September 11 Project: Ten Years Later

"I Will Love" was the first song I wrote, November 1, 2001. It was all I could think of to say. Although the chorus is rousing, uplifting, to me the song was more about the sounds I used than the words I sang, sounds of shock and disorientation. I had a hard to singing without crying and had to do many takes. Next, I wrote "Last Call." The lyrics are inspired from first hand accounts told to me by so people who had lost someone and now had only that last memory on the phone, calls made just before getting to work or from a burning building moments before collapse. While writing the third song, "New Holy Land," I began to crystallize my experience volunteering. I also began to place all the tragedy and loss into a larger perspective. That's why I decided to make it as the first track on the album: it says more of what I experienced, personally, and better summarizes what I've taken from that time. It began just as the lyrics describe: starting on the street alone, cutting bagels and pouring coffee for the ambulance workers lined up on the West Side Highway. 36 hours later, I had 200 people under me providing everything the fireman and EMTs requested. The last stanza wonders if the change we felt would sustain, if the new New York that was being realized all around us would translate into something permanent. It is a question still unanswered.

The concern that something had forever been lost was what inspired "Was There Once A Time." That song ended up finding its way into subsequent musicals. It's lyrics are applicable to many times, many ages. In writing that song, I felt like I had turned the corner from my 9/11 obsession and could actually write about other things.

"At Her Window" was actually written to my daughter, since I had just divorced her mother and wanted her to know I had not left her. She was only 11 years old at the time. But after listening to it again, I realized the song could also be sung by a father's ghost to his surviving daughter. Including it in this collection has added something special to the song. I hope you agree.

The last two tracks form a kind of couplet: "What Thou Lovest Well" and "When I Sing." I wrote the first version of "What Thou Lovest Well" in 1978, when I was a young man. It was originally inspired by Ezra Pound's Canto LXXXI, composed in his mind while he was imprisoned in fascist Italy during WWII. I've tinkered with the lyrics and arrangement many times over the years. I felt it's message was apropos and revisted it again in my living room in 2001. I haven't change it sense. In fact, I rarely sing it anymore. This is the final arrangement. I think it finally strikes just the right chord.

The final track, "When I Sing", was written in Cape Cod, after the World Trade Center's pile of rubble had been cleared. The hole left behind formed a sad, silent, sorry scar. Ground Zero stayed that way for so very long. Long enough for me to question whether any of the effort would ever result in renewal. Would at least one small piece of the Utopian world that had animated us as volunteers ever be made manifest in the truths of the future? The last line of the previous song, "What thou lovest well will always remain," is answered by the first line of this song, "Why do I lie when I sing?" The album ends with this stanza: "It's not that I don't believe./It's that I don't seem to need to anymore./It's not that I want to be free of it/Except when I sing..."

There is very deep belief running through this music, regardless of what my final lyrics suggest. Belief I witnessed in everyone's eyes with whom I worked during that time. Belief felt by those viewing it through their television screens, or through the filter of a decade remembered. A belief that, I hope, will never leave us. A belief in something better. A hunger for meaning. A belief that requires continued reaffirmation..

The September 11 Project: Ten Years Later is available from CDBaby as a digital download. If you do not do digital downloads, please email me and I can send you a burned copy.

Lyrics pages:

1. New Holy Land
2. Was There Once A Time
3. Last Call
4. I Will Love
5. At Her Window
6. What Thou Lovest Well
7. When I Sing

All instruments and vocals are by me, accept on "What Thou Lovest Well" my pop singer friend from L.A., Joseph Gray contributes backing vocals. All music & lyrics ©2001 Tobin Mueller.

See CDBaby.com for info on recordings, reviews and other liner notes.

Below please find additional recordings...

Bio Notes: Tobin Mueller's grandfather was a violinist for silent films, and his mom was a vocalist. He started his music career at age 14, arranging music for his mom. He grew up in Wisconsin, and attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Marquette University and UW Milwaukee. He moved to New York City in the 90's when his musical dramas began being produced there and had several shows off-Broadway. He now lives in Connecticut. A songwriter, playwright and photographer, Tobin is free spirited in his ways of artistic discovery, dedicated to creating new musical expressions above all.

Tobin has journeyed through musical theater, classical, jazz, and progressive rock. He's written ballets, film scores, children's music, poetry, historical fiction, political essays, domestic humor, and video games. He has recorded with Dave Brubeck, Ken Schaphorst, Donny McCaslin, Janet Planet, Dane Richeson, Woody Mankowski and others.

In London, Tobin was inducted into the United Nations 1994 Global 500 Roll of Honor for his cherished work with youth and the environment.

His RAIN BATHER album won ALBUM OF THE YEAR in 2009, from Jazz Chicago. THE MULLER'S WHEEL is currently spotlighted at JazzRadioDC.com.

Member: ASCAP, Dramatists Guild (NYC).