by Carole King
Showtime 2005, continued
Slice is walking rapidly toward me.
“Sorry about that,” he says. “Are you ready?”
I barely have time to quip, “I was born ready!” before he takes off again.
As I try to keep up I hear my boots clicking noisily on the concrete floor. We approach a door marked “Stage Right.” Slice stops, puts up his hand, and says, “Hold up a minute.”
I do as he says.
Slice opens the door, pops his head in, and says something I can’t hear to several stagehands who, I observe, are in physical positions suggesting inactivity. Despite Slice’s relatively small stature, his comment and the manner in which he delivers it causes the stagehands to spring immediately into action. Soon everything is up to Slice’s standard of readiness for the entrance of his artist. He pops his head back out and reaches for something in a pocket of his shorts. Indoors or out, no matter how cold it is, I’ve never known Slice to work in anything but shorts. He brings out a small flashlight and uses it to guide me around a row of tables with computers, stacks of chairs, coiled-up cables, equipment cases, electricians, stagehands, and other potential obstacles. The memory of coiled rubber cables in Dublin flickers in my mind, then just as quickly disappears. Slice is on it. I’m safe.
The rest of my walk through the backstage area is illuminated by Slice’s flashlight and minuscule bulbs emitting just enough light that each crew member can see what he or she is doing. On the opposite side of the stage I see “Rasta” Jon Schimke moving faders on the monitor to set the opening levels. The glow from the mixing board illuminates, with a ghostly light, Rasta’s face and the dreadlocks he has cultivated over many years. At the top of his list is keeping his eye on me at all times when I’m onstage so he can make an immediate adjustment should I indicate a need using universally understood sign language. If I point to my mouth and then point up, Rasta knows to raise the level of my vocal. And so on. Rasta also watches Rudy and Gary and makes adjustments for them. If we can hear the music in a good balance, it’ll feel right when we play it. We don’t hear what the audience hears, but their reaction tells us that Christian Walsh’s front-of-house mix is everything it needs to be.
Slice delivers me to my holding position and turns off his light. Black curtains intrude just enough on each side of the stage to hide backstage activity from the audience. A scrim hangs at the back of the set to enhance Joe Cardosi’s lighting design. There is no front curtain. The set is visible to the audience as they enter. It’s an arrangement of furniture softly lit with several lamps. There are several rugs, plants, a couch, a coffee table, photos and books, a grand piano with a small lamp on it, and a wedge monitor to the left of the piano bench. Notwithstanding the presence of a couple of stools, microphones, and wedges for Rudy and Gary, the audience knows that the set is a living room.
From the wings I see people chatting animatedly, visiting, milling around, looking for their seats, and doing what audiences have done before shows since they came to see Ugg wrestle Krog for the tusk of a newly killed mammoth.
It’s kind of cool to be invisible, I think as I watch the audience. In less than a minute, they’ll be watching me.
“House to half,” Slice says to one of the stagehands, who repeats the command into his headset. The house lights dim. Audience members who aren’t in their seats quickly scramble to find them. The level of excitement in the audience begins to rise and I suddenly feel an overwhelming rush of responsibility. I’ve been performing for so long that I should no longer doubt that I’ll be able to give everyone in the audience what they came for, yet every night when I hear Slice say, “House to half,” I feel the weight of that undertaking. At that moment, the knowledge that I’m the person the crowd has come to see feels a little daunting. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It gives me an edge, a surge of energy short of butterflies that keeps me from being complacent.
Like a great impresario—which Slice is right now, because he is in total control of the stage—he gives the people in the audience just enough time to get to their seats without letting the excitement lag before giving the command, “House to black.”
The stagehand with the headset repeats Slice’s command, the house goes dark, and the audience erupts in anticipatory applause. The lamps onstage are now the brightest objects in the room. Slice turns on his flashlight. Then, with the ceremonial air of an Olympian passing the torch, he officially turns control of the stage over to me.
“The stage is yours. Remember to turn on your light, and have fun!”
His light guides me through the darkness until the spotlight finds me. The welcoming roar engulfs me. I wave to the audience, take a deep, appreciative bow, and remind myself that their applause isn’t only for me. They’re clapping for significant events in their own lives that have little to do with me—falling in love, marching for peace, dancing at friends’ weddings, serving in Vietnam or the Peace Corps, losing a parent, conceiving a child, going through a difficult divorce—passages for which my songs happened to be the soundtrack. I’m surprised to see so many audience members in their thirties and forties, but it’s my contemporaries who are most enthusiastic in celebration of our shared history and individual survival.
I walk along the proscenium to acknowledge the folks from whose view I’ll be hidden by the piano for much of the show. I give one last wave from stage left, then walk to the piano. Per Slice’s reminder, I turn on my lamp. Then I sit down on the bench. It is exactly the right height. (Me of little faith.)
I lift my hands to the keys and play the opening C-minor chord of “Beautiful.” I hear, “You’ve got to get up every morning” coming out of my wedge in perfect balance with the piano and smile at Rasta so he knows all is well. I continue through the first chorus. As electric energy begins to pulse through my mind in little bursts of neurons firing, I am reminded of the way in which some Eastern philosophers compare a mind jumping from thought to thought to a monkey leaping from tree to tree. As I sing, my monkey mind wonders where songs come from. God? Which god? Apollo? Adonai? Jesus Christ? Allah? Buddha, Yahweh, or Jehovah?
When I was nineteen I questioned the existence of God. I didn’t feel guilty about it because I reasoned that if God had not meant for us to question his or her existence, she or he would not have given us the intelligence to so question. It wasn’t until a decade later that I arrived at something resembling faith—a combination of cultural and religious precepts that ended my need to question the existence of a something, a higher power, a whatever you want to call it. I also arrived at the conviction that belief or nonbelief in the existence of God by whatever name is something each of us has to figure out for ourselves.
You’re gonna find, yes, you will
That you’re beautiful as you feel…
The instrumental of “Beautiful” requires more dexterity and occupies more of my attention, but then, after I execute the modulation and begin to sing the last verse, monkey mind wonders why God by whatever name gave human beings the instinct and ability to kill other human beings simply because they define holiness in different ways and have different names for their understanding of God. Or did people learn how to kill each other on their own? If that’s the case, is God by whatever name wringing his or her figurative hands?*
As I begin singing the last chorus I wonder how one part of my mind can be thinking about theology while the other part is completely focused on what I’m there to do. But what I’m hearing in the monitor sounds present and joyous, and the audience seems happy, so whatever’s happening is probably okay.
You’ve got to get up every morning with a smile on your face
And show the world all the love in your heart
Then people gonna treat you better
You’re gonna find, yes, you will
That you’re beautiful… you’re beautiful
You’re beautiful as you feel
The audience applauds with heartfelt appreciation after the last chord. I thank them
and reach down to get my water bottle. As I sip, monkey mind comes up with a rapid series of questions. Why have I spent so much of my life pushing away from this thing I do that people seem to enjoy, and that I, too, enjoy, so much? Was it because I wanted to experience other things, other lifestyles, other adventures, other career paths? Are those such bad things to want?
With startling clarity I grasp the answer, and I feel the essential truth of it with every cell of my body.
It’s always been important to me to encourage the best in people, and music has been my principal instrument in doing that. And yet I kept pushing music away because I thought it was keeping me from having a normal life.
At this moment I understand that for me, music is normal life.
And then I stop thinking. Monkey mind merges into the moment. I set the bottle on the floor, place my hands on the piano, and strike the A-flat major 7th chord that heralds the next song. The applause immediately dies down, and I begin to sing.
Music is playing inside my head
Over and over and over again, my friend
There’s no end to the music…
Ah, it’s not always easy
But the music keeps playing and won’t let the world get me down
Afterword
Because my father, Sid Klein, died while I was still writing A Natural Woman, his passing is included as part of my narrative. I honor my father for his readiness to help others, for teaching me to value excellence in myself and others, and for his role in creating Lake Waubeeka, a community that is still thriving after more than half a century.
My mother, Eugenia Gingold (née Cammer), was ninety-four when I lost her on December 22, 2010. In the summer of her life she helped my father build the aforementioned community and put on shows there. In her autumn years, my mother earned respect in South Florida as an actress, director, and theater critic. I was privileged to bear witness to her acceptance of the winter and the end of her life with courage, grace, and dignity. I honor my mother for her unwavering love and support, for her wisdom, encouragement, editorial comments, and remarkable memory while I was writing this book, and for being an example of how to live life to the fullest.*
Rudy Guess passed away at age fifty-seven on December 31, 2010. No one misses Rudy more than his wife and best friend, but Lorna is not alone in missing him. Whether one met him for a moment, knew him for years, or was lucky enough to play music with him, simply being around Rudy brought joy to everyone.*
Don Kirshner was surrounded by his children and grandchildren and his beloved wife, Sheila, when he passed away at age seventy-six on January 17, 2011, in Boca Raton, Florida. Donnie’s talent for both music and business redounded to the benefit of many more songwriters and musicians than history may record. I’m thankful that I was one of them.
The seeds of James Taylor’s and my 2010 Troubadour Reunion Tour were planted in 2007 when James and I played at the Troubadour club in Los Angeles with our original bandmates. Those shows are memorialized in a CD and DVD, Carole King/James Taylor—Live at the Troubadour.
Our reunion with that talented group of musicians and friends recalled for all of us the period of tremendous growth during which we had influenced each other both musically and personally. If you’d like to learn more about James and me and other singer-songwriters and musicians who emerged in California in the early 1970s, documentary filmmaker Morgan Neville captured that period remarkably well in his film Troubadours: The Rise of the Singer-Songwriter.
Because there wasn’t enough room in this memoir for me to give the 2010 Troubadour Reunion Tour the depth and reflection it deserves, please be assured that it’s a subsequent tale that I want very much to tell.
Acknowledgments
COLLEEN DALY: my first editor—“Just write.”
SHERRY KONDOR: bff, manager, and child of mine.
ROBBIE KONDOR, DILLON KONDOR, AND SOPHIE KONDOR: music, love, and laughter.
LOUISE GOFFIN: gifted songwriter and producer, daughter of light and wisdom.
HAYDEN AND ELIJAH WELLS: rhythm and joy.
MOLLY LARKEY: maker of art and LOVE.
LEVI, BENA, AND OCEAN LARKEY: sun beauty rock steady love family hilarious.
LOU ADLER: then, now, and always.
ELISSA KLINE: fine art photographer, archivist, documentarian, and caring friend.
ERIK GILLBERG: “I just call out your name” and there you are.
IAN GILLBERG: the person you get when you teach your children well.
JOY HARRIS: friend and literary agent.
DEB FUTTER: my esteemed editor at Grand Central Publishing.
KRIS ADETOSOYE: for keeping it all together.
KATIE PAGE: for making a good noize better.
ROBIN FORT-LINCKE: ’tis a wondrous web she weaves.
JACK KAUFMAN AND EDITH PREVER: “Always begin with an outline.”
MARTY BANDIER AND NEIL LASHER at Sony/ATV Music Publishing.
VERONICA COTA, EVELYN HADDAD, AND RONNY SCHIFF.
JULIE MCDOWELL with Hal Leonard Corporation.
LAURIE SORIANO, JEFF SILBERMAN, SETH MILLER, AND STEVE MILLEMANN: the eagles.
DAVID WEISE, BETH SABBAGH, ROB SALZMAN, DINA DEMAS, VIOLETA DAVIDYAN, and everyone at DWA: for care and excellence with numbers.
BRAD SNOW AND TIM ROGERS: for taking care of the “it” we get out amongst.
CAROLYN MALONEY, COLLEEN CORRIGAN, and everyone on the NREPA team: water on a rock.
GRAND CENTRAL PUBLISHING: Chris Barba, Dianne Choie, Jimmy Franco, Tommy Harron, Liz Kessler, Michele McGonigle, Mari Okuda, Martha Otis, Roland Ottewell, Bruce Paonessa, Jamie Raab, Karen Torres, Anne Twomey, and David Young.
JOY HARRIS LITERARY AGENCY: Adam Reed and Sarah Twombly.
Lorna Guess, Ralph and Emily Simon, Gerry and Michele Goffin, Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil, Toni Stern, Carole Bayer Sager, and Sheila Kirshner.
Rudy Guess, Charles Larkey, Danny Kortchmar, Russ Kunkel, Ralph Schuckett, Paul Hipp, and Charlie Macey.
James and Kim Taylor, Paul Simon, and Paul McCartney.
Jerry Wexler, Ahmet Ertegun, Peter Asher, and Hank Cicalo.
Phil Robinson, Beverly Klein, Judith Freeman, Howard Frank, Roy and Mon’nette Reynolds, and Captains Greg Freitas and Barbara Emerson.
Special thanks to Bob DiCorcia, Mary Rohlfing, José Martinez, and all my longtime fans and CK heads: Thank you for your steadfast appreciation of my work and for being cool enough to know “when not to play.”
Deepest gratitude to all.
Credits
Page 11
“Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”
Lyrics by Jane Taylor from the poem “The Star” (1806); music adapted from the French folk song “Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman” (1761)
Page 13
“Bell Bottom Trousers (Coat of Navy Blue)”
Written by Moe Jaffe and performed by Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians (Tony Pastor’s Orchestra had the longest- and highest-charting version)
Page 14
“Heart and Soul”
Lyrics by Frank Loesser; music by Hoagy Carmichael
“Chopsticks”
Music by Euphemia Allen, aka Arthur de Lulli
Page 16
Teaching Little Fingers to Play—A Book for the Earliest Beginner
Written by John Thompson
Page 17
“Shoo Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy”
Lyrics by Sammy Gallop; music by Guy Wood
Page 19
The Romance of Helen Trent (soap opera)
Created by Frank and Anne Hummert; various directors and writers
“Dance with a Dolly (With a Hole in Her Stocking)”
Lyrics and Music by Terry Shand, Jimmy Eaton, and Mickey Leader
Page 20
The Shadow (radio drama series)
Adapted by David Chrisman and Bill Sweets; various directors and writers
The Lone Ranger (radio drama series)
Created by Fran Striker (George W. Tr
endle is disputed); various directors and writers
Inner Sanctum Mysteries (radio drama series)
Created by Himan Brown; various directors and writers
The Green Hornet (radio drama series)
Created by Fran Striker (George W. Trendle is disputed); various directors and writers
Suspense (radio drama series)
Created by producers of the CBS summer series Forecast; various directors and writers
Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons (radio drama series)
Created by Frank and Anne Hummert; various directors and writers
Page 21
I Love Lucy (TV series)
Created by Jess Oppenheimer, Madelyn Davis, Bob Carroll Jr.; written by Jess Oppenheimer, Madelyn Davis, Bob Carroll Jr., Bob Schiller, Bob Weiskopf; various directors
Texaco Star Theater (TV variety series)
Various writers including Milton Berle; directed by Edmund L. Cashman, Greg Garrison, Sid Smith, Milton Berle
The Milton Berle Show (TV variety series)
One season only; see Texaco Star Theater above
Page 22
The Horn and Hardart Children’s Hour (TV variety series)
Created by Stan Lee Broza; directed by Stan Lee Broza and various directors
“If I Knew You Were Comin’ I’d’ve Baked a Cake”
Lyrics and music by Al Hoffman, Bob Merrill, and Clem Watts
Page 23
Hit Parader (magazine)
Published by Charlton Publications; edited by various
(Ted Mack’s) The Original Amateur Hour (TV variety series)
Written by Jac Hein; directed by Albert Fisher