of you garden reflections in the middle of the song...counter point?" it all ties in when I relate it to the weather, "...there's lightning and thunder...but this summer is a wash...what we really need is rain." The reason the river was up that day was because there had been so much rain in the previous days, they were lowering the dam to lower the water lever in the lake that fed this river.
Refuge into the imagination:
Is it crazy?
Is it survival?
Is desire to survive crazy?
THERE SHE WAS Key - G 102811
G
She'd been gone for three years now so he'd been on the road
Playing every truck stop bar and every song he…
Now and perpendicular to now, where shadows are, as we will create the next song of music and make sounds together in the now but also in the perpendicular to now for the theme at sound in. of course any music on theme or not is ok. At right angles…
One night after three month of no rain, as we were driving home from singing at Gringos in Grapevine a splash of water hit the windshield.
I said to myself, "Sweet Rain."
I went home and wrote the song. It's on the soundtrack of a movie called…
I never sing this song the same two times in a row.
The lyric below is pretty close to how I sing it now.
Listening again, this is an awful version of this song...
I have my recording machine working again...I must redo this.
I PLAY C…
Like most or all of your songs, there is always something really stands out and pays off big time. That last verse (or is it the last two) is absolutely, powefully emotion packed. And it is somewhat Vonnegut like in that so much is conveyed so precisely and with elegant simplicity. "... in the dream we left behind" - my God man, it's pure genius. Not the first two times I heard the song, but the first time I "listened" to it, I thought WHAT WAS THAT! And the it sunk in.
I have a new love
Of course she doesn’t know
How can a work of art
Know when lovers come and go
And when the artist is the art!
My eyes are the eyes of the beholder
And my eyes are the eyes of the world…
…when the artist is the art…
CATTAILS AND BUTTERFLIES capo @ 4 in C
C G repeat
There was a field around the corner
And a stream flowed cross the field
There were cat tails in the summer time
And monarch butterflies
And tadpoles sprouting wings
E…
Comments on James Michael Taylor's stuff
Beautiful song
This is a beautiful poem sung beautifully by Barbara. Barbara passed on during August 20, 2019. Barbara was no only an extremely intelligent individual, she was ever so sweet and compassionate...always willing to listen to and be there for others who were going through rough water.
This is exquisite Michael. I HAD NEVER HEARD WYN SING...DIDN'T KNOW SHE COULD EVEN AND RABYN'S PLAYING...ALL BEAUTIFUL ...PERFECT.
Beautiful lovethis song
Beautiful song,love it.
Life is full of "feathers in the wind." Another bright star in the night sky.
So beautiful!
Beautiful. Did you write this when your child slipped into eternity?
Fantastic!
Amazing and beautiful!
Beautiful. My dear friend 💛
Funny
This is amazing. I love this song. I was born in 1961 and was aware of the war as a child. It was a big world lesson for a little mind that if you were a young guy you would be forced to fight and die in a country on the other side of the world, and I saw this on the same tv I saw the GI Joe doll ads aimed at little boys. Later as a teen I had the vision of the guys on stage thrashing out the rock & roll and punk, the living spirits of the dead boys, armed with guitars and drums and skill and rage. Thanks for writing this song. It has a fine groove.
My last post tonight I promise! Here is the link to the video of James Michael Taylor and Sam The Lion - Shipping & Receiving 06/14/19 LIVE on YouTube PLEASE, somebody else watch this video and either confirm my belief SAM THE LION can own whatever song they want... or tell me I'm full of... ahhh... stuff... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRbr9wj71Nw&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR1a3LFyCzsLpCKu22Szezh220UAsmbq7vMacCVx1lC3GJl1jZWljQnsyLQ
HEY! I just had a GREAT idea! Hey... SAM THE LION... hey, you guys... hey, you, SAM THE LION guys... I watched the video of you guys doing your set of JMT songs... you had JMT on stage with you... (LOVED IT!) How about this... DO THIS SONG !! And have BOTH JMT and Rick Babb on stage with you! Maybe also do "Quiet Tonight" ??? Hmmm... start strong with HCLonely and then go softer with QT ??? Or... maybe start soft with QT and then break out strong with HCL ??? Hmmm... which way... which way... What a nice decision to have to make! BUT MAY I SUGGEST... do them... either, both, or all of them... as SAM THE LION songs! Do NOT simply "cover" the Babb/Taylor versions... own the songs. (that is... "own the songs" period... end of sentence!) I watched you SAM THE LION guys play on that "Songs of JMT" video... and after watching it, it is my firm belief... you guys can "own" any damn song you want!
Here is ANOTHER great Rick Babb song!
Yes, this is a great song. When I was allowed the honor of choosing my own "Best Of JMT" collection, I am proud to say... in that collection, I included another great Rick Babb song... "Here Comes Lonely" You know, Jimmy... I think I have a CD... someplace, in some drawer or box... tossed in with my collection of JMT "Works In Progress" and my collection of... "Hey, JohnQ, here is new song I'm working on!" CD's... well, that CD I am thinking of... I believe it is called... something like... Babb-ylon... ??? Maybe even a Babb-ylon II... ??? Think I'll go look... see if I can find it... see if I can find them...
Very nice! I like the way you’ve composed this song; it is musically expressive of the central metaphor. Jenni Mansfield Peal
Wow! Beautiful lyrics and accompanying music.
I love the way this song moves the chords fluidly, appropriate to the subject. Very pretty! And I have felt the winds of change blow through me, as well as atmospheric winds, so I like the metaphor.
Comments made by James Michael Taylor
“I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.” - Charles Dickens
Wow! Starts of so light and carefree. Then pow to rock lead guitar breaks the tranquility. Contrast. Js Bchard.
David Young That’s the album that got me started loving your music! I used to listen to it often on my drive to work and back.
Candy Davis I love that album. You gifted it to me a long time ago, and I still think about those hapless men becoming ill and dying, making hickory handled hardware. And "Help!' raises so many emotions in me--that people would just stand on the shore and do nothing while you risked your life alone to save that boy. All of the songs on Slaughter Mountain are ones that are so well written and so memorable!
Wow. That is a good one. Michelle Soto
I just listened to A YEAR IN JAIL. both versions. Yours is much better than mine. Jeff Jeff Prince Thanks. I remember approaching it as a straight-ahead country-and-western song vocally, and the production is good, especially toward the end. Great song. The music is better from the 1st note.
You really broke me down on that one. It's like you have been looking into my living room. It took me a second to remember your names is James also. - James Bucannan
Haunting voices and guitar work. Nuno
The line: "The window's a mirror when it's dark outside..." Wow! Nuno
Gerald Ray - I love this.
"Nobody Knows Me". Your voice is so different in that song. Deeper.NUNO
NAAD -Just read your lyrics and liatend.to the son...w Very beautiful, very moving...beautiful how you he'd on the rhyme scheme an dmade it work...so love the slave t rhymes as well...they're my favorite...super smooth transitions....tell me a bit about the inclusion of you garden reflections in the middle of the song...counter point? Balancing urgency and reality? Love, love, love thisnone...will.ha r to listen again. "tell me a bit about the inclusion of you garden reflections in the middle of the song...counter point?" it all ties in when I relate it to the weather, "...there's lightning and thunder...but this summer is a wash...what we really need is rain." The reason the river was up that day was because there had been so much rain in the previous days, they were lowering the dam to lower the water lever in the lake that fed this river.
Cory Michael -I listened to the song and think you should definitely sing it next week. You're a hell of a story teller, James!
Evocative stuff.
Cindy Grayson James Michael Taylor beautiful song
Pamela Steuber Anderson James Michael Taylor I love this song. Thank you.
Like most or all of your songs, there is always something really stands out and pays off big time. That last verse (or is it the last two) is absolutely, powefully emotion packed. And it is somewhat Vonnegut like in that so much is conveyed so precisely and with elegant simplicity. "... in the dream we left behind" - my God man, it's pure genius. Not the first two times I heard the song, but the first time I "listened" to it, I thought WHAT WAS THAT! And the it sunk in.
That is beautiful, James. Thank you. Rachel Eastman
It's fun trying to imagine the movie this is the sound to. "Hoooooonk." Thanks for listening to my music.
504 Hathaway, San Luis Obispo, California. 1954