I’ve spent a long time, far too long, trying to think of how to introduce this song. In the end, I think it best to say only this: it is the story of a person I greatly loved looking back at a long life from the vantage point of its ending. Watching her go was a transformative experience for me in ways that are difficult to discuss. It’s not just her absence that has left me shaken from that day to this, but that she left slowly, but inexorably. I had always understood the reality of death, had lost people, but only by sudden strokes. Somehow losing someone by pieces was much harder to put in perspective.

Having said all of that, this song is not about my reaction to the event, but hers. While she did not want to go, she was very much a realist, not someone who took comfort in religion or other emotional palliatives, and while I was not privy to her final thoughts, I would like to think that in her last dreams she went back to those places where she had been most happy and alive, restored to those whom she had loved. I never did go apple-picking with her, but heard her talk about it on several occasions, and somehow her happiness in describing those moments became a metaphor to me.

I am mostly satisfied with this song as I have written it, and I won’t bore you with the few cavils I have. I do hope that it is neither sentimental nor maudlin, but is simply as close as I can come to biography, to capturing the spirit of a unique mind in a moment of both pain and elation. Most of all, I wanted to say, “Yes, I listened. I heard every word you said, and I understood.”

Recorded in Aug 2009, in Rick’s Home Studio

Steve: Vocals
Rick: Acoustic guitars, orchestral programming, vocals

Of the songs in our catalog that Steve wrote both the lyrics and music to, “Apple Orchard” is my favorite. I remember when he first played it for me on his guitar, not too far removed from his loss, and I was really moved by it. A song like this could easily have taken the tone of a cautionary tale where an older, much wiser person shares their experiences with a young man, warning them that things can (will) be almost unbearably difficult at times. But I see an optimism in the song that extends well beyond that, where she is encouraging someone much closer to the start of the journey than to the inevitable conclusion to embrace the parts of life that give you joy as they are occurring, and to always be looking out for new opportunities and experiences, despite the obstacles and setbacks.

As for the recording, the instrument tracks are a single acoustic guitar which I put down for Steve to use in the recording session, and a number of individual orchestral instruments and ensembles using the Garritan Pocket Orchestra under the Dimension Pro soft synth. I love working on string and woodwind arrangements (cf. Haven), though I find it’s particularly hard to convince my inner perfectionist to stop tweaking those tracks. The guitar track is there mostly to provide a sense of rhythm, and I pushed it lower in the mix in the places where the arrangement could stand up on its own. The harmonies are also purposely low in the mix, because I felt that Steve’s voice needed to be clearly in front.

I’ll close by stating that while the lyric is not about Steve’s reaction to the event, as he says, the composition of the song itself is infused with the love he felt for her. I hope that I’ve been able to do it justice in the arrangement and recording, and also that you can find an uplifting message in it as I have.

Apple Orchard

Apple Orchard, 1955
Husband, children, on a Sunday drive
This is my favorite place
I close my eyes, I see…
Dreams are growing just like fruit
I pick one from a tree

Apple Orchard, 1942
Husband’s a sailor aboard the Richelieu
I’m displaced in time and space
A multiplicity of
Dreams are growing just like fruit
I pick one from a tree

I am confined to bed but in my head
The love I’ve lost walks again in the where and when

Apple Orchard, 1999
Light is fading on these walks of mine
I have had three daughters, one has gone ahead of me
Dreams are growing just like fruit
I pick one from a tree

I am confined to bed but in my head
The time I’ve lost walks again in the where and when

Through the seasons, time keeps rolling on
Apples growing, even when you’ve gone
And when I pass, my grandchild
Remember this of me
I have had more time than most
And known such tragedy
But even in the saddest times
Are possibilities…
Dreams are growing just like fruit
Pick one
Dreams are growing just like fruit
Pick one from a tree Powered by Hackadelic Sliding Notes 1.6.5