Songs for the Beloved by Judi Schoeck
Now available on CD and cassette from Labor Phase Productions. All songs on the album were composed either wholly or in part by Judi Schoeck, who has been writing songs to and for Meher Baba since 1976. Ranging from the reggae of An Everlasting Love to the blues of To Make You Mine, and backed by a wonderful group of Denver musicians, these songs of love and longing call for us to open our hearts and dance!
Titles on The Very Best Wine include:
An Everlasting Love ------- Drawn in Your Smile
The Very Best Wine ------- Gift of Your Love
Pilgrim is My Name -------- Rubbing Salt
Fact of One -------------------- Your Lovers Yearn
To Make You Mine
Judi writes:
"God Loves Rock" (with a stylized heart sitting in for "loves") was a bumper sticker I had on my car for many years. And for me, that’s true. I was working at Rolling Stone magazine when the article, "In Love with Meher Baba," by Pete Townshend was published (Nov. 26, 1970) and I first saw Meher Baba’s beautiful form when the issue with His picture on the cover was laid on my desk.
I wrote my first song the following spring, picked up the guitar a few years later, and I’ve been writing ever since as a way to converse with the Only One Who Matters/Who’s Matter.
Notes on some songs collected for The Very Best Wine:
An Everlasting Love: This is an adaptation of an anonymous prayer. I love the exclamations: "You have set us in the thick of things! You have fed us!" I found a tune for this prayer and completed the song during Amartithi one year at Meherabad.
Here’s a story! On the morning of the CD release party for The Very Best Wine (Jan. 25), I decided to check a perpetual calendar my dad gave me for Christmas. It has a spiritual affirmation for each day, along with a statement (chapter and verse) from the Bible. I hadn’t seen it for a couple of days, so I looked down before I flipped the pages. What my eyes and heart beheld was the biblical affirmation: "I have loved you with an everlasting love" (which is the title line of the opening track on the album!).
The Very Best Wine: The inspiration for this song was twofold: At a Meher Baba House meeting in New York, one of my dear brothers in Baba set the challenge during a talk in which the speaker mentioned Jesus changing water into wine. He leaned over and said: "That’d be something to write about!" I knew I had it the next time I read Beloved Baba’s statement from His Universal Message:
"My present Avataric Form is the last Incarnation of this cycle of time, hence my Manifestation will be the greatest. When I break my Silence, the impact of my Love will be universal and all life in creation will know, feel and receive of it."
Pilgrim is My Name: This is the only song whose rhythm was changed considerably by Michael Engberg, my producer. "Pilgrim" is a country tune when you hear me and my guitar, but Michael heard a real anthem. Then John, who’s done such good work on bass, said during rehearsals: "What we really need is a didjeridoo!" (I laughed...and proceeded to contact a didjeridoo player from Laramie who I heard was in town for a weekend!)
Rubbing Salt: This song comes from one of the ghazals Bhau Kalchuri wrote at Baba’s order. I found the words in a booklet accompanying "With Love," an album produced by Eel Pie Publishing, and the first collection of songs for Meher Baba I heard. It was an adaptation by Craig San Roque, presented before Bhau’s collections were available in English. After I composed the melody and began singing Rubbing Salt, Meher Sarod was published. Bhau’s translation appears as Ghazal 14. I was astonished to find that for most of the ghazals, Meher Baba had given two lines to Bhau, but for this one, Meher Baba gave all but two lines.
Your Lovers Yearn: This is the English translation of Meher Baba’s Gujerati Arti. I first saw this in both languages on a prayer card and learned the English version by heart before I heard the musical version (Meher Baba’s Bujaawe Naar). Many moons later, on returning from the only LA Sahavas I’ve ever attended, I was inspired to put it to music. I think hearing the different types of Indian music during my visits to Meher Baba’s Samadhi enabled me to find a way to share this in a Western form.
Musicians: Judi Schoeck, vocals; Michael Engberg, guitars, keyboards, and background vocals; Joan Staples, background vocals; John Pendleton, bass; Matthew J. Pulizzi, drums; Richard Slavich, cello; Clay Kirkland, harmonica; Rick Nelson, saxophones; Bataki Cambrelen, percussion; and Paul Taylor, didjeridoo. The album was produced and arranged by Michael Engberg, who has released two CDs of his own music under the Many Hats Productions label.
The Very Best Wine is available prepaid from:
Labor Phase Productions
402 74th Ave. N, Unit E
Myrtle Beach SC 29572
CDs are $15 each (plus $2 shipping). Cassettes are $10 each (plus $1 shipping). Orders of 4 or more will be shipped free of charge. Please double shipping charge for overseas addresses. Send check or money order in US dollars or equivalent amount in your own currency. No Eurochecks please. Half of all proceeds go to the AMB Trust. .
Avatar Meher Baba ki Jai!!