For Dixie

Sunday night I sat down and began working on a song for the jazz band. It is a tribute song after a fashion.

Last week I was at Dixie's and noticed a bunch of flowers and cards. When I looked closer it turned out that the owner's dog had died.

I asked him about it, and he confirmed that their dog had in fact died from cancer. It had been kind of hard for him and his wife because the dog was really one of the family. She was more than that too. She was the namesake of the coffee shop.

Dixie was a bloodhound. I had actually seen her once before when we did our first gig at Dixie's. She was a pretty dog. I had no idea that she was so sick.

Anyway, I started thinking about it and decided, "Man, it would be nice if we could do a song for Dixie when we play our next gig."

I had an idea of the pace that I wanted the song to go and an idea of the general feel and how I wanted it to end, but just let the ideas roll around for a couple of days until I could sit down and start putting pen to paper so to speak. I had some time Sunday night and began working on the song. It took me a little while, but by 11:30 I had something that I thought would work.

Last night I took it over to Justin and Sara's and Justin helped me to get it put on paper correctly. The title is Dog Days of Dixie. Unfortunately, we didn't get to run through it last night, but hopefully we will be able to get it ready for our gig at Dixie's on the 29th.

This is a first. It is my first non-church song. Well, I guess it would be possible to put religious lyrics to it, but this is really a gift to the owners of Dixie's. I hope it will brighten their day.