Shades of Soul EP 1.6: First Dance by Oliver Wang on Mixcloud
Yup, another wedding theme but I swear, the last for a while. Last weekend, a trip to Houston capped my third wedding gig in a month and as you may imagine, I’ve just had a wedding music on the mind for weeks now. Ergo, I devoted this show to the “first dance” but in this case, I crowd-sourced many of the selections, combining songs I’ve played for people’s weddings as well as songs that friends and acquaintances shared on social media. This raises the obvious question: what was (or would be) your first dance song?
Notes:
The Zombies’ “This Will Be Our Year” (4:20) + Brenton Wood’s “Oogum Boogum Song” (8:53)
Give me a strong piano opening and I melt like so much butter on popcorn. I also have to admit to totally sleeping on most of Brenton Wood’s catalog (besides “Gimme a Little Sign”), partially because, for a long time, I thought he was a prep school in Maine. Oops.
Curtis Mayfield: “So In Love” (42:25)
I completely slept on this Mayfield tune (from There’s No Place Like America Today) and good god…So. Very. Good.
Joni Mitchell: “All I Want” (50:47)
I didn’t have music at my own wedding. Yes, I know this probably sounds crazy but for real, when your wedding is a potluck in a friend’s backyard, when you’re still sleep-deprived from being a parent to a 3-month old, you’re not exactly spending a lot of time going through napkins designs, nor, as it seems, picking out a playlist. (Honestly, I loved our wedding and never, for a moment, missed NOT having music. Go figure.) But, had we had a first dance, totally would have been Joni. No hesitation or second thoughts with my choice (which is odd since I almost always have second thoughts. But not on this one).
chatter