Several songs are mentioned or alluded to throughout Cold Morning Shadow, beginning with two hymns sung in Latin and continuing with American country, folk, and pop music up through the late 1960s. Some of these are only casually mentioned while others bear significantly on the story. A reader who did not grow up hearing them or who cannot now call one to mind could miss the influence, particularly the emotional impact, that a song holds for the story.
Therefore, I offer here a list of songs referred to in the book, each one linked to a YouTube video. (No assurance is given that a video is still available on YouTube.)
Adeste, Fideles – Enya (Chapter 4)
Ave Maria – Maria Soldano (Chapter 4)
Tumbling Tumbleweeds – Sons of the Pioneers (Chapter 4)
Town Without Pity – Gene Pitney (Chapter 5)
Theme from Perry Mason (Chapter 5) — I managed to play these two YouTube cuts in the same browser at the same time on two separate tabs. No, one doesn’t overlay the other like Gounod’s Ave Maria and Bach’s Prelude, but it seems that one inspired the other.
Great Balls of Fire – Jerry Lee Lewis (Chapter 12)
Wake Up, Little Susie – the Everly Brothers (Chapter 18)
Different Drum – the Stone Poneys (Chapters 22 & 30) — Yes, that’s how they spelled Poneys. The name could have flowed more smoothly if they had been the Stoney Poneys. Some think it is evident that they wanted to be the Stoned Poneys but that their record label or promoters had an issue with the name.
I’ll Never Find Another – the Seekers (Chapters 24 & 25)
Tiny Blue Transistor Radio – Connie Smith (Chapter 30)
Daisy a Day – Jud Strunk (Chapter 33)
Unchained Melody – the Righteous Brothers (Chapter 33)
Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die Rag – Country Joe and the Fish (Chapter 34) — I, the author of Cold Morning Shadow, signed up for four years in the Army in 1970. I think this song sat like acid refulx in the esophagus of every Washingron politician for three or four years and was as effective as any other single persuasion in bringing an end to the Vietnam “police action.” Chapter 34 begins with a letter from Rockie to her brother. The letter quotes a line from this stanza in the song:
Come on mothers throughout the land Pack your boys off to Vietnam Come on fathers, and don't hesitate To send your sons off before it's too late And you can be the first ones in your block To have your boy come home in a box And it's one, two, three What are we fighting for? Don't ask me, I don't give a damn Next stop is Vietnam And it's five, six, seven Open up the pearly gates Well there ain't no time to wonder why Whoopee! we're all gonna die!
Sweet Sixteen – Perry Como (Chapter 34)
Wedding Bell Blues – The 5th Dimension (Chapter 40)
I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry – B.J. Thomas (Chapter 48)
LOnesome 7-7203 – Hankshaw Hawkins (Chapter 48)
Wilton Straed’s own song for Cyleine Comosh is described on this page.
the novel 