After a fulfilling career as a teacher and counselor, Larry Potts becomes an award-winning songwriter

Larry Potts was 55 when he started writing songs. Ten years later, the former Petaluma schoolteacher and counselor has just released his third CD of original songs, Close to Home.

I asked Larry what first inspired him to begin writing songs. He said, “In 1999 I had a painful nerve disease and thought I might die. If I only had a little time left on this earth, what would I want to do? In the worst of it, I started writing songs.”

“Songwriting,” explained Larry, “was healing for me. I’ve tried to write songs that touch and connect with people and it’s become a great joy to share them.”

All Things Considered

I have known Larry for about nine years, and I have always been amazed at his ability to craft so many songs about so many important topics. Curious, I wanted to follow his journey.

Larry taught Psychology, English, and American literature for 31 years before recently retiring. He has also been a marriage and family counselor for the past twenty-three years. Perhaps this rich background, in working with people, and his long life experience, has driven Larry’s success as a songwriter.

Larry’s songs range from the biographical, historical, and humorous to the romantic. I sat down with him and his wife Margaret recently, to get a better idea of exactly how Larry does it. He has written about seventy-five songs (45 recorded), some alone and others collaborating with such musicians as hit songwriter George Merrill, Scott O’Brien, Reed Fromer, and Kevin Harris, and often relied on a mentor, hit songwriter Steve Seskin.

The Shape of Things to Come

Larry is passionate when telling how and why he takes care in crafting every song he writes. Many of them he has revised sixty times before recording. And he thoroughly researches the biographical and historical material for his songs.

In my visit with Larry and Margaret, he talked about the last song on his latest CD: “The Story of Your Life,” a song he’d held back from finishing for eight years before Margaret, who co-wrote it, gave him the go-ahead to complete it.

Margaret explained how near the end of her mother’s life, she got an unexpected phone call from the nursing home telling her that her mother was wide awake and responsive. When Margaret arrived, her mother asked her, “What did I do? Where did I go?”

Climbing into bed next to her mom, she told her the story of her life, highlighting many chapters from her childhood, marriage, and parenting, as her mother listened in amazement to her own story. This was a beautiful time of connection with her mother in the face of such a drastic loss of memory. Margaret brought out photos of her mother, telling me about Margaret “Montana” McIntyre Hansen’s Irish descent and her wise and independent nature.

This fall, Larry wove together the details of the event with Margaret, combining tone, lyrics, and melody in a way that aims for universal appeal.

Hometown Hardware

Some of Larry’s songs are about his own childhood. In “Home to Oregon,” you can just feel the icy water when Larry, as a boy, jumps off a rock into the Santiam River. When Petaluma’s beloved old Tomasini’s Rex Hardware Store burned to the ground about two years ago and then was rebuilt, Larry found a song in the ashes with “Hometown Hardware.” After reading about shrinking glaciers, he wrote “Close to Home” about global warming. “Since Then” expresses the vulnerability Americans felt after the tragedy of 9/11. “Grandma’s Patchwork Star” is a story about his Grandmother’s prize quilts.

I asked Larry what has kept him going as a songwriter. He talked about joining The West Coast Songwriters Association and getting the oppor­tunity to sing at competitions where he got feedback from fellow musicians and judges.

“That was the key to my continued song crafting. I also entered songwriting competitions, and in 2004 was chosen as a finalist in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest for a song called “The Ballad of Poker Alice.” Larry’s won numerous songwriting awards in many genres, including folk, Americana, country and jazz.

At the recent Far West Folk Alliance, I visited a three-day conference hosting about 500 singer-songwriters: people were riveted when Larry sang. It was clear to me that his songs touched souls and connected with people.

His albums, The Shape of Things to Come, All Things Considered, and Close to Home, are available at CD Baby, Amazon.com, iTunes, and in local Petaluma and Santa Rosa stores. To hear samples or buy his albums, visit www.cdbaby/lkpottssongs.com or his Web site, www.larrypottsmusic.com.

“I’m a big fan of Larry’s music. His writing is honest and real fresh. He has that thing you can’t quite put a finger on, that x-factor, the imagination and word play and knack for story telling that no matter how hard you try, you can’t teach someone.” —Steve Seskin, hit songwriter

The Story of Your Life

By Larry Potts & Margaret Potts

A true account—dedicated to my wife Margaret and the wonderful relationship with her own mother Margaret Hansen—and to all those who support loved ones afflicted with memory loss.

The call came through at half past two, said your mother’s wide awake

She brightened up she spoke your name, can you get here right away

The road went on forever to that home up on the hill

And down the hall room 213 it was like the time stood still

I could see a spark of wonder light up those old eyes

When she searched to find her words it was then I realized

The memories she’d counted on lay locked behind a door

She said What did I do? Where did I go?

Let me tell you the story of your life

Let me lay down here beside you and we’ll go line by line

I know you’re not afraid—I’m with you all the way

Let me tell you—I can tell you—let me tell you—the story of your life

Your father was a railroad man on the move from town to town

You skipped around to thirty schools no time to put roots down

A child yourself you raised up your sister and your brothers

You never turned away from a world put on your shoulders

You listened to my every hope and prized my childhood dreams

My ups and downs, my winding roads, you were right there for me

And it makes me glad I have this chance to hold your story now

We’ll turn those pages one by one and we’ll get through somehow

                   . . . . we’ll get through somehow

Let me tell you the story of your life

Let me lay down here beside you and we’ll go line by line

I know you’re not afraid—there’s angels on the way

Let me tell you—I can tell you—let me tell you the story of your life

                   . . . .let me tell you the story of your life