Prairie Melody

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The Yellowstone soundtrack project (1987) followed the Ballads of the Grand Canyon. However, it was never funded. Still, I composed and recorded an 8-track soundtrack and ended up having to play all the instruments (except the pedal-steel guitar), as well as the singing. Compared to the 48-track Grand Canyon soundtrack, the demo is rough around the edges, but was intentionally recorded that way. My idea was to have popular recording artists record pre-selected ballads such as John Denver, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Willie Nelson, and some few others who lived in Colorado. Unlike the 18-day recording sessions to lay down the tracks for the Grand Canyon program, the Yellowstone tracks were laid down in 2-days. The first day entailed my playing the instrumental tracks and the second day I recorded the vocals.

This section I had in mind performed by Judy Collins, Reba McEntire, or Suzy Bogus. Some of the lyrics for the song were phrases from popular folk or ballad songs from the late-19th century or early 20th century. A bit corny, but, nonetheless, apt given the impact of the song’s simile, and meant solely for the sake of encouraging a singalong by the listener such as was popular with Mitch Miller’s renditions. . .for those who remember Mitch.


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