FRANK MILLS
BRAND NEW CD “THE FRANK MILLS STORY”
September 1, 2018
RELEASED IN SEPTEMBER OF 2018, FRANK MILLS IS EXTREMELY EXCITED ABOUT HIS LATEST CD – “THE FRANK MILLS STORY”. – “The Frank Mills Story” contains 16 songs that highlight or perhaps “tell the story” of his career which began some fifty years ago. Listening to this CD takes one through the musical journey of his fifty plus years at the piano, in the recording studio, and on stages around the world. The CD also contains a three page booklet which, in Frank’s own words, tells the story behind each and every song.
For many the “highlight” of the CD will be Cut # 16 – “Lest We Forget (Where Poppies Grow)”, a brand new song which Mills’ fans have never heard before. Here, Frank tells the story of this beautiful new song.
In 2017 I received an e-mail from Joanne McIsaac Johnson who had attended my November concert in Fredericton NB on November 6th, shortly before “Armistice Day”, November 11th. She was interested in my comments about songwriting and suggested that although there were several versions of music composed to the poem “In Flanders Fields”, by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae MD, I should do one. I mulled it over. As I read the poem several times I realized I had embarrassingly forgotten much of it. I realized that it would soon be 100 years since “The Great War” had ended, that within the lines of the poem “the torch, be yours to hold it high” was my high school motto with which I had ended my valedictory speech in 1958, that Dr. John McCrae had attended Medical studies at McGill University as I had (but went into music), that he was an associate of Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal (where my father died), that he taught physiology at the University of Vermont Hospital in Burlington Vermont, (where I now go for my medical needs), that Matt McIsaac (the whistle player on the song) is related to Joanne McIsaac Johnson (above) whose grandfather had been operated on by Dr. John McCrae during the war, and that Dr. McCrae died on January 28, 2018, 100 years ago. My latest song “Lest We Forget (Where Poppies Grow)” was recorded on July 11, 2018 in Toronto, 100 years after the end of World War 1 and the death of Dr. John McCrae. I pray I have done justice to this beautiful poem….. Frank Mills
THE FRANK MILLS STORY
1 – Love Me Love Me Love
2 – Reflections of My Childhood
3 – The Poet and I
4 – Hennessey’s Island
5 – Music Box Dancere
6 – Peter Piper
7 – Sunday Morning Suite
8 – Somewhere A Child Is Sleeping
9 – A Classical Rock
10 – Wish I Weren’t Alone
11 – Song of Haruko
12 – Rose Island Days
13 – Shadows of the Dancer
14 – Moving On
15 – Sadness Is Goodbye
16 – Lest We Forget (Where Poppies Grow)
