Hello, and welcome to my site, home of me, Rich DeWilde. I am a singer songwriter who primarily writes minimalist songs of loss on piano. I know, everybody's worst nightmare, Worse than a hippie playing lyrical rewrites of Simon and Garfunkel on an out of tune guitar with a missing string. This post primarily focuses on the first seven songs on the music page.
A lot has been happening the past few years that gave fruition to many of these first seven songs. It took a few years to process exactly what was going down, then to turn it into a cohesive set that even actually blends well with my previous material. This set focuses on the nature of loss in many different aspects. General blues/love loss, loss of innocence, loss of youth as we drift into later years, a yearning for connection, and especially the loss of loved ones through that passage of time called death. Altogether, the music can be incredibly relaxing, especially when enjoyed with a glass of wine and a meditative spirit.
Three of these songs -West Towards, Mama Always Said, and Absence - focus on the loss of loved ones through death. In 2014-15, I saw the passing of four persons in rapid succession. A best friend's wife (herself a close friend) lost her mom to cancer in September. I, and my cousins, then lost an uncle and father a few months later in November. Within two months, my own mom had passed away in January after a minor stroke incapacitated her, then a major stroke left her brain dead. Three months later, that same best friend lost his brother. It was a time of leaning on each other but knowing we were and are all left with our own burden and grief. One digs deeply into the healing power of music.
I initially started recording the majority of these seven songs in 2018 but had to put them on hold for another project. But in that time, I was able to write and define Love Me Anymore and Summer Fades. Adding those two to the previous material gave me what I feel is a very strong, unified set that moves smoothly into previous material that is closely related, such as Wish Away, Can't Recall, and People Need Love (see the music page). Recording started back up in June 2019 on random weekend nights.
While these songs may appear to be sad due to the concept of loss, I take heart, and hope you can do the same - that I have my loved ones who surround me with more care than I know. We partake of life with joy and occasional abandon - though not as much abandon as when we were 25, damn it. We face the future knowing life is finite but with hearts full of life and love. I'll stop there before I sound worse than a piano player writing minimalist songs of loss. Hats off.
All CDs are available on iTunes, Amazon, etc., and can be found on Spotify as well.