Welcome to Sunday and welcome to the absolutely sublime sounds of Margo Guryan. ‘Take a Picture’ is a breezy pop dreamboat and it all starts with ‘Sunday Mornin’’. Guys, we do think about this stuff…
A few weeks ago, Numero released Words and Music, a career appraisal (including unreleased recordings) of the much revered but bizarrely uncelebrated American songwriter Margo Guryan. Compiled by Numero alongside legendary record collector Geoffrey Weiss, A&R man Douglas Mcgowan and Guryan’s stepson Jonathan Rosner, the 3LP box also includes absolutely brilliant liner notes from music critic Jenn Pelly, covering a quite fascinating life in music.
They are such an engaging and highly recommended read, but we’ll paraphrase the early years into a Sunday nutshell for you…
Margo Guryan was a jazzer. She studied with piano legend Jaki Byard in Boston, led a trio that were offered a recording contract from George Wein’s Storyville label (also the founder of the famed Newport Jazz Festival) before signing to Atlantic as a songwriter at just 19 years old. She earned a scholarship to The Lenox School of Jazz - run by progressive jazz pioneers John Lewis and Gunther Schuller - with peers to include Ornette Coleman and Don Cherry. As one of only two female Lenox students, she prevailed over unprecedented sexism to win the respect of revered instructors like Max Roach and Bill Evans. All of this before a fateful encounter with The Beach Boys’ ‘God Only Knows’ on the wireless would change her dial to pop.
She was honestly quite miraculous.
![Margo Guryan - Take a Picture](https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0161/8690/files/D_Margo_Guryan_B.jpg?v=1724528720)
![Margo Guryan - Take a Picture](https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0161/8690/files/D_Margo_Guryan_C.jpg?v=1724528777)
A proper joy. Please do enjoy your Sunday.
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