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MM – 9/2

Published on: by Suzi 6 Comments

“MacArthur Park” was written and composed by Jimmy Webb in the summer and fall of 1967 as part of an intended cantata. Webb brought the entire cantata to The Association, but the group rejected it.  The inspiration for the song was his relationship and breakup with Susie Horton.  MacArthur Park, in Los Angeles, was where the couple would occasionally meet for lunch and spent their most enjoyable times together.  At that time (the middle of 1965), Horton worked for Aetna insurance, whose offices were across the street from the park.  When asked by interviewer Terry Gross what was going through his mind when he wrote the song’s lyrics, Webb replied that it was meant to be symbolic and referred to the end of a love affair.  In an interview with Newsday in October 2014, Webb explained:

Everything in the song was visible. There’s nothing in it that’s fabricated. The old men playing checkers by the trees, the cake that was left out in the rain, all of the things that are talked about in the song are things I actually saw. And so it’s a kind of musical collage of this whole love affair that kind of went down in MacArthur Park…. Back then, I was kind of like an emotional machine, like whatever was going on inside me would bubble out of the piano and onto paper.

Webb and Horton remained friends, even after her marriage to another man. The breakup was also the primary influence for “By the Time I Get to Phoenix“, another song written and composed by Webb.

The idea to write and compose a classically structured song with several movements that could be played on the radio came from a challenge by music producer Bones Howe, who produced recordings for The Association.

Love Never Dies

Published on: by Suzi 2 Comments

Love Never Dies

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I will sit here with you, by the river

And watch the lazy clouds drift by

You’ll always know that I’m here with you

For I’m, forever, by your side.

You will see my face in the rippling water

You’ll hear my voice as a breeze blows by

My smile will appear in the Spring’s first iris

My eyes will sparkle in the Summer sky…

I am not gone, I did not leave you

My heart is breaking, at your despair

But, you’ll always know that I’m here with you

For you’ll feel my presence every where.

~Those who touch our lives remain in our hearts forever~

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