TERRY LEE NICHOLS, Love Is...

Sixty years after Jackie DeShannon introduced us to Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s timeless Grammy Hall of Fame song/anthem/prayer “What the World Needs Now,” we truly need to discover the power and share the beauty of love more than ever. While it’s often all too elusive, has the troubling habit of slipping away too quickly sometimes and can break our hearts, as human beings we know it’s the answer to our prayers and our only hope. To that end, nothing quite inspires us or moves our hearts and souls to act on our higher instincts like the gift of music.

In these particularly divisive times, it feels like little is more essential to our emotional and spiritual endurance than having a brilliant artist/composer like Terry Lee Nichols freely and unabashedly share heartfelt, personal yet universal pieces of music that speak to us like whispers of encouragement from the heavens. On the pianist’s truly epic, richly immersive fifth album Love Is…, the award-winning classical crossover/neo-classical artist artfully blends his solo piano and synth orchestration artistry with a small ensemble of virtuosic soloists and the lush, emotive vocals of his longtime collaborator Rebekah Eden to reflect upon and share his exuberance for many types of love that can exist in our lives.

As Nichols shares his lush, beautiful expressions, he allows us to find pieces of ourselves in his experiences of romantic love with his beloved Annie, familial love (via a lullaby to his sons and the poignant reunion of his mother and stepfather), love of former partners, platonic love with a good enduring friend and dare we say, the love of just being alive to partake in all this cool divine madness. In his world, and by extension ours, amidst the potential heartache, there is gratitude, because Love Is… all these things and so much more. I couldn’t agree more with Nichols’ overall assessment of the project: “Given the divisiveness of current times, an album about the value of love is needed. I want each listener to realize the importance of love. Love…is…needed…now…more…than…ever. It just is! In the end, love is the key to our existence and caring for each other has always been the key to our survival.”

Each of the 11 compositions on Love Is… feel like wonderful narrative completions of the sentence after the ellipses of Love Is… It’s also worth noting that Nichols includes in his packaging (and makes available on his website) two insightful companion booklets – one featuring his personal anecdotes about and reflections upon each track, the other a collection of Poetic Reflections and Stories based on the tracks by 95-year-old lyricist, poet and author Philip Spevak. In this day and age where most listeners just stream or download tracks, these are extraordinary, thought and soul-provoking blessings that serve to guide us through the highways and byways of love as we listen.

Yet before we marvel at the exquisite intricacies and overall grandeur of some of them, we should also be grateful that Nichols’ is gracing our ears at all. His official bio details a childhood full of musical achievement – including an invitation to perform with the University of Miami All-Star High School Jazz Ensemble under jazz legend Gerry Mulligan and earning degrees from Florida State (BA) and Cal Arts (MFA). Though classically trained and accepted into a doctoral program at Brandeis University, Nichols followed his passion for technology into a successful career.

It's hard to imagine what our world might be missing had Nichols chosen to stay in software, but fortunately he found a path back to his musical destiny. When he sold his software company to a major industry player, he had the financial wherewithal to pursue exactly what he was meant to from the start. He was an immediate hit in new age and world music. His debut album At Peace Beneath the Shade of My Father’s Tree earned nominations for Best Piano with Instrumentation at the One World Music Awards and Best Neo-Classical Album at the Zone Music Reporter Awards. His 2020 album Pale Blue Dot won in those same categories.

At his first ZMR Awards in 2016, he struck up a friendship with fellow nominee and vocalist Rebekah Eden, which led to their renowned 2018 collaborative album We Have Only Come to Dream…(a project exploring human migration to the America) and subsequent collabs with Eden on The Pale Blue Dot and now Love Is… 

The glorious Nichols-Eden symbiosis captures our ears immediately on the unique opening piece “Is This All a Dream (Moon River Variations),” which opens with a hypnotic rush of gentle, mystical synth atmosphere and Eden’s sensual whispers, then eases into an ethereal guitar, piano and vocal version of the Henry Mancini-Johnny Mercer classic that’s every bit as brilliant and soft-spoken as Audrey Hepburn’s in Breakfast at Tiffany’s while showcasing the full range of the soprano’s majestic voice. Mercer’s enigmatic lyrics have been sung by countless legends but this version takes them to a whole other place of hushed contemplation.

Opening with the sounds of birds and Nichols’ soft, elegant piano, “Friendship” is a soulful, gracefully rhythmic and ultimately soaring meditation on platonic love that introduces us to both Nichols’ melodic elegance and his dynamic way of incorporating strings, percussion and other instruments (Maisie Ireland’s English Horn, Ardie Son’s cello) to create full-bodied emotional resonance.

After a difficult divorce, Nichols fell deeply in love with Annie, who became not only an incredible life partner but a powerful muse for some of his most compelling works. No one has written this breathtakingly about a loved one named Annie since John Denver over 50 years ago! He composed many of the early tracks of Love Is… with her in the next room – and three of them, “Lying Next To You,” “I Remember Her Smile” and “Finding Annie” are direct reflections of their flourishing relationship. As its title would suggest, “Lying Next to You” is an   instrumental love song for the ages, a sweetly melodic, subtly rhythmic dance of souls connecting in a single moment of a lifelong journey. Nichols offers this moment of bliss via a blend of his elegant piano touch, Eden’s ethereal wordless vocals, dark touches of cello, sunlit moments of horn and ultimately, swelling strings.

The second “Annie song” is “I Remember Her Smile,” a tender-hearted reflection of the “love at first sight” moment Nichols first met her. All at once, through its soothing piano magic and passionate string caress, we can feel the rush of energy pouring forth in his heart amidst his silent awe at the Universe’s boundless grace in the moment a miracle entered his life and changed him forever. Tapping into the artist’s classical background, “Finding Annie” is an eloquent and richly impassioned piece of piano and orchestral magnificence inspired by the complexities of Annie’s life and her ongoing search for fulfillment after a difficult childhood. In this tune, we can feel not only Nichols’ enduring love for her, but also his patience in allowing her to go through many challenges to emerge as her most authentic self. Not surprisingly, these Annie songs wrap perfectly around the sparkling, optimism filled “Morning Glory,” whose sensory seduction will no doubt spark listeners’ overall love of life just as that feeling inspired him.

While these four pieces form the emotional core of Love Is…, there’s a lot more for our hearts and minds to unpack as the collection continues. One of the more enigmatic pieces is “Trinity,” a title which refers not to the religious concept but the process of distinguishing between desire, longing and love (all holy things, of course!). “We all move through those phases at various points in our lives,” Nichols says. “Ultimately, we want to arrive at love and appreciate it for what it is.” True to the theme, it’s an exploration structured in three parts, with an ambient introduction that includes Eden’s loving whispers. From there, his easy-flowing piano melody pairs with a haunting cello, a slightly more hopeful horn, touches of harp and some of Eden’s most surreal angelic vocalizing, which soars like a momentary aria. The next part of the piece features piano, orchestra and more of Eden’s heavenly musings. “Trinity” is a beautiful expression of the complexities and longings of the human heart. Nichols cleverly leaves it to the listener to determine which section reflects which emotion. 

It may be best for listeners to read Nichols’ liner notes to fully appreciate the meanings behind the love songs for family members “Lullaby” and “We’ve Had a Good Life,” but suffice to say that the first is, as the title implies, a wondrous entry into a moment in Nichols’ life as a young dad singing softly to his sons and the second weaves a stirring narrative about his mother’s reconnection with an old flame, who becomes the love of her life who later battles a difficult disease. These compositions feel like hypnotic soundtracks to important parts of Nichols’ family life. “Lullabye” has a lilting, childlike quality, with playful chimes, a dreamy French horn and strings to reflect the intense emotion of a dad reminiscing about a sacred nightly ritual.

On the opposite side of the generational coin, “We’ve Had a Good Life” is both wistful and hopeful, a piece that both speaks to the euphoria of rediscovering one’s true love and going through the heartbreak of aging in later life. As we read the poignant story in Nichols’ notes, we experience this one like a soundtrack to a beautiful but heartbreaking love story about his mom and stepdad.

The inclusion of legendary film composer Ennio Morricone’s classic “Nella Fantasia” (based on the theme “Gabriel’s Oboe” from the 1986 film The Mission) allows Nichols an opportunity to reveal himself as a great, intuitive interpreter of works of other masters. Popular among classical crossover singers (from Sarah Brightman on down), the scintillating arrangement features the impactful vocals of tenor John Riesen and Nichols’ wonderfully intense piano melody. He originally intended the piece for Eden, but she developed back issues and was not able to complete it in time for the release. Nichols recruited Riesen from an international musicians collaboration service – and it turned out to be a perfect, totally meant to be choice. The pianist chose the piece because its Italian lyrics depict love of the earth, and in his opinion, Morricone has written the most beautiful film scores of all time.  

The poem Nichols wrote for the album’s final piece “The Winds of Time” gives some insight into his feeling that as the winds of time carry us on through the changes of life, they also allow us moments of key reflection – as the pieces on Love Is…illuminate throughout. Yet as with the other pieces, listeners can also put their own experiences into this concept and simply allow themselves to feel joy, sorrow, despair and hope – always hope – as all the memories of love return to remind us what this journey called life is all about. Like the rush of wind itself, it’s a sweeping piece that reminds of the endless intertwining of music and love in our lives – and how each has the powerful to help us carry on.