Jimmy Griffin

Forty years of the musical relationship between 'Bread' band co-founders James Griffin and Robb Royer --- Album notes: I first met Jimmy in 1966. We were introduced by my school friend, his girlfriend and soon-to-be wife Maria Yolanda. On a particular evening she thought he d be home by eight so she invited me over to their apartment where we sat waiting for him, sipping wine. He didn t actually come home til eleven and by the time he walked in, here was this strange guy in his apartment with his old lady, both of us pretty plastered. This didn t seem to bother him at all and a very few minutes after meeting him he asked me can you write horn parts ? Yes! I lied and ended up helping him with some orchestration he was doing for a music class at LACC. It was the beginning of a musical relationship, bromance if you will, that lasted almost forty years. Along the way there were a number of periods . We started out as contract writers for Viva Music where Jimmy forced them to sign me with the threat I will be writing with him. Do you really want to give away half the publishing on all those songs? It was a wise move on their part because several of the songs that followed ended up being recorded by a group called Bread which was our next period. During this phase we also wrote a song called For All We Know with Fred Karlin for a film called Lovers and Other Strangers . The song turned out to be a hit for the Carpenters and, in a masterpiece of improbability, won us an O. I ended up leaving Bread before Jimmy did but we wrote together for the group for the duration of its existence. Bread finally broke up for the last time in 1977 but Jimmy and I continued on. The 80 s were our Island period followed by a rediscovery of roots and country in Nashville in the 90 s. We often were involved in separate projects, but always found a way to write and record together. The last song we wrote was Share This Love , recorded in April 2004. By August of that year he had lost his voice to cancer. He died in January 2005. This album is, of course, dedicated to him. Robb Royer --- Recommended if you like * Dorsey and Johnny Burnette * Sam Cooke * Steve Winwood

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