When I was a young teen, my older brother brought home a record album. Park was my music mentor and well versed in folk and blues in the mid 60’s. The magazine Sing Out, honoring and publishing folk music since the 50’s, was arriving regularly at our house. The album he brought home was Free Wheeling, by Bob Dylan. And on that album was Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right. That is the song that made me want to be a song writer. Hands down. Right then and there. My brother learned (along with thousands of young kids) to play it on his acoustic guitar (a Martin he still has and lets me borrow when I head back down to southern California to be with family). Some of his friends would join in, and sometimes they allowed me to play along on piano. The song had a sound and lyrics the likes of which we’d never heard before. It was folk, but so much more. Our young brains absorbed it like dripping sponges. Round and round, again and again, the vinyl spun with its red label, first song on side 2. Our Sinatra-loving parents said “Who the heck is singing that song. You kids actually like it?” Yes, we did. It was the beginning of a new life. This song is my only cover to date. My tribute to a song that changed my life. When I hear it, I’m back in my cool brother’s room with my whole life ahead of me, somehow more mapped out than ever before.
Don't Think Twice, It's All Right
Liz Kennedy - "Coyote"
Liz Kennedy - Lizzy's Christmas Sleigh
Liz Kennedy "Snow in San Francisco" Official Video
About Liz Kennedy
After going through a whirlwind of life changes, the San Francisco based singer-songwriter, Liz Kennedy, has come to see songwriting not as a choice but something she has to do. She says music sustains her and offers a way forward. Her decade plus as a critically acclaimed recording artist has brought her confidence in her ever-unfolding identity as a quirky, often humorous and ever insightful storyteller committed to honesty and finding something unique to say.
Jaffe, whose credits include Maria Muldaur, Lenny Williams and Magic Christian, is the renowned engineer and producer of Studio D in Sausalito, where legendary artists like Bonnie Raitt, Ringo Starr and Carlos Santana have recorded. One of the greatest influences on Kennedy’s development since she took the plunge into recording, he has helmed all her previous recordings, Clean White Shirt, A Good Peach, Nothing Like an Angel, Speed Bump, and Hike Up Your Socks. Jaffe adds numerous string textures to Kennedy’s songs, including acoustic and electric guitar, dobro, mandolin, lap steel and ebow.
Kennedy describes herself as honest and observant and adds, “I sure hope I can easily laugh at myself.” Her songcraft – where the lyrics always follow the music – perfectly reflects that thoughtful self-assessment. The fascinating part of the process is not knowing just where the inspiration will come from. “It’s strange how emotional pain and joy can equally send you racing to the piano to capture something … whether it's a butterfly or a heavy brick.
After graduating from Stanford University, where she studied anthropology and journalism, she settled in the Bay Area and worked for film companies that made TV commercials. Long before reality TV became a mainstream part of our culture, Kennedy specialized in casting real people (instead of professional actors) for commercials. She also married and raised two children. In her later 40s, around the time she began realizing she had “songs in my head” that had never been recorded, she met Jaffe, who liked what he heard and encouraged her to take her work as a singer/songwriter more seriously. In addition to her growing catalog of recordings, she has performed over the years at such renowned Bay Area hotspots as Sweetwater Music Hall, the Throckmorton Theatre and Club Fox. Kennedy enjoys performing live in an intimate setting and finding a connection people make to her songs. I love to hear what someone gets from a song, in their own way. A good song should translate into another person’s language. Yet before performing there is recording. “I’ve had inexpressibly sublime moments in the studio, listening to what these great musicians bring to my songs,” she says. “I have literally fallen to my knees with the joy of an unexpectedly beautiful touch. There’s no greater moment for me than when we are all listening to the finished product and loving what we hear, experiencing our collective ownership.”
