Musical notes

I've been watching the broadcast of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. It's a pretty amazing array of inductees this year- Dr. John, Darlene Love, Tom Waits, Leon Russell, Neil Diamond. All different, none of the over-the-top famous, though Neil Diamond certainly was big for a long time. It was a fun watch and thought provoking, so here's what I got in no particular order.

In my basement, I have a box of singles, or 45's as we called them back in the day. In it sit two Neil Diamond songs, "I'm a Believer," which he wrote and was a huge hit for the Monkees and for whoever sang it at the end of Shrek, and Sweet Caroline. Sweet Caroline was not my favorite Neil Diamond song; Cherry Cherry was, but that was his hit when I first had the money and the interest to buy records. If you had told me back then that it would be a beloved, timeless hit, played at every Boston Red Sox home game, I would have said, "I'm a 13 year-old boy; I don't care about you or anything you say."

But I guess my point is that you never know what songs will have lasting appeal and you certainly don't know why. By 1980, when Tom Waits wrote Jersey Girl, I might have had a clue, but I still wouldn't have guessed that Waits would assemble such an astounding body of work over the years. I had started liking him in college, but never had really thought about him as more than a interesting niche artist. He is that, but he's also perhaps the most underrated living American songwriter. I know he has the gruff voice and funny persona, but he is witty, insightful, a multitalented musician and he writes sweet, beautiful, sentimental songs along with the gritty stuff. He's also a great interview (check the Fresh Air archives) and gave a really funny acceptance speech.

Leon Russell was one of the great session musicians of the pre-rock and rock age, his career spanning from Frank Sinatra and Doris Day to the Beach Boys and Rolling Stones. He wrote The Carpenters' first hit. His life and career fell off a cliff af the the '70s until Elton John recorded an album with him last year. Dr. John is a great New Orleans roots pianist who had a couple of unlikely hits.

The other two carried a common theme of bitterness, as in why am I only being selected now? The best parts of the show were the performance segments. Aside from Waits, the highlights were a piano duet with Dr. John and John Legend and Leon Russell with John Mayer playing a perfect guitar accompaniment.

Well worth watching if you see it on the schedule.