When You Left
by TobinMueller

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Guest profile visits: 2995 Member profile visits: 0 Song comments: 37 Tokens: 0 Plays: 465 Last Played: Downloads: 153 Fans of this song: Submitted on: Jul 24, 2005 - 09:33:45 PM Last Updated:

	said 1227 days ago
	Touching very heartfelt song, I like the vocals they lend to the sensitivity of the subject nicely, a great song for the greiving people go through,,, the keyboards sound great, hard to do when you its coupled with one acoustic guitar, nice song :)

	TobinMueller said 1227 days ago
	Touching Thanks Tom. I always felt like I had a cowboy voice, and I conceived this as a folk song sung in a cowboy fashion. The organs added a new dimension. I used 12 different keyboard settings for the organ and ele piano, to give it movement. Thanks for noticing everything.

	TobinMueller said 1227 days ago
	It's hard to comment I know what you mean. You're welcome. This is a hard song to sing sometimes, too. But the holes left behind, I guard them, and remembering is important, feels like the right thing to do while I'm singing it, the right way to remember.

	TobinMueller said 1227 days ago
	Devastatingly beautiful Thanks for mentioning that last note. And the flute organ that flutters about like a bird without, I hope, ever seeming trite. The high overtone whine on that last organ note has a devastating effect on me too, like it is the searing edge of loss always just on the edge of thought. Thanks you for your careful listenings.

	TobinMueller said 1226 days ago
	Moving Thanks for the careful ears and patience to get what I was doing. I spent some time tweaking the organ sounds to get a mixture of what I thought would work well for the song. You're right on in your analysis. I tried to get at the thinning of ones soul that happens at such moments, the timeless stringing out of thought, the suspension of action. Thanks for noticing.

TobinMueller said 1226 days ago

Deeply felt Thanks, Patrick. If there was one saint in my life, it was my sister. She is forever 19 in my mind, always in a place of anticipation and discovery, always just beginning life. Altho she the disease that took her life she contracted at the age of 12, she was never "dying." She lived until she couldn't anymore. She taught me music theory at the piano, gave me my first guitar lessons, and told me to learn "River" my Joni Mitchell on her deathbed. Her inspiration has never left me. Thanks for your thoughtful remarks.

TobinMueller said 1226 days ago

Tobin... Thank you for not only taking great care to listen to this and imagine it in different settings, but in wading thru my posted songs and giving many others a listen. I enjoy your comments. Yes, the guitar is from a Roland JV-1080, the nylon string patch with layered fret noises. It initially inspired me to put this song down. I used to play acoustic guitar but my fingers are too soft now (arthritis doesn't help) and time became too limited over the years to keep it up. (And the Roland is so much easier to tune!) Used to play sax too. Keeping up on one instrument is hard enough. Thanks again for your thoughtful comments.

	TobinMueller said 1226 days ago
	The shift into present tense Thanks for noticing the tense change. To me, it is the most emotional moment of the song, from a performance point of view, when I flip into present tense. I was hoping you'd like that part.

	TobinMueller said 1226 days ago
	Your words still bleed Thanks, Del. I really appreciate how closely you listen. Thanks for your kind words.

TobinMueller said 1226 days ago

I'm staring at this box Thank you very much for sharing your reaction, your own emotions. After my sister died, that evening, a friend came over and made me go for a walk. He was an energetic fellow and jumped on a fence, tightrope walking along the top. I stayed on the ground, but smiled up at him for his life and friendship. I often think of that moment when doting along new walls. Separations, compartments, decisions, standing amid ruins but not seeing beyond the one one left standing; everything at once. Thank you for inadvertently encouraging me to post this.

TobinMueller said 1222 days ago

Oh man, Thanks for the perfect comments. I really appreciate them. Yes, this event changed my life, and Toni was the main "audience" in my head for probably 20 years, for everything I wrote, music and books. Trying to please, to live up to, to justify. Sorrow stays, as part of the process to hold on and not forget, but it brings strength too, in feelings of meaningfulness and loyalties. I know you know what I mean.

TobinMueller said 1222 days ago

From where does it all come... One of the things Toni brought into my life was poetry. When I was 13, she gave me The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. Then a collection by Rod McKuen, a favorite of the 60s generation. She kept a notebook of poems with her that she would add to, hundreds, handwritten whenever she would discover a new favorite; and lyrics too, especially Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Gordon Lightfoot. I began writing poetry at 14, then discovered ee cummings and others. I wrote my first play at 15, produced by my high school. So I was already playing with words. But this was a special one (that's why I've have forgotten my other early songs) for a special moment. Thanks for your kind and caring comments.

	TobinMueller said 1222 days ago
	such beauty pain can become There's a great song by Shawn Colvin that has the line, "At least I got a song out of it," about the hurt of a failed relationship. Such terrible yet true consolation.