Thad Mumau – “There are a few songs, but the one for me is My Love by Paul McCartney and Wings. “The song was popular when Dahlia and I were dating and I just loved what it said (What Paul was saying about his wife, Linda) – that ‘my love does everything good for me.’ Translated, it means she is everything to me. We have been married more than 31 years, and Dahlia is my best friend, my confidant, my counselor and my sweetheart. I look at her and still feel the way I did when we were first dating. Dahlia . . . beautiful name, beautiful lady. She is simply the best person I have ever known, and I am blessed to have her as my wife. She is “My Love.”
Louis Feraca - I am easily impressed by anyone who can sing three notes in a row on key. I have so little personal vocal ability that I am bound by public petition and court order never to sing in public again. So for me, the songs that really stick in my mind are the ones that are as well-written as they are well-sung. They also must never have been played 72 times in one day on the same radio station. “Unchained Melody” is my favorite classic. More currently, I like Marc Cohn’s “True Companion.” Play that one with a loved one in the room and you better make sure there are handrails around.
Shannon Ward - While I was sifting through my record collection, it occurred to me that my favorite love song, like my favorite color or favorite food, is entirely contingent upon my mood at any given moment; however, so as not to be completely indecisive, I decided to go with Ani DiFranco’s “Hour Follows Hour” because it’s the one song that I find comforting regardless of whether I’m feeling elated, disappointed, angry, or any of the other emotions on the “How Are you Feeling Today?” posters. The song is about how even though love is this crazy, complicated, perplexing thing that may or may not wind up being painful, it’s still worth all the trouble. It reminds me not to get so distracted by uncontrollable variables that I lose sight of what I think love should really be about: wanting each other to be happy.
Lia Tremblay - Three years ago, when my husband was still just my boyfriend, he asked me out of the blue to name my all-time favorite love song. After a lot of thinking, I came up with "Something" by The Beatles. (You know, Something in the way she woowoos me ... ) I love its sweet simplicity, and the open-endedness of it sounds like something is just getting started. My choice won me some cool points when we learned that Frank Sinatra -- a guy who knows love songs -- once called it "the greatest love song ever written." Weeks later, Patrick played it on his stereo just before asking me to be his wife. That's a lot of cool points!
Johanna Royo - My favorite love song is “At Last” by Etta James. Although my true love did “come along” just a few days into my freshman year of college, we didn’t get married for 7 (long) years. Let me explain. I wanted to marry Joe on the spot, but he wasn’t convinced that his future army career included a wife. After 3 years of not dating, he decided I was, in fact, the love of his life. I didn’t take much convincing. It sounds like the “happily ever after” part of the story would come in here, it didn’t. When my then boyfriend asked my dad for my hand in marriage, Dad said no! He said no again the next year. My father wasn’t sure that the life of a young lieutenant’s wife was right for his oldest daughter. But my patient boyfriend just worked harder to show him otherwise. Finally in 2001, with my father’s blessing, we danced our first dance “at last.” One more thing, my father adores my husband now and has admonished my younger sisters to bring home boys “just like Joe.”
Jason Brady – My favorite love song? “Sounds great,” I said over the cell phone, unconvincingly, when Sara gave me the assignment. “Is she nuts?” What kind of Tea for Two was she serving over the holidays? Doesn’t she know men are from Mars and women from Venus? I don’t know any Silly Love Songs. I met my wife in college as a Young Girl when a virus called disco infected music. That soured me on melody during our courtship. Wait! There was high school and Slow Dancin at the teen club with Angie, Cecilia and Mandy. Or was it Brandy? I can’t remember her name but she was a fine girl, and at the age of 16, I really wasn’t concentrating on the lyrics. I asked my college-aged son if Queen’s Another One Bites the Dust would work. He said I might be able to slip it past Sara as a song about another lost love. For once, I’m at a loss for words. Perhaps a nap will inspire me. All I have to do is Dream and maybe something will come to me.
Celia McGuire - This is not a song per se, but a melody...LIEBESFREUD (LOVE'S JOY) By Fritz Kreisler (Austrian-born American composer and violinist)
b. Vienna 1875 - d. N.Y. 1962. I consider this one of the most beautiful romantic violin and piano compositions, an old-Vienna melody. It has the power to transport me to the atmosphere of a Viennese Coffee House, imagining having my loved one at my side and feeling the uncontainable joy of being alive and loved. (Regrettably, we had no photo of Celia to share with you, and she was unavailable to have one taken by our staff photographers.)
