Carolina Mindful - by way of Mass General

Hear this right... here:
EXIT 150- 154 I-95s To: Whitakers, NC

"Ok Road Crew, now we play a game called "Name that recording artist."  The winner gets to claim a free month of Pandora app but they got to Claim the deal by tapping the Deal Radar button on this smart device during this narration.  Tap it now, go ahead. It's blinking!  ​

Ok. Good tap.  We got the message and you get the Pandora deal should you want it.  So Now....Today's recording artist is a soft spoken sweet balladeer who has recently been honored by Taylor Swift and Selena Gomez.  In his youth, this Carolina tar heal was supported by no less than the late great Beatle, George Harrison.  In fact George and Paul McCartney sang un-credited back up vocals on one of his first hits about growing up in North Carolina. But this adoptive Southerner was born up north. He was born at Mass General in Boston on March 12 1948, where his father worked as a resident physician.

His father came from a wealthy Scottish family from the South. His mom studied singing at the New England Conservatory of Music and was an aspiring opera singer. In 1951, the family moved back south to Chapel Hill, where Dad took a job as an assistant professor of medicine at the UNC School of Medicine.



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​Years later our artist would recall, “Chapel Hill, the Piedmont, the outlying hills, were tranquil, rural, beautiful, but quiet. Thinking of the red soil, the seasons, the way things smelled down there, I feel as though my experience of coming of age there was more a matter of landscape and climate than people.” His Dad later rose to become dean of the School of Medicine and...

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...having summers off,  beginning in 1953, the family spent summers on Martha's Vineyard. Regardless of his privileged upbringing, our hero suffered from depression so much so that between his prep school and college year, he committed himself to a psychiatric hospital in Massachusetts.  Between the meds and the organized schedule he started to achieve structure which he credits for saving his life and influencing his music.  Still he lived chaotically and despite getting signed by the Beatles Apple Records he wound up becoming addicted to heroin.  However he continued to be productive. He wrote songs, including "Carolina on My Mind”. Paul McCartney and an uncredited George Harrison guest sang on "Carolina on My Mind", whose lyric "holy host of others standing around me" referred to the anonymous Beatle pals.

​Once he recovered, our hero moved to California, and there he produced his second album. Titled "Sweet Baby James", and featuring the participation of Carole King, the album was a  triumph.  Memorably, it included the single "Fire and Rain," a song about experiences in rehab and the suicide of his friend, Suzanne Schnerr.  In 1970, the album and the single reached #3 on the Billboard charts, with Sweet Baby James selling more than 3 million in the United States alone.

​The entire album was received as a folk-rock masterpiece, marking a direction he would take in following years. In following years there were many more triumphs than personal slips including a ten year marriage to singer Carly Simon.  Quick aside: Carly Simon likely appreciated her husband's literary chops because her dad was the founder of Book Publisher "Simon & Schuster."

So now can you name that artist?  You have 3 seconds to guess. Three, two... and one.  

This recording artist is a once and forever native of upcoming Chapel Hill.  And I think you know by now, his name is none other than sweet baby James Taylor.

And you can get a free month of Freemium ad free Pandora since you tapped the Deal Radar icon. 

Like James Taylor's song says, "How Sweet it is" to be using the RoadSpoke app!  

Ok. I know it was a stretch. Now I'll leave you alone."

#HappyBirthdayJamesTaylor #SweetbabyJames #JamesTaylor #FireandRain #CarlySimon #Beatles #GeorgeHarrison #PaulMcCartney #UNC #CarolinaonmyMind
#ChapelHill UNCMedicalSchool #CarolKing

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