Song Series Archives - June Gervais

Cover of “Across the Universe,” by John Lennon Vocals: June • Guitar: Rob • Chirping: local crickets I used to share music here regularly—just humble home recordings alongside little reflective essays—and I don’t know why I stopped. Pandemic, I guess? (77 weeks as a working-from-home mama? Revising my novel before sunrise, lesson planning at night? Chaotic mélange of … The...

  A little music in honor of St. Paddy’s Day. As I wrote in an essay for Cordella recently, I fell in love with traditional Irish music as a struggling teenager, when a wonderful teacher introduced me to it. This music felt visceral and wild as any Nirvana bootleg and put an ecstatic hum alongside my heartaches. … The post The Perfect Wrong Note appeared first on June Gervais .

These are the last days of summer, whatever the schoolbuses, candle stores, and Pumpkin Ales may tell you. Don’t be rushed by the makers of seasonal markers: This is the liminal space of crickets and figs ripening. The ripening, too, of summer musings into autumn doings. Interesting things happen in middle-times. Liminal spaces are an … The post Beg, Steal or Borrow (Song Series #19) a...

We almost didn’t make the visit; it stormed in the morning. But the day shook off the rain and we headed east, miles of wet vineyards glowing green in the new light—my bearded beloved, my wee boys & me.   Out in Greenport, at the house of our good friend V. Hansmann (poet, essayist, and host of … The post After the Storm (Song Series #18) appeared first on June Gervais .

95% of my days are a quotidian mixture of laboring at my desk and the care and feeding of hurricanes. (Pictured here: Hurricane #1 and Hurricane #2, along with a rare eye-of-the-storm moment) I’m pretty tired, usually; but when all is said and done, it’s a lucky life. Last week, though, felt like I’d been … The post Lucky (Song Series #17) appeared first on June Gervais .

If there’s an afterlife, I don’t know what it’s going to do with Rob and me. When we come to the door of the great beyond, if such there be, maybe we’ll sit busking forever just outside the fence, until they start throwing the rotten fruit of Eden at us. At least Death Cab wrote a … The post I’ll Follow You Into the Dark (Song Series #16) appeared first on June...

I think it’s just a fact of our human wiring. Things close at hand: more urgent than faraway things. Fresh and novel things: more compelling than familiar things. People like me: more compelling than people unlike me. Maybe, then, after our years of seeing weepy charity commercials, it’s almost understandable: We just get inoculated against the problems … The post Coventry Carol...

Yeah… we just went ahead and did it. “Santa Baby.” Because, Eartha Kitt. Pair this song with the lights display above, and you have a Very Long Island Christmas. But it’s so much fun to sing. [box type=”download”] Santa Baby Guitar: Rob Vocals: June Written by Joan Javits and Philip Springer [/box] The post Santa Baby (Song Series #13) appeared first on June Ger...

It’s throwback Tuesday with this little recording. Two years ago at Christmastime, the poet Elijah Burrell and I recorded “Gabriel’s Message,” and I still like how it came out. [box] Gabriel’s Message Vocals: Elijah Burrell, June Gervais (from a Basque folk carol) [/box] This song is a moment between a terrifying divine postman with fire-eyes and … The post the...

All in one week: The anniversary of Kristallnacht. A wave of hate crimes in the U.S., in the wake of a fraught election. And the death of Leonard Cohen, who wrote this song, “Dance Me to the End of Love.” [box] Dance Me to the End of Love Guitar: Rob; vocals + viola: June; written by … The post Dance Me to the End of Love (Song Series #12) appeared first on June Gervais .