Riverpeople Music

Riverpeople: The River Keeps on Flowing

$0.99

	Get-Outside.mp3
	31-33.mp3
	Chinook.mp3
	The River Keeps on Flowing.mp3
	River Afternoon.mp3
	Does The Wet Suit You.mp3
	Being with You.mp3
	_ _it Happens.mp3
	Magic's in the Music.mp3
	Desolation Sounds.mp3
	Casey’s Homemade Jam.mp3
	Colorado Roll On.mp3
	Insight Out.mp3
	Help Wanted.mp3

The River Keeps on Flowing

Get Outside quantity	Get Outside	$0.99
31-33 quantity	31-33	$0.99
Chinook quantity	Chinook	$0.99
The River Keeps on Flowing quantity	The River Keeps on Flowing	$0.99
River Afternoon quantity	River Afternoon	$0.99
Does the Wet Suit You? quantity	Does the Wet Suit You?	$0.99
Being with You quantity	Being with You	$0.99
_ _it Happens quantity	_ _it Happens	$0.99
Magic's in the Music quantity	Magic's in the Music	$0.99
Desolation Sounds quantity	Desolation Sounds	$0.99
Casey’s Homemade Jam quantity	Casey’s Homemade Jam	$0.99
Colorado Roll On quantity	Colorado Roll On	$0.99
Insight Out quantity	Insight Out	$0.99
Help Wanted quantity	Help Wanted	$0.99

Category: Riverpeople

Riverpeople: Full Album

$10.00

Get the full album.
Songs by Casey Garland.
All the songs, $10. For individual songs and descriptions, please visit this link.

Riverpeople: Full Album quantity

Category: Riverpeople

ABOUT THE SONGS
Click on a song title to find out more about it.

Get Outside!

Get Outside! is my flagship song and the story of my life. A song for outdoor adventurers of any stripe. As a kid and like a dog, all I ever wanted to do was be outside doing something, anything with some adventure to it. In a way my mom was probably responsible for this title because with a house full of kids she would yell Get Outside! After doing all the typical main stream sports and a few summers of fly fishing and hang gliding, I settled into whitewater rafting and kayaking as a career. Now, 40 years later, it’s all history and I’m so glad I chose to invite the outdoors into my time this way. Not only is it beautiful, it’s about as much fun as you can have with your pants on 😉

31-33

31-33 is the last song written in the collection and the simplest one too. Several years after my divorce I was getting pretty lonely. What’s does a 62 year old river guide do to get a date? (BTW, guitars are not really chick magnets). In a moment of weakness I signed up on Match.com. Sure was fun window shopping all the ladies, but they all seemed to be looking for something other than a whitewater addict. It’s true, “1,200 women looked to see, one big gal she wrote to me.” After 6 months of that tease, I bailed and in a moment of self-deprecation I sat down and penned 31-33.

Chinook

Chinook was one of my first efforts at putting down interesting chords into a song. Dang it turned out nice with Jeff putting the gliss on it and Tammy Frost putting the heart felt vocals on. I was trying to convey that sense of loss and resignation that you get when you hear about the destructive nature of man. The approaching consequences of deforestation, all forms of pollution, global warming and species extinction. Here in the great Pacific Northwest, we care a lot about Salmon. I saw a turn of the century photograph in a museum years ago of men literally walking across the backs of thousands of Chinook (king) salmon trying to get upstream at the mouth of Oregon’s Rogue River to spawn. There were more salmon than there was water in the river!

By now most people realize what’s at stake but they, like me, don’t know what to do about it other than change our individual behavior. An estimated 100 million tons of plastic and garbage is floating around in Earth’s oceans. The largest ‘Gyre’ in the Pacific Ocean is causing all kinds of grief and death to birds and aquatic life. I have faith in humanity and the younger generation. I don’t think they’re going to put up with this planet raping much longer. Whether we collectively vote out the politicians who appear to be nothing more than corporate shills or a revolution gives back the power to the people, something big is going to happen to help humanity create a sustainable relationship with the natural world. That’s why the end of this song is so upbeat! Keep the faith baby and make sure to vote.

The River Keeps on Flowing

The River Keeps on Flowing is a wonderful collaboration between Rob Lynch, Yakima Valley fruit farmer and kayaker, Casey, George and Jeff. I was returning from a Klickitat River trip and stopped by to see my friend Rob’s tasty new home on the banks of the Yakima River. While there I noticed a large greeting card on a table and picked it up to read it. Rob had written inside a huge poem that was actually a wedding proposal to his fiancé. I thought it was pretty good writing and asked Rob if I could take it home and edit it into a song. Thankfully he said yes! I put on my editors hat and went to work crunching it down into a song and changing some words here and there. Next I sent it down to George to see if he would put some music to it and within a short period of time he came back with this most excellent, anthem of a love song.

Without Rob knowing, I got the lyrics and recorded song to the band that was to play at his upcoming wedding. They learned the song and on the evening of the wedding reception, called the audience to attention and announced that they were going to play a special song for the newlyweds. I grabbed Rob by the arm and marched him up to the stage telling him to say the magic proposal words when the song came to that point and he did it! The crowd went wild and the rest is history. Later I changed the bride’s name to be a more generic ‘darlin’ rather than her real name. I decided long ago that this would be the title cut of the album. Jeff did a great job filling in all the bass, drums and other instruments without stepping on George’s stellar vocals and keyboard work. It’s a fitting anthem for any marriage.

River Afternoon

River Afternoon was my first song written way back in 1978. I started my whitewater career in 1974 as one of 3 owners of Sundance Expeditions, a rafting and kayaking company on the beautiful Rogue River in southern Oregon. I left there in 1978 and I wanted to memorialize my time there in a song. One night jamming around with Steve Moddemeyer in Seattle I wrote the structure and Steve came up with some partial lyrics. That’s as far as it went until some pre-production work occurred with Grant Stott in 2002. Originally titled Rogue River Afternoon, I made it more generic and Jeff took it to it’s current form, beautifully reflecting my feelings about the care free life style of floating wild and scenic rivers.

Does the Wet Suit You?

Does the Wet Suit You? Did you know that the noun for a group of Penguins on land is called a ‘waddle’ and a group at sea is called a ‘raft’? I was looking for the right noun for the song and looked on the web to find a penguin expert. As it turned out, I got this guy on his cell phone just as he was getting off a jet from a conference in South America. You guessed it, a penguin conference where they had actually just decided upon the appropriate noun for penguins on land, sea and birthing ‘rookerie’. Karmachanics.

I wanted to script a song that approximated what typically happens when people go on their first commercial river rafting trip. As a veteran guide, I see this all the time. The guys come in all bravado and their girlfriends are willing to go along but a bit more reserved. As a part of any well conducted river trip, there’s always the mandatory safety briefing or orientation in which people learn the basic ‘how to’ rules and to follow the guides’ direction and safety procedures. When they learn the actual risks involved up to and including the possibility of death, the atmosphere changes dramatically from ‘bravado’ to cautious curiosity. Once they’ve put on the wet suits, life jackets, helmets and loaded into the raft it’s a bit late to turn back and the adventure begins! Of course after about 10 minutes on the water they start to realize that we actually have a great deal of control over the boat and this could shape up to be a ton of fun. Camaraderie and bravado ensue. Does the wet suit you?

I stole the title of this song fair and square from a book written by NW kayaker and author Whit Deschner :-).

Being with You

Being with You ahh, the love song. Every songwriter has to have one! On this tune the guitar groove was built first and the lyric came second. I was working the Basanova intro one night and it just kept coming. Refined over the years, the song touched my sense of chord harmony and sent me to a place where I wished I had found that eternal someone to share time with. You know, the softer side of life, peaceful and at ease with each other. It became a duet and its only a matter of time before I find the right two voices to grace this lovely song. Is that girl from Ipanema still gigging?

_ _it Happens

_ _it Happens Came into creation lyrically first. I sat down in year 2000 to write about life’s ups and downs. We all have them, sometimes feeling great and soaring high, then times of despair and loneliness. Thing is, we always get over those slippery moods and we look back, laugh and say ‘shit happens’. I worked hard on this tune and sent it down to George to see what he thought. He liked it and roughed out some chords but left the rest to me. I struggled with how to put the right spin on this tune and finally decided that, with this risky title, it should be a boot kicking Country song with the type of humor those folks can get away with. Jeff spent years in Nashville and he knew just what to do to amp up the tune. Stellar vocals from Tammy Frost completely knock this one out of park!

Magic’s in the Music

Magic's in the Music

Magic’s in the Music came into being over a period of time but all started on a 3 day river trip on the Grande Ronde river in eastern Oregon. I was rowing the baggage boat on that trip and a drop dead gorgeous lady decided to join me on that boat while everyone else rode in the paddle rafts. We hit it off and laughed our way down the river. There was definitely an attraction there, but being married at the time, we both knew nothing was going to happen. We even joked about that, remarking that she would just have be my ‘slave chicken on the baggage boat’ and help with the gear. The sexy, swampy chord structure was playing away in my head for 3 days! At night, after a couple of beers, I sat beside the river and sketched out the basic progression. Of course I couldn’t write the lyrics for what I was actually thinking about doing with this lady, so the song didn’t have words until much later. Eventually I decided to make the lyric about the ‘magic in the music’ which is next best thing to hot relationship! Grant Stott did a bunch of solid pre-production work on this song back in 2002 and much of it survived in the current version produced with Jeff Tassin. Les Shelton contributed his soulful lead and background vocals. Thanks Slave Chicken, you know who you are. 😉

Desolation Sounds

Desolation Sounds was written while spending two weeks totally alone on Mink Island in the heart of Desolation Sound, British Columbia, Canada. I stayed there working on one of 3 homes on this 800 acre paradise. I ate fresh oysters and watched Orca whales and seals from the deck. Funny, no telemarketers were able to reach me. You ever been totally alone for 2 weeks? George Merrill’s voice is golden on lead and background vocals. Pamela Mortensen from Seattle lent her expert didgereedoo chops skillfully to the effort. This song says it all for me and applies to all wilderness seekers, wherever you may roam.

Casey’s Homemade Jam

Casey's Homemade Jam

Casey’s Homemade Jam was written in a pensive mood when trying to wrap my head around politics and corruption. How can our elected congress be so obstructive to forward progress? It’s not like there’s an infinite amount of time to get a move on people! Why aren’t they helping people become productive contributors to society? The world is full of brilliant people held back by this stifling system. I guess it’s just plain old greed. The haunting chords and melodies that occasionally resolve reflect despair and hope at the same time. I chose not to write any lyrics for this song because there aren’t any printable words that encompass the distain I have for the 530 some elected members of congress who are at the helm of our destiny, just wasting time, feeding the 1% and making themselves wealthier than they already are. You can of course, just ignore my thoughts and enjoy the music for whatever it may mean to you. Perhaps a stroll on a moon lit beach somewhere warm and beautiful?

Colorado Roll On

One of the seven wonders of the world, there’s only one Grand Canyon. Inspired by my love of the Colorado River and The Canyon, I wrote this ten-minute song to share my feelings about it. I know, it’s hard to describe the indescribable beauty and majesty of such an amazing place.

My goal was to carry the listener along the water’s path from the rainfall above through the Canyon and on to the ocean. This first half of the song is spoken word performed by Dan Wymm, while the second half is sung by Tammy Frost. I’ll never forget the day in the studio when these artists breathed life into this song. I couldn’t hold back the tears.

I’ve floated the 225 mile section now 10 times in rafts, kayaks and once on a boogie board. It takes at least 14 – 18 days to do it. Being in this wilderness that long can be a life changing experience for most people. It certainly changed mine.
Here’s a link to view the video we made about the song.

Insight Out

Insight Out is a song of personal discovery. While the song is complete, I’m still working on the higher consciousness part! I’ve found my greatest peace in the challenge and solitude of outdoor recreation. There comes a time in life when you realize that you can’t control the world outside of yourself. Your only hope to effect change in the world is to change your own perceptions from within. Connection with the source, the great healer and teacher is within us all. Simply put, if everyone would live by the Golden Rule ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’ i.e. love, this world would be a cosmically cool place to spend our lives.

Help Wanted

Help Wanted has everyone’s two favorite instruments, banjo and tuba, in the same song! A tongue in cheek kinda tune that takes a poke at modern employment opportunities. Written back in the dot com era, it’s come around again now after the 2008 economic crash. I was desperate for work and rather than relying on my own gut instincts, I picked up a local employment newspaper. Nearly all the words in this song came directly from the ads in that paper. No kidding! I couldn’t believe how much these corporations and employers were asking for people to do for so little compensation. I’m sure that everyone out there has had to look for a job before and run across this sort of thing, I just put it down into a novelty song to shine a light on it.

Riverpeople Music

Riverpeople: The River Keeps on Flowing

Riverpeople: Full Album

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