Happy Birthday Barry Manilow!

Today is Barry Manilow's 64th birthday. I wish him all the best and many more years of wonderful music making. I rediscovered Barry when he had a TV special on CBS a few months after 9/11. He brought me back to life, gave me hope, gave me courage, gave me joy. I owe a lot to Barry but I've paid him back pretty well in CDs and videos I've purchased, in addition to joining the fan club and seeing him twice in person, once flying to Las Vegas to do so.

I think he's terribly underrated as a performer and as a musician. Especially as a musician. In the confection of a TV movie that is Copacabana, the bar pianist Tony, played by Barry, plays a collection of lovely songs. These songs became the album 2 AM at Paradise Cafe, for which Barry enlisted some of the greatest jazz musicians of our time and on which he introduced us to the hauntingly beautiful When October Goes.

I have my personal opinions on Clive Davis's influence on Barry. Clive surely made Barry a household name, made him tons and tons of money over the years, but the music Barry turns out under Clive's aegis is fluff, bubblegum, flotsam, jetsam. I hope Barry's star fades (again) soon so Clive loses interest and Barry can go back to making gorgeous albums like Paradise Cafe and Mayflower, even if he doesn't sell very many of them. Maybe he'll find the time to finally get the musical Harmony mounted on Broadway as well.