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The singer, who wrote ‘Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)’ based on her experience at Woodstock, had been working on a covers album this month.
Melanie, the singer who performed at Woodstock in 1969 and had big pop hits with “Brand New Key” and “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)” in the early 1970s, died Tuesday at age 76. her advertising company, Glass Onyon PR.
No information on the cause of death was immediately provided. But Melanie (full name Melanie Safka) had been in the studio earlier this month working on a new covers album, “Second Hand Smoke,” for the Cleopatra label; It would have been her 32nd album, the label said.
Their three children, Leilah, Jeordie and Beau Jarred, posted a message on Facebook, writing: “We are heartbroken, but we want to thank each and every one of you for the love you have for our Mother, and tell you that She loved you all so much. She was one of the most talented, strong and passionate women of the time and every word she wrote, every note she sang reflected it. Our world is much darker, the colors of a dreary, rainy Tennessee pale with her absence today, but we know she is still here, smiling at all of us, all of you, from the stars.”
Her children requested that tonight (January 24), at 10 pm CT, “each of you light a candle in Melanie’s honor. Lift them up, lift them high, high again. Light up the darkness and let us all be connected in memory of the extraordinary woman who was a wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and friend to so many people.”
Melanie’s first pop hit was “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain),” a gospel-flavored collaboration with the Edwin Hawkins Singers that peaked at No. 6 on the Hot 100 in 1970. It was followed in 1971 by “Brand New Key.” . an inescapable hit that was taken as a kind of children’s tune by some and full of sexual innuendos by others. It reached number 1 and was her only other top 10 hit in the US. In the UK, she also reached the top 10 with a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Ruby Tuesday”.
“It was the bane of my existence for a few years,” Melanie said. the Guardian in 2021 on “Brand New Key,” which many perceived as a novelty song, due to its childish tone. The singer said that it was composed as a blues song, but she sped it up in search of greater commercial appeal.
Melanie didn’t always get her due in the male-dominated folk-rock scene of the time, and was rarely mentioned even in the company of female artists like Joni Mitchell. She speculated to The Guardian about why she might have been like that: “It wasn’t the era of smiling women,” she said. “I had to be much more melancholic and I was too cherubic. Men can be cute. Randy Newman can sing ‘Short People’ and that’s fine because he’s a guy and he has something to say. But a girl? How could it have any social meaning?
Safka was born in Astoria, New York, on February 3, 1947, and grew up in Queens. She studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, but it was her interest in performing in the folk clubs of Greenwich Village that would lead to her ultimate professional career.
She was virtually unknown when she was flown by helicopter to the Woodstock Festival in 1969, before she had success on the radio. In 1989, and again in 2019, when the festival reached historic anniversaries, she wrote about the experience for Rolling Stone.
“I had my first out-of-body experience. I was terrified,” she said. “I just left my body and went to a side and higher view. I saw myself go up on stage, sit down and sing a couple of lines. And when I felt it was safe, I came back. She started raining just before it continued. Ravi Shankar had just finished his performance and the announcer said that if you lit candles, it would help keep the rain away. When I finished my presentation, the entire hillside was a mass of small flickering lights. “I guess that’s one of the reasons I came back to my body.”
That experience was the basis for “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain),” their biggest hit and possibly their most popular song today, even though “Brand New Key” had been more ubiquitous in its time. Candle lighting became a trademark of their shows for about a year after that, Melanie said, and that song “became so connected to my concerts that my shows were banned because the fire departments didn’t approve them,” she said. .
Her husband, producer and manager, Peter Schekeryk, died in 2010. She had been collaborating musically with her son Beau Jarred and daughters Leilah and Jeordie in recent years on recordings and in concerts.
Melanie achieved her greatest successes in the early 70s with the Buddah label, which she left in 1971 to found her own label, becoming a pioneer of independent artists. He had recently signed to Los Angeles-based label Cleopatra, which has been in the process of putting together his entire post-Buddah catalog for reissue.
In early January, according to her label, Melanie recorded a cover of Morrissey’s “Ouija Board Ouija Board” for an upcoming tribute album celebrating his music. (Morrissey was known to be a fan of hers, as she had covered “Some Say (I Got Devil)”). She had also just recorded a cover of Nine Inch Nails’ “Hurt” for her planned covers album, “Second Hand.” Smoke.”
Other songs he had recorded for the new album included “Creep” by Radiohead, “Nights In White Satin” by Moody Blues, “Enjoy the Silence” by Depeche Mode and “Everyone Says Hi” by David Bowie.
In their Facebook statement, the singer’s three children said: “We are planning a Celebration of Life for Mom and it will be open to all of you who want to come and celebrate. Details will be announced as soon as they are available. We look forward to seeing you there.”