231 songs reveal we don’t become ourselves alone: Jan Risher | Entertainment/Life

I sing in the shower.

As in loud. 

And proud.

My morning routine is to hit play on my “liked songs” playlist — an ever-evolving list that runs the gamut. I went through and counted them — 231 songs.

They range from the first songs I loved (think Elton John, James Taylor, Dan Fogelberg) to oddballs that I happened upon in strange ways. Like “Vuma,” a song I discovered last summer as I was preparing music before a little dinner party I hosted for some students visiting LSU from Africa.

My mother made homemade chicken and dumplings, my ultimate comfort food, for dinner. I wanted our guests to have some comfort too. So, I created a playlist of contemporary and traditional songs from their countries — in doing so, I discovered “Vuma,” which I’ve kept in rotation since. I don’t know every word, but I understand it anyway.

And every time I hear that song, I think of those young women from Africa. When I press play, the list shuffles. I recognize the song by its opening notes — and the version of myself it holds.

The music moves like a strange road map.

There’s Simon and Garfunkel, who my older cousins introduced me to when I was 11.

There’s Carole King. When I was 12, my friend Keith Long won her “Tapestry” album on WJDX in Jackson. His family already had the album, so he called and asked if I wanted it for $5. I did.

A year later, I won a Glen Campbell Live at Carnegie Hall on WQST.

There’s Donna Summer and Olivia Newton-John — I loved them both in the eighth grade when I stayed home from school for two weeks with the chickenpox.

There’s “Les Mis,” who I saw with Mary Ellen Horan in Los Angeles. I walked out of the theater different than I walked in.

There’s Jimmy Buffett, who makes me think of Michelle Weaver Jones and the summer of 1991. Van Morrison reminds me of my old friend, John Gabel. 

There’s the Gypsy Kings, who Michelle Foster used to play at her dinner parties in D.C.

My husband introduced me to The Nylons in his red Mustang convertible on our first date.

There’s Clay Parker and Jodi James’ “Nothing at All” from right here in Baton Rouge. When I heard them sing that song at The Red Dragon Listening Room, I knew it would be with me for a long time. 

There’s Mon LaFerte, who I heard in a restaurant in Mexico City. A waitress wrote down the name for me.

Each song on that playlist carries a person — or a place or a season.

I can’t separate the music from who handed it to me, or who I was when I first heard it and knew — immediately — that I loved it.

“Someone Saved My Life Tonight” by Elton John was the first record that was mine. My mom bought it for me because I had been brave when Dr. Lee gave me a shot. Afterward, Mom took me to Dan’s Rexall Drugs to pick out a record.

I remember the sales clerk, a cool teenager, did her best to get me to buy an album of his music, but the album didn’t have the song I wanted. So, instead, I went home with the 45 of “Someone Saved My Life Tonight.” 

I didn’t fully understand the lyrics. I just knew the song made me feel something big and important. I took it home and played it over and over.

I’m still not tired of that song.

Friends call many of my favorites “sad songs.” I don’t. They let me feel sadness without getting stuck there. Music gives shape to what I can’t always name.

So, when I press play each morning and step into the shower, I’m not just listening to music. I’m hearing my cousins in their living room, Keith Long on the phone offering me “Tapestry” for $5, a radio DJ announcing my name on WQST, and my husband in a red Mustang telling me to “listen to the words of this next song.”

I see a waitress in Mexico City scribbling down a title and my mother handing me a 45 at Dan’s Rexall.

I didn’t discover most of these songs alone. Someone somewhere handed them to me.

Maybe that’s what the playlist really is — 231 reminders that we don’t become ourselves by ourselves.

The music still moves forward, even when it reaches back.

And so do I. 

If you would like to take a listen to Jan Risher’s 231-song playlist, here’s a link from Spotify. Risher’s weekly ‘Long Story Short’ runs on Sundays in the Inspired section. Her ‘Louisiana at Large’ column runs on Tuesdays in the Metro section.