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Introduction:


A series of essays wherein I explore the numerous musical identities of my favorite musician: from child prodigy to teen idol to guitar hero to singer/songwriter to award-winning in-demand film composer.
Featuring news/updates and commentary/analysis of Trevor's career and associated projects.
Comments are disabled but please feel free to contact me at rabinesque.blog@gmail.com.



Wednesday, January 28, 2015

The Secret Discography: hearing double

One of a series which examines Trevor’s musical career in South Africa.

As long-time fans are aware, Trevor possessed a boatload of credits in the ZA years...and one song in particular has a double life, even.

"I Surrender" - a song Trevor and Patric van Blerk co-wrote for Margaret Singana - was first recorded in 1975 with co-production and arrangement by Trevor, and it's really a great vehicle for Lady Africa's voice, the way she could effortlessly phrase with such power.  It appears on the album Stand By Your Man which was released internationally in 1976 with the title Where Is The Love.  Interestingly, there is also a song called "Love Will Find A Way" written by van Blerk and Fransua Roos - so we might surmise that was a title which lived in Trevor's mind for quite a long while.


In 1977 Sharon Tandy covered the song which Trevor also arranged and produced, but it's slower than the original.  It's really not surprising that nearly identical copies of the song exist simply because those stations who did not care to cross the color line in their programming could then play Tandy's version.  Tandy was an interesting figure in South African pop - she was once married to Frank Fenter (the man who signed Rabbitt to Capricorn Records in 1976) and had some recognition in the UK in the late 1960s as a contemporary of blue-eyed soul singers like Dusty Springfield, but ultimately returned to South Africa in 1970.


The tempo seems an unusual choice because the song is a disco anthem of sorts, it's meant to soar out of the speakers in keeping with its lyrical sentiment...I suppose you can tell which version I prefer.  So not only was Trevor incredibly busy with at least a dozen different musical ventures during the '70s, but also with reprising his own material and arrangements for different singers - and I don't believe there are many artists who can make that singular claim.