Friday, February 26, 2010
Lady Luck smiled on a fellow St. Louisan just a few months ago.
A musician and songwriter, who had recently lost his day job in marketing, gave a cassette tape of his original song, “Up in the Air,” to the director of a new movie which, coincidentally, had the same title.
One year ago, St. Louisans were anxiously awaiting Hollywood to descend upon our city. Kevin Renick, the out-of-work songwriter, heard that Jason Reitman, the director of the movie that would star George Clooney, was to give a talk at a local university.
Taking a chance and reaching for the moon, Renick attended Reitman’s lecture.
Somehow, he was able to give the director a tape of the song he had composed a couple of years prior to the movie’s development.
When he wrote the piece, Renick had no idea there was a movie in the offing, yet the lyrics echoed aspects of the movie’s plot. According to news reports, six months later, Renick received an e-mail telling him that the director loved the song and that it would be used as background music for part of the movie’s credits. Something this unusual and synchronistic seldom happens, and Renick must be excited and awed that his effort paid off.
When I heard that story, I was reminded of another that Frankie Avalon told me. When Frankie was performing in St. Louis in 1966, I had the opportunity to ask him how he was able to get hold of “Venus,” the song that made him an international teen idol. That song was at the top of the charts for five weeks and, even though Frankie had one previous Top Ten hit, “Venus” stands out today as the one which he is most associated.
Frankie had been staying at a hotel while performing in New York. One day, a songwriter found out where he was staying and he called Frankie’s hotel room from the lobby. To his surprise, Frankie answered the phone. The songwriter (Ed Marshall) told Frankie that he had composed a song that he knew was destined to be a hit and that Frankie needed to hear it.
He had a piano in his suite at the hotel, and Frankie’s gut instinct told him to ask the guy up to his room to play it on the piano. As soon as he heard the song, he knew it would be a hit. Frankie immediately contacted his arranger and they worked on the song; the very next day, they went into a recording session.
One of the intrigues of being in the music business is that you never know when that hit song will come along. Occasionally, all the elements that make up the songwriting experience and of launching a song come together in such a way that it seems like the planets were in some kind of mysterious but favorable alignment. A good song, a good marketing plan and, of course, talent are the necessary ingredients, but a little luck or Providence can’t hurt, either. Yet, if there are any rules that govern “success,” whether it’s when someone is trying to write a song or launch a song, events like the above two situations prove that there are exceptions to the rules.
It has been my experience that most new, up-and-coming performers crave success and dream of being suddenly discovered by a talent scout or a record company. But, like employment in other fields, certain procedures and hurdles usually have to be overcome in order to get any kind of recognition.
When I was a newcomer to the music business, I loved music and worked hard at it, and one of my goals was to cut a record and launch a song. That dream-come-true, a recording session, was way down the road because we first had several hurdles to overcome, not the least of which was the financial aspect of cutting a record.
TO BE CONTINUED
Visit www.bobkuban.com for information about upcoming dances and Cruisin’ with Bob Kuban in October 2010.
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