Story Behind The Song

For along time my dream has been to own a Martin acoustic guitar. This dream I thought would never come true but recently I bought one. So I was inspired to write about such a dream. In my folk ballad, a man who has a gypsy violin dreams of owning a Stradivarius violin, knowing he never will. It is a song about being content with what you have got and of how everything in the end passes away.

Song Description

A folk ballad about a gypsy violin player who dreams of owning a Stradivarius violin. It speaks of how it is wise to be content with what you have got and reminds you that everything in the end passes away.

Lyrics

Sand and Dust

A Stradivarius violin
he knew he would never own.
Fated to stay a pauper player
while he reaped what he had sown.

No, there were worlds that were not for him,
would remain outside the dance.
Stood against the wall where he was pinned,
stabbed by a glittering glance.

This poorly put together pantomime,
cruel circus antiquated with rust,
revue organised by black suited crime
was to him so much sand and dust.

Helicopters could not rescue him,
if the ocean hid his hand.
Followed the flight of the albatross
to be native to no land.

Content with his gypsy violin,
played for lovers and for wine.
His tunes were his horse drawn caravan,
be the weather foul or fine.

These cold chants to oppose the citadel,
lost with the bare ballads of broken trust,
were to him like marks on a prison cell,
to fade away like sand and dust.