Melissa Manchester’s New Single a Reimagined Recording of Her Classic Hit “Fire In The Morning” Is Out Today – Breaking Music News
Fifth single from 24th album RE:VIEW available now
RE:VIEW album is rolled out as a series of singles
Steve Dorff / Gary Harju / Larry Herbstritt song blooms with optimism as the country emerges from pandemic lockdown
Stream “Fire In The Morning” music video
“It’s pretty – it’s a pretty video and it’s a pretty song.” So says GRAMMY® Award-winning, multi ACADEMY® Award-nominated singer/songwriter, Melissa Manchester, about the new remake of her 1980 hit. ““Fire In The Morning” is a lovely, mid-tempo ballad and, as we are coming out of this pandemic very slowly, it gave me a chance to not have a pandemic-centric video. The video was about reflection – and people can watch me struggle writing!” she giggles.
Originally released on Manchester’s 1975 album, Melissa, which lingered on the Billboard charts for 41 weeks, the classic hit was a slow burn that didn’t reach the Top 100 and Adult Contemporary singles charts until five years later.
“I didn’t write this song. It came to me through Clive (Davis, of Arista Records) and the guys, but I know veteran songwriter Steve Dorff,” who co-wrote the song with Gary Harju and Larry Herbstritt.
For this new version, “I had the opportunity to invite a new generation of young artists – the musicians of Citrus Community College in Glendora, CA (where I’m proud to be the Artist In Residence) – to join me in revisiting and bringing new energy to the song,” Manchester enthuses
The rhythm section and lead vocals were recorded in the state-of-the-art Citrus College Studios in early 2020, before the campus was shut down due to the worldwide health crisis. When the lockdown was mandated, Manchester realized that she had most of the her 24th studio album, RE:VIEW, “in the can” – already recorded during the previous several months – so it might be possible to complete the collection remotely, with the aid of audio engineer Ebiut Cervantes, and using an unconventional song-by-song rollout. As 2020 unfolded, “Just You And I” was released, followed by Manchester’s blockbusters “Midnight Blue,” “Don’t Cry Out Loud,” and the GRAMMY® Award-winning “You Should Hear How She Talks About You.”
“Right now,” Manchester explains, “I don’t know what those other videos will look like, because we were so in the center of the pandemic earlier. But this one is very pleasant, thanks to videographers Paco Silva and Daniel Henry-Smith, and you get a chance to see me interact with my dear ones … and sit at the piano a little.”
The idea for the new album project bubbled up in 2019. “The whole point of RE:VIEW,” explains Manchester, “is that, in these times, as with many of my colleagues, the original record company owns all of the masters, and the only way I can empower myself and own my masters is to re-record these old songs, with a little bit of a tweak, just to make it interesting.”
And why not? The 50-year veteran artist is reminding music lovers who they are, and who they were back in the day. Manchester also reminds the listener of what a great singer she was – and still is – partly because her voice has deepened and strengthened with maturity and partly because, “You grow into the songs,” Manchester continues. “You start to, you know, mess with the harmonics a little bit. So that’s what we are doing.”
A uniquely versatile artist, Manchester composed the score to the hit musical, Sweet Potato Queens, with book by TONY® Award winner Rupert Holmes and lyrics by Nashville Songwriters Hall of Famer Sharon Vaughn, based upon the New York Times best selling books of Jill Conner Browne, She also penned the score for the bittersweet I Sent A Letter To My Love, a musical based on the Bernice Rubens novel, with book and lyrics by playwright Jeffrey Sweet.
In 1980, Melissa Manchester became the first recording artist in the history of the ACADEMY® Awards to have two nominated movie themes in a single year – “Through The Eyes Of Love” from Ice Castles and “I’ll Never Say Goodbye” from The Promise – and to perform them both on the Oscar telecast. Manchester starred in the national tours of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Music Of The Night and Song And Dance, and she created the role of Maddy, the title character’s mother, on the NBC hit TV series Blossom.
With nineteen Billboard® charted hits to choose from, it’s been a happy challenge to pick ten for the new album. “Fire In The Morning” made the cut because it’s one of the most requested by Manchester’s followers. “A fan favorite. It’s one of the nicest ways I could think of to say thank you to my amazing fans.”
“Fire In The Morning” is available now:
SoundCloud HERE
YouTube HERE
iTunes HERE