Robert's Creative Commons Project
Original songs you can freely perform and shareSadly, we live in an age where music is no longer freely shareable as it has been since the times of the toubadors. Even sharing among musicians is illegal (organized jam sessions are getting hassled to pay licensing fees.) I could go on about the music industry's dismal failure to creatively find new business models for the internet age, resorting instead to strong-arm tactics with small venues it couldn't be bothered with 20 years ago, and how it has lobbied for and been handed ever more restrictive copyright laws. But you probably aren't here for that.
A beacon of sanity in today's cesspool of corporate greed is Creative Commons - a legal licensing model that enables creators of music and other works to allow their stuff to be freely shared, with money changing hands only if the work is exploited for monetary gain (and even that can be optionally waived).
Robert's Creative Commons Songs
All songs listed are licensed under the Creative Commons Noncommercial-Attribution-Share Alike License version 3.0. In addition to the provisions of that license, permission is explicitly granted for public performance in bars, cafes, and similar venues with maximum capacity of 500 people, and in concert or music festival venues where the works are not recorded for commercial distribution. If you cover one of my CC tunes in your show, I'd love to know about it and I'd be happy to link to your site.
Banjo players & Bluegrass musicians!: Special page for you...
| Title | Description | Links |
|---|---|---|
| Walkin' Man | Countrified Bluesy little tune with my first attempt at resophonic guitar. |
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| City Bar Boogie | Jazzy boogie-woogie tune featuring blues harp. Inspired by and dedicated to the good folks who used to used to run and hang out at the former City Bar in St. Petersburg. Some good times were had there. |
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| Firefly Days | A Bluegrass tune. Inspired by and dedicated to my cousin Paula who used to chase these critters with me, and without whom leading the life I've lead over the past decade would have been a whole lot more difficult. Where have they flown, eh? |
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| Next Train Comin' | Another Bluegrass style tune... kind of spritely, up-tempo, and cheery tune with doom and gloom lyrics – true Bluegrass spirit at least as dismal as "Old Home Place"! Dedicated to the many friends I've made (and am still in the process of making!) on the Banjo Hangout, in hopes that a) someone will like it enough to add it to their band's repertoire and b) maybe a real banjo player will learn it and really play the #$*% out of it! | Lyrics Download MP3 |
| I-29 |
If you're gonna write country/Bluegrass tunes, sooner or later ya gotta write a Truckin' song — so here's mine. Inspired by the days when I
used to drive Interstate 29 through the Dakotas and Iowa with a country band that played the upper mid-west club circuit. Never trucked myself, but did caravan a
big van dragging a double-axle equipment trailer through frigid nights with a lot of truckers. Running behind five 18-wheelers was sometimes the only way we got
through the drifts and made the next gig. (Winters up there really suck — St. Petersburg is warmer!) Occasionally we'd pull off and meet up with some
of the gents for coffee. Now and again our "chick singer" would ride a stretch with one of them. That made for some entertaining CB radio chatter late
at night on I-29. I think that band's only radio airplay was over the CB! I used my best Waylon Jennings voice for this one. :-)
|
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| Irish for a Day | A fellow member of the Banjo Hangout, a self-described "purveyor of fine hot dogs" whose surname is Connor and who is also something of a songwriter, posted that St. Patrick's Day was near and he could find no Irish songs on the site's jukebox. In his post he asked "Do you have an Irish song in you?". Unbeknownst to me, a mad Yankee of Hispanic descent living in Russia, I actually did have an Irish song lurking in there! And it just tumbled out almost effortlessly. So you can thank (or blame) Mr. Connor for this tune. Yer strongly advised to take this wid a pint o' Guinness. I warn you: the tune is kind of infectious. Kinda like Guinness. |
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| Je Donnerai Québec | Yet another Bluegrassy tune with an international flair. A weird hybrid actually. The first verse and chorus (in French) are from chapter 5 of Rudyard Kipling's
Captains Courageous. For some reason when I read it I heard it as a bluegrass tune - weird considering Bluegrass didn't emerge until the 1940s and Kipling
wrote his novel in 1897. So far I have not been able find the rest of the words - I have no clue where Kipling got the song. Maybe it's some old French Canadian ditty? Anyway I took my guitar and came up with kind of a catchy tune. But the song was short. So I mustered up my 1 semester of college French and wrote a second verse in French. The song was still short. So I decided to see if I could express the ideas and feelings in English. I think it falls out kind of nicely. My Bishline banjo likes the summer humidity and is really startin' to snort! Anyway, have fun with this one - I did! |
Lyrics Download MP3 |
| Neva Nights | Another tune with an international theme, and a kind of weird Bluegrass-Jazz (Jazzgrass??) flavor. I guess it could be the first banjo tune written in (and about) St. Petersburg (for whatever that's worth). Seemed appropriate to write a tune about the city that's been my home for over a decade, not to mention being the native city of my wife and daughters. The weird effects at the beginning are jet lag, in case you weren't sure. I actually wrote the tune back in 2006 or 2007 but I had a really hard time making a decent recording of the tune. This one has its glitches and glops (as does everything here) but you'll get the idea. I hope. |
Neva Nights Download MP3 |
| Samuel Adams Waltz | Grab those waltz partners folks! This Country-Bluegrass tune has in infectious three-four waltz beat in the tradition of the great oom pah pah beer swilling
songs, with a country flavor featuring banjo, Dobro (resophonic guitar), flat-picked acoustic guitar, and thick 3-part vocals. The tune is dedicated to Douglas and the folks at The Other Side Gastro-bar & Refuge in St. Petersburg, Russia who managed to introduce Samuel Adams Boston Lager to the city and to Russia. As a result of their persistence with the brewery, local distributors, and Russian Customs, we American expatriates can now hold up our heads around our Brit counterparts around town. We may not convert 'em, but neither do we have walk with out tails 'twixt our legs! Warning: This song is not kind to Illinois and Ohio. This was based on past experience, not contemporary reality which now involves some excellent micro-brewing! The song is also not kind to Miller Lite, Bud Light, and Rock and Rye. Tough turkeys! |
Samuel Adams Waltz Download MP3 |
| Stranger in a Strange Land | This country-blues tune is reminiscent of something out of O Brother, Where Art Thou?
(I would love to hear it sung by Dan Tyminski!) The tune just fell out one afternoon when
I was strumming my guitar in an open tuning. Took me more than a year to come up with a halfway decent recording though. Yes, the title is ripped off from the Heinlein novel. The folks who have heard it so far assume it must be about my experience as an American living in Russia. Actually, I was thinking in terms of my experience as a human living on the planet Earth. |
Stranger in a Strange Land Download MP3 |
| Funk-a-Duck | Bizarre banjo-country-funk instrumental, the result of screwing around in the old home studio late one night (and a few stiff cognacs). I re-recorded it later after I got the use of my fingers back. No lyrics page, just download the MP3 (at your own risk). |
Instrumental Download MP3 |
| Sweet Marie | Wrote this tune back in 2005. It was of my first attempts at home recording and playing slide guitar. I re-recorded the tune in March, 2009. During the sessions I remembered why I wrote these lyrics. After seeing the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the disgracegul response of the administration of George W. Bush & Pirates. I wanted to write a tune about New Orleans the way I remember it – a city for music and lovers. Because of Katrina and the Bushites I threw some futility and frustration into the last verse. |
Sweet Marie Download MP3 |
More tunes on my Audio page »