Soundtrack for a Story: Lost Lake House

I honestly didn’t listen to any music to inspire my progress when I was writing Lost Lake House, because (A) I did most of my writing outdoors, (B) I pretty much zipped through the first draft without needing extra inspiration, and (C) I wasn’t all that familiar with the music of the 1920s to begin with. But after Suzannah beta-read the draft, she pointed me to a Shostakovich waltz that she said the aura of the story reminded her of, and it was perfect: the music called up the same moods and images I’d been imagining. Then I also had to do a little exploring of 1920s popular songs to correct some references in the story—and in the process I had so much fun and discovered so much great music that I created a YouTube playlist. I foresee listening to it quite a bit while I’m formatting and proofreading. So I thought I’d share some of my finds here on the blog today:

• Tanzerische Suite by Eduard Künneke—particularly the Overture foxtrot, the Blues, the Valse Boston, and the Finale foxtrot. This is awesome; the music is Lost Lake House absolutely to a T!
• Here’s the Shostakovich waltz I mentioned: the Waltz II from his second Jazz Suite. Then there’s also the Lyric Waltz from the same suite and the Foxtrot from his Jazz Suite #1.
• “Wonderful One” by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
• “Three O’Clock in the Morning” by Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra
• “Fascinating Rhythm” by Sam Lanin and His Roseland Orchestra. For an old version with lyrics, here’s Fred and Adele Astaire with George Gershwin himself on piano (!).
• An early version of the Charleston by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra (starting to notice a trend here?) accompanied by a little instructional film from the ’20s demonstrating how to do the dance step.
• The Three Shades of Blue Suite by Ferde Grofé, who (surprise, surprise) worked with Paul Whiteman and did orchestral arrangements for Gershwin: “Indigo,” “Alice Blue,” and “Heliotrope.” Grofé is a composer whose music I’ve adored and included in several “writing soundtracks” before.

Like I said, much ’20s popular music was initially unfamiliar to me, and it surprised me a bit. It sounds light, perky, much of it in a cheerful major key—almost tame compared to the brassier punch of 1930s and ’40s swing. I guess one has to keep in mind its newness to hearers of the time, to whom the jazz style was much more unfamiliar. The jazzy classical pieces, however, are by far my favorite—I’ve always enjoyed that style, and poking around finding music for this playlist introduced me to a whole treasure-trove more!