San Francisco lured quite a few classmates to her shores after graduation, many of whom landed at Henry Africa’s bar. Jeff Boylan, Dave Campisano and Dave Klinges were among the original ’79s to find work there, followed shortly thereafter by Scott Brooks (my Topliff roommate), Rich Pugh, Rick Reno, Kevin Sullivan, Buddy Teevens and Chris Wells (R.I.P.). Another member of the original Henry Africa’s crew was Ben Riley, who lives in Orinda, California, and practices law in the City by the Bay. Our multitalented class historian is an accomplished musician, as those of you who saw him play at Peter Christian’s and college parties will recall. At my request Ben was kind enough to share the following story of the making of one of his stellar new tunes. The song is called “Twilight Rising” and it goes something like this:


“I’ve been writing songs since before high school. My songwriting went on hiatus during law school, but 10 years ago I started singing and performing again and I’m now a regular in a monthly songwriters’ group—no covers allowed.


“In the fall of 2012 I read an article about a little town called Twilight, West Virginia, that was threatened by a nearby mountain-top removal (MTR) strip mining project. The poetry and ambiguity in the town’s name—the idea of twilight as either the end of one day or the beginning of another—resonated for me; I immediately thought, ‘Here’s my next song!’


“I wrote ‘Twilight Rising’ with Pete Seeger, John Prine and other singer-songwriters I admire in mind, and throughout the process I benefited from the advice of members of the group as well as my wife, Janet, who helped me simplify and sharpen the chorus. The group recommended I lose the first verse, lead with the second and then add a concluding verse, which is when the theme of the song ultimately crystallized. 


“I performed the song several times this past year to good audience response, and in November a friend in the songwriting group who is a professional music composer and producer urged me to record it at his studio. Needless to say I jumped at the opportunity! My friend played most of the instruments on the recording, including a killer guitar solo, and another friend contributed some great riffs on mandolin. During the session a Grammy-winning violinist who played on Carlos Santana’s Supernatural happened to stop by and added his fiddle to the mix. After 13 hours of studio time my little four-minute song was ready. It was an amazing experience!


“ ‘Twilight Rising’ is available on iTunes and Spotify, as well as on my Facebook page. I would love to play it in Twilight someday and hope that perhaps the song may assist the town’s efforts to protect itself from the MTR process!”


Thanks to Ben for penning this guest column. Enjoy “Twilight Rising,” everyone; it’s a gem. I wish you all a healthy new year and a happy 35th anniversary. Rock on, ’79s!


—Stanley Weil, 15 Peck Road, Mt. Kisco, NY 10549; (917) 428-0852; stanno79@gmail.com