To me, a ballad is first of all a song with words, and second, a human
story. Most all of my songs are in rhymed couplets and more or less in
diatonic scale. These five ballads are strung out over a period of thirty
years. They do represent definite feeling periods in my life.
In 1968, I was thirty years old, still a single virgin, and living
in a room going to graduate school at Indiana University. These tragic,
romantic words stated that my woods were indeed full of fallen
leaves.
I dated two women in 1969. Neither of these relationships could last;
I knew I was homosexual. But I wanted romance in my life, the romance
of a first warm spring rain.
1983 saw the healing of my relationship with my parents. After years
of struggle to accept each other's differences, we took a two week
vacation in Michigan. The song by that name captures a feeling of light
joy.
When I settled with Stephen in 1984, he was in dire financial straits.
By 1988, a good position he had held for three years was slipping
from his grasp. I wrote him a heart song.
Tommy, my younger brother by six years, has always occupied a special
place in my heart. He and I are the boaters on a cold and
choppy sea.