Northern Michigan Songwriters in the Round

Northwest Lower Michigan is home to dozens of talented songwriters as well as plenty of cultural diversity and natural beauty to inspire them. Their words and music reflect directly on our times, our lives and our community. In appreciation of their contribution to our sense of place, we are beginning a new feature this month highlighting songs and songwriters of the Grand Traverse Region.

 

These songs are being provided courtesy of the Northern Michigan Songwriters in the Round, an affiliation of over 50 local songwriters who perform on a rotating basis every third Friday night at Horizon Books in Traverse City. For the past nine years, Songwriters in the Round has featured over 100 performances of original music in the Rise & Shine Cafe and three concerts at the Milliken Auditorium.

 

This month, Your Place is proud to feature a song by local legend and Kingsley resident, Jim Crockett.

Words and Music by Jim Crockett

 

Listen with RealPlayer or download MP3 

 

The Manistee River Song was written at a time when I needed to convince myself that, like the river, my own changing life was about continuity, constancy, and connectedness for which the river has always been a metaphor.  Each listener should take the song into his/her heart and decide what meaning it holds. ~ Jim Crockett

 

The Manistee River

it runs near my home

I sit on her banks

when I'm feeling alone.

She plays with my spirit

she eases my bones.

She's the finest old lady

that I've ever known

 

My daddy was blind man

although he could see.

He raised up my brothers,

my sisters and me.

He married my mother,

it didn't last long.

She went to Chicago

and never came home.

 

Chorus

 

If you see my mother

tell her for me.

I got me a woman,

tiny baby.

I've got cows in the stable

a nice piece of land.

I go to my river

whenever I can.

 

Chorus