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Labi Siffre
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Browse piano sheets by Labi Siffre on Zen Virtual Piano. Claudius Afolabi Siffre was born in 1945 and raised in west London, to a Nigerian father and a mixed-race mother who refused to pass as white. One of five boys, he counts his older brother Kole, with an amazing record collection, as probably the largest influence on his life as a musician. He studied music at the Eric Gilder School of Music on Wardour Street in Soho, and a poem of his, education education education, thanks Gilder. A brother's record collection, beside a poem that thanks Gilder, may suggest that listening and study both mattered to him. He formed his first band at 16 and played jazz guitar in groups around Soho in the late 1960s. The self-titled debut arrived in 1970; The Singer and the Song, Crying Laughing Loving Lying and For the Children came after. By Crying Laughing Loving Lying, the third album, his lyrics were no longer written as if for the opposite sex. Jazz guitar groups may suggest a grounding in live playing before recording. A shift in his lyrics by the third album may mark a turning point in his writing. He has said that when he sat down, played a C chord and sang the first two lines of Something Inside So Strong, he realised he was writing about his life as a gay man, and he cried. He has also said he concluded he was trying to write songs that are useful, and that if you manage to make something seemingly out of nothing, the satisfaction is that you have done a good job. Calling songs useful may suggest he judged his work by what it gave listeners. His tears may suggest how personal that moment was for him. The Guardian calls Madness's recording of his song It Must Be Love the definitive cover, and Kanye West, Jay-Z and Primal Scream are among those who have sampled him. The riff on Eminem's My Name Is was his, and Kanye West sampled his 1972 song My Song, from Crying Laughing Loving Lying, on I Wonder, from the 2007 album Graduation. Essays, the stage and television play Deathwrite and three volumes of poetry, one of them Monument, are also part of his output. With Pride cancelled by the pandemic, he quietly put out a reworked take on (Love Is Love Is Love) Why Isn't Love Enough? Covers and samples may point to songs strong enough to be reused by others. A 2007 album sampling a 1972 song may show a gap of decades between writing and reuse.
Browse piano sheets by Labi Siffre on Zen Virtual Piano.
Claudius Afolabi Siffre was born in 1945 and raised in west London, to a Nigerian father and a mixed-race mother who refused to pass as white. One of five boys, he counts his older brother Kole, with an amazing record collection, as probably the largest influence on his life as a musician. He studied music at the Eric Gilder School of Music on Wardour Street in Soho, and a poem of his, education education education, thanks Gilder. A brother's record collection, beside a poem that thanks Gilder, may suggest that listening and study both mattered to him.
He formed his first band at 16 and played jazz guitar in groups around Soho in the late 1960s. The self-titled debut arrived in 1970; The Singer and the Song, Crying Laughing Loving Lying and For the Children came after. By Crying Laughing Loving Lying, the third album, his lyrics were no longer written as if for the opposite sex. Jazz guitar groups may suggest a grounding in live playing before recording. A shift in his lyrics by the third album may mark a turning point in his writing.
He has said that when he sat down, played a C chord and sang the first two lines of Something Inside So Strong, he realised he was writing about his life as a gay man, and he cried. He has also said he concluded he was trying to write songs that are useful, and that if you manage to make something seemingly out of nothing, the satisfaction is that you have done a good job. Calling songs useful may suggest he judged his work by what it gave listeners. His tears may suggest how personal that moment was for him.
The Guardian calls Madness's recording of his song It Must Be Love the definitive cover, and Kanye West, Jay-Z and Primal Scream are among those who have sampled him. The riff on Eminem's My Name Is was his, and Kanye West sampled his 1972 song My Song, from Crying Laughing Loving Lying, on I Wonder, from the 2007 album Graduation. Essays, the stage and television play Deathwrite and three volumes of poetry, one of them Monument, are also part of his output. With Pride cancelled by the pandemic, he quietly put out a reworked take on (Love Is Love Is Love) Why Isn't Love Enough? Covers and samples may point to songs strong enough to be reused by others. A 2007 album sampling a 1972 song may show a gap of decades between writing and reuse.
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Labi Siffre
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Labi Siffre is a singer-songwriter, guitarist and poet, born Claudius Afolabi Siffre in 1945 and raised in west London.
His self-titled debut album came out in 1970.
Sampling by Kanye West, Jay-Z and Primal Scream is on record, and Eminem's My Name Is uses a riff of his.
He has published essays, the play Deathwrite and three volumes of poetry.