Ode to 905 Loma Vista Dr — "Loma Vista Breath"

[Intro]
Up on Loma Vista Drive
The quiet is alive
The hill view holds its breath
And watches the city arrive

[Verse 1]
It was nineteen twenty-eight
Gordon Kaufmann drew the slate
The Welsh roof and the Indiana stone
A weight that waits alone
Five red brick chimneys taste the air
A story settled there
(Piano enters, sparse and resonant)

[Verse 2]
The film crews have all gone
The long years with Lucy drawn
Across the leaded glass
All the whispered histories pass
From a mansion to a park
A landmark in the dark
Guarding the Trousdale lights below

[Chorus]
And the house remembers a different name
Before the fortune and the fame
El Rodeo de las Aguas
A gathering of the waters
It holds the quiet and the sound
On this old and hallowed ground
A gathering of all the years

[Bridge]
The formal gardens keep their lines
Against the twisting chaparral vines
(Strings swell slightly)
A single bat cuts a line across the twilight
And the steel-reinforced heart of the house beats on
It just beats on

[Outro]
The gathering is done
Just the evening and the one
Cool stone against your hand
On this piece of California land
El Rodeo de las Aguas
Goodnight.


Style:
Sweeping chamber pop with a languid tempo. A bed of cellos and violas,
a lone classical guitar, and a distant, melancholic piano. The vocals
are close-miked and unhurried, almost narrative, with a quiet intensity.
Think of a late-evening film score for a classic movie, ending on the
image of city lights appearing one by one from a high, quiet hill.