My husband bought me Dance With Me: The Best of Orleans for Christmas and I've been happily humming along to it ever since. As I mentioned in a previous post, John Hall of Orleans is now a Democratic Congressman who got great election exposure on The Colbert Report. There are great liner notes on this CD and lots of pictures of the guys in the band then (1975) and now (1997). Even with the beards they kinda always looked like a friendly bunch of guys.

What I didn't know was that many of their hits were co-written by John Hall and his wife Johanna. From the liner notes:

The most significant event in Hall's life during the late '60s was meeting future wife Johanna who was then working as a journalist. Their romantic relationship blossomed into a songwriting partnership. The catalyst was Janis Joplin, who became a friend of the couple's after Johanna wrote a sympathetic article about her in the Village Voice. Janis suggested that Johanna try writing lyrics to John's tunes, then recorded their first effort together, "Half Moon," on her posthumously released album Pearl. Johanna brought a deft, literate touch to her lyric-writing and she and John continued their collaboration."

The John/Johanna co-writes on this CD include " Half Moon", "Fresh Wind", "Dance With Me", "Time Passes On", "Cold Spell", "Give One Heart", "Reach", "What I Need", "If I Don't Have You", "Waking and Dreaming", "Sails", "Still The One", and "Golden State".

I also didn't know that in the '60s John Hall composed for "a well-received Broadway theater trilogy, MORNING, NOON AND NIGHT."

Finally, a politician who has the right to use "Still The One" for his campaign!

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