Victorian Seniors Festival Reimagined 2020
Carl Pannuzzo - Week 23
Bec Reid
This week, we’re exploring courage and our next artist has been described as vocally fearless. We welcome Carl Pannuzzo. Carl, how are you going?
Carl Panuzzo
Good, thanks, Bec. Thanks for having us.
Bec Reid
Carl, we’d love to hear about your musical journey and how you found your voice.
Carl Panuzzo
I think it was never really a decision. I was just incredibly drawn to music from - as a baby. There was a piano in the house and a few people played it and I would just try and find things or remember stuff. A theme on the TV, I’d go after the show and try and work it out on the piano. I finally met some musicians at high school and we formed a band together. The piano player left the band and he was the singer at the time. So, I started singing. I didn’t even think about it. It wasn’t a question of whether I was on the drum kit at the time or not. As far as I understood, music is not a finite thing. It’s a piece of clay that can be turned into any form and, so, I would listen to classical music as easily as I would jazz or whatever it might have been that I discovered on, for example, through PBS, you know, public radio, when I discovered that, my life opened up another billion fold. Just because there was the world of music accessible to me. Yehudi Menuhin, I think, at the age of 96, was interviewed and they said, look, at this point, you’re probably the best in the world. Why do you keep on practicing? And his answer was, I believe I’m making progress. So, I’ve really taken on the idea that there is nothing that I’m going to want to do more than keep exploring music and until I drop dead.
Bec Reid
Carl, speaking of that fearless curiosity and really navigating all those multiplicities, has there been a time, as an artist, that you felt most courageous?
Carl Panuzzo
I think I’m told to be courageous every day, as an artist, because it’s about the relationship of one’s own experience and self-expression. So, you never fear music leaving you. It’s a wonderful friend and it’s loyal. You can’t afford to put too much pressure on the way the world perceives you, because what music’s greatest command is, is to ask of yourself, to be yourself, because that’s the only way that it is different and that it is unique.
Bec Reid
And, Carl, is there a particular song that gives you courage?
Carl Panuzzo
You know, one of the earliest pieces that I can remember is Solsbury Hill by Peter Gabriel. [Carl singing] ‘Going down on Solsbury Hill. People thought I was a nut. I always liked that line. Turning water into wine. Open doors would soon be shut. But the driving force of the music, the - the momentum in it, the sense of this sort of rising expansion within the sonisphere was enough to bring me a sense of ‘I think I can’. You know, there was something in that.
Bec Reid
You’ve collaborated with all sorts of extraordinary artists, Vika and Linda Bull, Shane Howard, even Cirque de Soleil, across jazz, rock, even comedy opera. Is there a genre of music that really makes your heart sing?
Carl Panuzzo
When I sing and play drums in the blues band, Checkerboard Lounge, I feel as though the entire of me is activated and expressed. It is up and out.
Bec Reid
Carl, can you tell us about the song that you’ll be sharing for the Victorian Seniors Festival?
Carl Panuzzo
Essentially, it’s a song about dealing with the human condition in - warts and all, you know, everything that we are, how to embrace it, how to accept it, how to hold it, how to be humble within it and how to not - and how to not sink into a despair of - of how difficult and how challenging it is to be. Rather, look towards the simplicity.
[Carl singing]
Little light keeps the fire inside
Like a child that it burned bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away my bitterness
Bad feelings here
Little light keeps the fire inside
In the cold and darkness
In the cloudy skies
There’s only confusion
Between the truth and the lies
A little time
A little silence
Is all I’ll need to help me see
By the humble light of a candle flame
I can remember the power in me
Little light keep the fire inside
Like a child that it burned bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away any bad feelings here
Fortify my courage
Fortify my will
Fortify forgiveness till my mind is still
Little light keep the fire inside
In the stormy winters
Of my hearts unrest
There’s only anxiety
Put me to the test
A little quiet meditation
On the peace that is my soul
Brings me back to that candle flame
And that nothing more can take its toll
Little light keep the fire inside
Like a child keep it burning bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away any bad feelings here
Fortify my courage
Fortify my will
Fortify forgiveness ‘til my sky is clear
Then fortify my faith that my love will fulfil
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside
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Victorian Seniors Festival Reimagined 2020
Carl Pannuzzo - Week 23
Bec Reid
This week, we’re exploring courage and our next artist has been described as vocally fearless. We welcome Carl Pannuzzo. Carl, how are you going?
Carl Panuzzo
Good, thanks, Bec. Thanks for having us.
Bec Reid
Carl, we’d love to hear about your musical journey and how you found your voice.
Carl Panuzzo
I think it was never really a decision. I was just incredibly drawn to music from - as a baby. There was a piano in the house and a few people played it and I would just try and find things or remember stuff. A theme on the TV, I’d go after the show and try and work it out on the piano. I finally met some musicians at high school and we formed a band together. The piano player left the band and he was the singer at the time. So, I started singing. I didn’t even think about it. It wasn’t a question of whether I was on the drum kit at the time or not. As far as I understood, music is not a finite thing. It’s a piece of clay that can be turned into any form and, so, I would listen to classical music as easily as I would jazz or whatever it might have been that I discovered on, for example, through PBS, you know, public radio, when I discovered that, my life opened up another billion fold. Just because there was the world of music accessible to me. Yehudi Menuhin, I think, at the age of 96, was interviewed and they said, look, at this point, you’re probably the best in the world. Why do you keep on practicing? And his answer was, I believe I’m making progress. So, I’ve really taken on the idea that there is nothing that I’m going to want to do more than keep exploring music and until I drop dead.
Bec Reid
Carl, speaking of that fearless curiosity and really navigating all those multiplicities, has there been a time, as an artist, that you felt most courageous?
Carl Panuzzo
I think I’m told to be courageous every day, as an artist, because it’s about the relationship of one’s own experience and self-expression. So, you never fear music leaving you. It’s a wonderful friend and it’s loyal. You can’t afford to put too much pressure on the way the world perceives you, because what music’s greatest command is, is to ask of yourself, to be yourself, because that’s the only way that it is different and that it is unique.
Bec Reid
And, Carl, is there a particular song that gives you courage?
Carl Panuzzo
You know, one of the earliest pieces that I can remember is Solsbury Hill by Peter Gabriel. [Carl singing] ‘Going down on Solsbury Hill. People thought I was a nut. I always liked that line. Turning water into wine. Open doors would soon be shut. But the driving force of the music, the - the momentum in it, the sense of this sort of rising expansion within the sonisphere was enough to bring me a sense of ‘I think I can’. You know, there was something in that.
Bec Reid
You’ve collaborated with all sorts of extraordinary artists, Vika and Linda Bull, Shane Howard, even Cirque de Soleil, across jazz, rock, even comedy opera. Is there a genre of music that really makes your heart sing?
Carl Panuzzo
When I sing and play drums in the blues band, Checkerboard Lounge, I feel as though the entire of me is activated and expressed. It is up and out.
Bec Reid
Carl, can you tell us about the song that you’ll be sharing for the Victorian Seniors Festival?
Carl Panuzzo
Essentially, it’s a song about dealing with the human condition in - warts and all, you know, everything that we are, how to embrace it, how to accept it, how to hold it, how to be humble within it and how to not - and how to not sink into a despair of - of how difficult and how challenging it is to be. Rather, look towards the simplicity.
[Carl singing]
Little light keeps the fire inside
Like a child that it burned bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away my bitterness
Bad feelings here
Little light keeps the fire inside
In the cold and darkness
In the cloudy skies
There’s only confusion
Between the truth and the lies
A little time
A little silence
Is all I’ll need to help me see
By the humble light of a candle flame
I can remember the power in me
Little light keep the fire inside
Like a child that it burned bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away any bad feelings here
Fortify my courage
Fortify my will
Fortify forgiveness till my mind is still
Little light keep the fire inside
In the stormy winters
Of my hearts unrest
There’s only anxiety
Put me to the test
A little quiet meditation
On the peace that is my soul
Brings me back to that candle flame
And that nothing more can take its toll
Little light keep the fire inside
Like a child keep it burning bright
Threw away my anger
Threw away my fear
Threw away any bad feelings here
Fortify my courage
Fortify my will
Fortify forgiveness ‘til my sky is clear
Then fortify my faith that my love will fulfil
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside
Little light keep the fire inside