Re: view

Soundtrack of memories
I want to have people who love music look back on their memories of a certain album and record the significance of everything they find.

Ana Roxanne

■Your name including the names of your musical project(s): Ana Roxanne Recto
■Occupation: Musician
■Date of birth: April 1, 1987
■Where you live: San Francisco, CA
■What does music give you? : Music gives me the ability to express myself in ways that I cannot through talking. It gives me a space to be free. I feel most like myself when I am performing.
■Album: 『H’art Songs』 – Moondog 

Moondog Memory

　A memory that springs from hearing H’art Songs by Moondog is when I was living in Minneapolis, Minnesota from 2008 to 2011. I had dropped out of a jazz school in rural Iowa I had been attending for 3 years, and decided to move to Minneapolis instead of back home to California.

 Minneapolis seemed like a more interesting place than my home to me and I was enjoying finding my own path away from where I grew up. But also I was feeling quite lost, in my early 20s, trying to figure out my life, living in a strange town away from family and everything familiar to me.

I was taking music classes here and there but not fully in school at first in Minneapolis. Spent most of my time working at a coffee shop and playing bass in a prog-rock/math band. I was mostly playing music with other people and not really writing anything original. I would contribute with the writing process here and there with my band, but in the end it wasn’t really my project. I wasn’t sure how to write music of my own, having been to jazz school as a singer and not too proficient at piano or other instruments. I wasn’t sure if I even had the ability to write my own music.

 I think most of my conflicts at the time were based on not feeling as though I belonged. I had moved there, knowing a few friends but the majority of my experience in Minnesota felt quite lonely. I think there is something about the weather in combination with small town culture that makes people stick together in cliques and not really branch out to newcomers. I also struggled with not really having direction, and felt pressure to find a “real” job, both internally and probably from my parents.

During my time there I would often spend afternoons in bookstores, collecting poems and excerpts from books here and there. Whenever I read something that inspired me, I would write down a quote in my journal. I followed this same practice with music and lyrics. I recall sitting in a bar by myself, maybe waiting for friends to arrive, writing out the lyrics to “High on a Rocky Ledge,” as I listened on my headphones. It was loud, but I was able to tune things out.

 This was the first album by Moondog I had ever heard, and probably the first example of music from this particular lineage of avant garde music (before I knew what avant garde meant) that I came across. What I love about the album is its simplicity as well as its earnest, positive and tender lyrics. From beginning to end, I think this album is really wonderful. “Do Your Thing” is an inspirational anthem, encouraging confidence in one’s individuality. “I’m This, I’m That” is a sweet little tune that reflects on the duality of human nature. But the song that has stayed with me the most from this album is “High on a Rocky Ledge.” If I were to make a list of the best love songs ever written, this would be in the top 5 or 10 perhaps. I think this song is one of those love songs that crosses over into the spiritual realm. Where the love you feel for someone is on a higher plane… it is true devotion. I found the poetry of the lyrics to be so beautiful. I recall rereading them to myself, thinking what it would feel like to have that level of devotion for someone, and wishing that I could write a song like that one day. The song helped me when I was feeling down or needing some kind of encouragement. It felt, and still feels, like a perfect song.

 I eventually ended up taking a year to study early childhood education and began working with children as a way to feel grounded/stable. It was very rewarding and that experience helped me to get a job in San Francisco, so I left the midwest in the summer of 2011.

 Text by Ana Roxanne