Watchman & Crow by ned's demos

April 2025

Interviewer: When did you go back to songwriting?

ned: You were there! We were attending a Sylvia Plath celebration in October 2013. You were reading “A Birthday Present” aloud in the hotel room. One line struck me: “O adding machine—//Is it impossible for you to let something go and have it go whole?” I started making up words and a melody in the shower. When we got home, I finished it* and followed up with “Watchman,” a sort of mystery murder ballad. They were the first songs I'd written since my 30s.

I: What else led you back to music?

ned: Small coincidences really. The following year, I snagged a visiting MFA gig teaching creative writing in the Midwest. The program director at the time, Deb Marquart, is an accomplished writer-musician, and I was soon jamming regularly with faculty friends. At our grad students' request, Deb and I once sang at a local art gallery reading. I took a turn on Bowie’s “Starman” with Deb on percussion and harmonies. When I got back to Baltimore full-time a few years later, I found myself writing songs on breaks from poetry.

I: When was “Crow in the Courtyard” written?

ned: In 2019. Poet-novelist George Guida kindly let me stay over for a couple of back-to-back readings I was giving on Long Island. There was a charango, a sort of Bolivian mandolin, in my upstairs room. Using standard ukulele tuning, I made up the music—very quietly, so as not to wake my hosts—then wrote the words when I got home.

I: When did you start recording?

When Mark McDonnell and Mary Meriam invited writers to submit videos for The Ballsians, a YouTube channel created to bring their fellow poets together. They allowed me to post a slideshow with “Crow in the Courtyard” as the soundtrack. This was July 2020.

I: Your previous versions of “Crow” and “Watchman” appeared back in 2021. What’s different now?

ned: Well, those were the first two recordings I ever did. Let’s just say: it showed. So I’ve replaced the originals with new performances and arrangements. They’re the same songs but totally reinvented. Whatever the result, they benefit from a few more years of experience and improved equipment, at least.

I: Anything else you’d like to mention?

ned: I love songs with playful fade-outs and couldn’t resist sneaking a few lines of you reading your poem “Joining the Crows” into “Crow in the Courtyard”’s last few bars.

Also, I added two more tracks to the project: variants of the same recordings for folks who prefer slightly quieter listening. Using fewer instruments showcases the voice and lyrics and spotlights a song’s foundation, for better or worse. For “Watchman,” I went further and had some fun with the arrangement in the finale.

I like discovering different ways of performing the same song and hope other people do, too. It's a peek into the workshop, if you like—a glimpse of what goes into making the idea of a song become the performance that we hear.

*“(A Girl Named) Sylvia Plath,” included on Ultraviolet Chimera.
~

Original tagline (December 2021)

’Tis the season of vanishing light & farewells to the past, so here are 2 shadow-&-starlight tracks from 2020.

ned's demos feature guitar, ukulele, piano, keyboards, vocal harmonies & more. Bowie, Eno, Smiths Elliott, Patti & Harry, plus an ocean of indie, folk, & psychedelic artists lend their influence. ned's also a poet with several award-winning books, so have a peek at the lyrics while you visit.