When I Fall in Love

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! To finish 2022, I'm playing a ballad called "When I Fall in Love," composed by Victor Young and Edward Heyman. This one has been around for 70 years now, but you might know it because of the famous version by Nat King Cole. I hope you like it!

Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

Together Forever

If you've been around in the last few months, you don't even have to ask what's happening today - you know the rules and so do I. In fact, I don't even have to put a single R in this sentence to make you know what's happening today.

"Huh," one of you is saying. "You just quoted the lyrics for Never Gonna Give You Up instead of Together Forever. You should really stay quiet, since you're another one of those people who can't even tell the difference between two songs." Well, I'm about to prove that the two songs you're thinking about are pretty well connected.

Together Forever often gets referred to as "the other Rick Astley song." Of course, I've been around long enough to know that musicians generally don't make 2 songs and then disappear. What these commenters mean to say, most likely, is the other song that he became famous for around the same time. After all, it was 1988, and Rick had just been broadcasted around (quite literally) the entire world. Listeners had quite a reason to be excited when the radios announced that he had a brand-new song.

Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

Don't Say Goodbye

I told you in June about my plan for my next few posts. Although you might not have realized it, I'm taking that statement seriously. And that only means one thing.

Rick's back!

If you're closing the page as I say this, you've got the freedom to do that, but you've just defeated the point of the song. What's happening in the lyrics is that a girl is about to say goodbye and we're trying to convince her not to. So if you're heading out right now, you're saying goodbye before I can even persuade you to stay.

If you know anything about Rick Astley, who sang this song 35 years ago, you know that he's the kind of person who doesn't just say goodbye to people. (Giving up has never exactly been his thing.) So the least he can do is expect someone else not to leave him. It's a fair position to take, right?

Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

Whenever You Need Somebody

I don't care about the things that people say. It's this song I think about each and every day. (Hmm, perhaps not every day, but pretty frequently, that's for sure.) Maybe I should stop quoting lyrics from this song and tell you something about it instead.

I'm late, again. If you were paying close attention, you would notice that this is coming out on Tuesday instead of Monday. But my plans haven't been affected all that much by what day it is. The time for the return is here.

The return of Rick Astley. One of the great voices is back.

No, I didn't come up with that line. I saw it in an ad. You're probably expecting me to tell you something about how Rick wrote the song, how he felt about the success of it, etc... but what if I told you that this wasn't Rick's song? 

I'm going to have some angry fans on my doorstep now. "But it's the title track for the album!" "I clearly remember watching him sing this on live TV when I was 13!" Unfortunately, even though my cover was mostly inspired by Rick's version, I must admit that the song isn't an original from him.

Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

No More Looking for Love

Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

This one's by Rick Astley.

"Rick?" you're going to say. "Man, I was young when his songs were coming out. I forgot about his existence decades ago."

Well, someone told me recently that a lot of old songs from the 70s and 80s can actually be better than modern music. So I'm partially playing this for him.

I'm also in a state where I've just found a good singer and am now perpetually determined to listen to their songs. There's a big 2018 throwback happening here. You may remember that after I played the song "River" and found that a lot of people were listening to it, I proceeded to play several more of Josh Groban's songs on my YouTube channel. Well, guess what? Now, after this one, you'll be getting new posts of Rick's songs every week!

Oh. You don't want that. I'll only play them every 2 weeks, then. To extend the parallel even further, my computer is attempting to correct me on the spelling of Astley like it did for the spelling of Groban back in 2018.

That's where the comparison stops, though. "River" had just come out weeks before my cover was recorded. Today's song was on Rick's first album that was released in 1987. So I'm also playing it for another someone who asks me on a regular basis, "Were you listening to songs from the 80s again?" 

Speaking of 1987, did you ever think about how that was exactly 35 years ago? You're not the only one to notice. Apparently, the CD of that album was just re-released to celebrate that it's been 35 years. Once I heard that, I was determined. If I'm going to play Rick Astley songs, I might as well get rolling and do it now. So, if Rick is celebrating, one could argue that I'm playing this song for him, too.

We're done, right? Now that we've added Rick himself to the list, there couldn't be anyone else I'm playing it for, right? Unfortunately, I have to tell you that you forgot someone.

You forgot Liya.

Maybe after all my years of studying classical music and all my years in jazz bands, I'm supposed to be on another level in which I don't like these 80s songs. But that doesn't change the fact that I actually like them. (In fact, if you want to hear a little bit of music theory, I noticed while learning this song that it's in the key of F, but it's using notes from the Bb major scale. That bears a striking resemblance to a lot of jazz and blues tunes that I've played. Maybe I'm not falling too far from the tree.)

What I haven't said yet is that I'm playing this song for myself. And I'm playing it for you, the person who's listening to this recording, so that you can keep filling your teacup with music.

~Liya

He's a Pirate

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! Today's song is "He's a Pirate," the theme song of the movie "Pirates of the Caribbean." It was composed by Klaus Badelt and Hans Zimmer. The song has now become more popular than the movie itself, much like quotes we might know from books or even a classical song I posted a few weeks ago. I hope you like listening to it!


Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

Hallelujah

I have to remember how to spell the title of this song. This week, I'm playing the song "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen. You've probably heard this song in recent years, but this sounds quite a bit different from the original version. I hope you like listening to it!


Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

River Flows in You

If any of you know of a contemporary pianist who calls himself Yiruma, then you probably discovered his music through this song. Likely his most popular composition, "River Flows in You" has been played by both professionals and piano students. When I first heard an actual performance of this piece, it didn't sound like what I had first imagined, but maybe I was confusing it with another song that had "river" in its title. Anyways, enough of Liya's Reminiscent Thoughts on Music. It's time for you to Listen to the song here!

(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

My Favorite Things

Oof! It's already going to be February in a couple of days - and considering that 2020 just started (I still have to stop myself from saying 2019), the year is definitely getting off to a fast start. At the times when I'm not moving from one task to the next, I can remember my favorite things - or write a post about the song, My Favorite Things! I hope you enjoy listening to this popular song, that I successfully turned into a jazz song. John Coltrane could do it, so why can't I?


Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

Music Box Dancer

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! Today, I'll be playing a song called "Music Box Dancer," composed by Frank Mills. If you have heard of this song but haven't actually listened to it, this would be a great opportunity for you to check it out! Thanks for listening, and I hope you enjoy this song!


Listen to the song here
(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)

You Raise Me Up

The 100th piano cover on Tea with Liya is a song that many of you have heard at some point in your lives - "You Raise Me Up." (A little note: I've been posting some covers on YouTube that aren't over here, so we're actually on post #92 here.) Despite its popularity, the song hasn't been around very long in comparison to my other piano covers - some of the jazz songs I play have been around for 70 or 80 years, and at the times when I do play classical music, those songs are hundreds of years old! I'd better take a step back to our current generation, shouldn't I?

Listen to the song here

(Can't see an audio player? It might not work if you're viewing this in an email client. If you are on teawithliya.blogspot.ca, you may need to try a different browser.)


Speaking of generations, I'd like to mention something about the date.

Yes, that's right, the date. September 18, 2019. Just another day like all the 30,000 days that could go by in your life ^♪. Nooothing special about it, is there?

♪30,000 days is about 82 years. Don't waste them.

Hmm...

What's the "Hmm" for?

I'm not so sure that the date is as insignificant as you think it is. While you think about that, let's see how many ways you can write out the date.

Hm. Okay..

• September 18, 2019
• 18 September 2019
• 09/18/2019
• 18/09/2019
• 09.18.2019
• Sept 18/19
• 9/18/19

That's a lot of ways of writing out something that "isn't important," isn't it?

Uh, yeah...

Take a look at the end of your list. What would happen if you tried to write it backwards?

That's a lot of mirrors. Somehow, they form a building. Image by hjrivas from Pixabay

Uh.... Let's see.

Looks like I get.. 9.18.19.

What a coincidence. It turns out that you can do that for any day of the week (although theoretically, it's 10 days). Pick any day from last week Tuesday until tomorrow, and the date will be a palindrome - that is, it can be flipped backwards and still read the same numbers.

Is this the only time it's ever happened?

No. There was also a "palindrome week" in August 2018, July 2017, etc., There won't be another one in October 2020, though. Instead, it'll be in February. But, don't expect them every year. By the time we get to 2098, for example, there won't be any till the turn of the century.

It might be a disappointment to hear that your chances of living till the turn of the century are quite low. Considering the aforementioned 30,000 days or 82 years, you'd practically have to be born yesterday to significantly raise those chances. Even if you were, it's impossible to predict who is going to be alive in 2100.

But, why worry about 2100 when we're here in 2019? There's already lots of beautiful patterns occurring within the days that are right in front of us. Every day holds something that can make you happy, if you take the time to look for it.

Maybe today, it's this post on Tea with Liya. Tomorrow, it could be a bright and sunny day. The next day, some bright red fall leaves. There's no need to know everything that's going to happen to you, when you can just take things one day at a time.

Image by tigerlily713 from Pixabay

And as always, keep filling your teacup with music.

~Liya

River

Some of you probably came here because you were looking for classical music (like I've been posting for the past few weeks). Unfortunately, this song doesn't meet the criteria needed to be a classical song. First of all, the name. Most classical songs have names like "(type of song) in (key)". There is actually an RCM song called "The River" (which I found while looking for the recording of this one on my computer), but that's not the same song that I'm playing here.

The second giveaway is what the song sounds like - it doesn't have the same structure as the piano sonatas I've learned.

Colors of the Wind

Finally, I've given you the old songs that you were asking for before! I learned this song when I was in grade 7 piano (which was 3 years ago). I'm pretty sure that you've quickly added 7 and 3 and guessed that I was in grade 10 piano. If you did, then you've just won the lucky ticket for guessing right. How much money do you win? Z-E-R-O.

Maybe

Hey look, we're at 20 songs!

That's right, I'm taking a break from jazz songs for a while..but you know, that's not the only thing that you can learn. There's many different varieties of songs and this is one of them.