It’s all about the songs; the stories behind them, the people they connect me with, and the activities they lead me through. It’s about being able to focus on writing after a career in education, media, and similar pursuits, living in a music town (Mountain View, Arkansas), and constantly searching for the next really “good one” to show up – a combination of lyrics and melody that comes from someplace I don’t fully understand but try to capture as best I can.
The songs come from my roots in Ozark/Appalachian songs and tunes, my teenage Rockabilly days, the unaccompanied, shaped-note sounds of the music I grew up with in church, my tendency to ignore genres and use whatever works, and my great, good fortune to know and be able to work with so many gifted players and singers over the years. The activities include involvement in projects ranging from radio programming to musical theater, and occasional forays to Nashville, performing traditional music with friends at the Ozark Folk Center, participating in and sometimes helping to lead songwriting workshops, and teacher workshops that flow from my original songs about Arkansas’s colorful history – part of the Arkansas Stories Project.
Welcome.
Charley Sandage