Van Dyke Parks: He Did (and Played) It All

If Van Dyke Parks, who supplied lyrics and arranged songs with the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson, should ever write his autobiography, chapters would be devoted to his time in the presence of a genius: Albert Einstein.

When Van Dyke was ten years old, the Hattiesburg, Mississippi, transplant was part of a Princeton, NJ-based boys’ choir that serenaded the locals at Christmas time. When what to their wondering eyes should appear out of a house was Mr. Einstein and his violin; he fiddled as the kids sang “Silent Night.”

Meeting Einstein prepared Van Dyke to meet another genius two years later when he turned to acting and played the part of Tommy Manicotti on Jackie Gleason’s The Honeymooners.  In a 2012 interview with the Huffington Post, Van Dyke recalled his time working with the Great One:  “I only had a couple of lines, but I didn’t blow them, not until Gleason blew his at least, then we would have a conversation. Gleason was a man of immense ability, but one of those abilities was not memorizing a script. He was a genius at improv, but that’s also why he didn’t have children or dogs on the show. I was lucky that I got to do two shows and meet him.”

When he hit his teen years, he left the acting world to make classical music at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Tech.  One of his teachers, the legendary composer Aaron Copland, did not tickle Parks’ fancy, dismissing contemporary classical music: “It ran the gamut from ebony to slate grey.”

He found folk music more to his liking and joined his older brother, Carson, to form a folkie duo in L.A.

While Carson later ventured on his own, writing “Something Stupid” for Frank and Nancy Sinatra, his brother found that his career path led to an animated jungle, aka Disney’s full-length movie, The Jungle Book. Van Dyke was hired to arrange “The Bare Necessities” song, but left to make musical connections in La-La-Land. He connected with Randy Newman (whose debut album Parks co-produced) and briefly played keyboards for Frank Zappa, only to leave, citing, “I didn’t want to be screamed at.”

Van Dyke found freelance session work with renowned producer Terry Melcher, who utilized Parks on Paul Revere and the Raiders’ hit, “Good Thing.”  Their mutual acquaintance, David Crosby, asked him to join a band he was in called the Byrds, but even though he played organ on the group’s “5D (Fifth Dimension)” song, Parks wanted to avoid any screaming scene. He told Ear Candy Mag, “Fame seemed to bring associated problems, and I wanted no part of it. I felt that it was unseemly to want to be screamed at by adoring fans.” Parks could’ve also blamed Crosby for introducing him to Brian Wilson.

Wilson and Parks bonded with Van Dyke, advising Brian to add a cello part to a song he was working on called “Good Vibrations.”  When cellist Jesse Ehrlich arrived at the studio to play notes that Brian was supposed to have written, his music stand was bare.  Parks suggested to Brian, “Have him play eighth notes triplets, and as a result, we got the ruby slippers moment of the song.”

Brian was so happy with his pal’s contributions that he hired him to be a lyricist on the sessions for an album that was going to be called SMiLE only for one Beach Boy to frown at Parks’ lyrics, which included “Over and over, the crow cries, uncover the cornfield” from “Cabinessence” or “Columnated ruins domino” in “Surf’s Up.”

Singer Mike Love sniped that Parks words were “acid alliteration” and didn’t appreciate Parks’ presence—and vice versa.  Parks recalled, “I walked away from the situation as soon as I realized that I was causing friction between him (Wilson) and other group members. It was an expensive decision for me not to continue my association with the most powerful artist in the music business at the time, but I walked away from that funhouse.”

Van Dyke walked into another studio to record his orchestral pop opus, Song Cycle, which was beloved by critics but not by record buyers.  The LP, then one of the most expensive albums ever produced, flopped, only for Warner Brothers to pour salt into Van Dyke’s wounds by reminding the world how much money they poured into the project.

An ad in Billboard meant to boost album sales read, “How we lost $35,509.50 on The Album of the Year (Damn it!).”  Parks was not amused, remarking, “I believe the music was beyond Warner Brothers’ comprehension, and flippancy was the only conclusion that they could come to. And it hurt.”

But Parks bounced back.  He went on to record six more solo albums and became a go-to arranger for artists like U-2 ( “All I Want to Do”) and Fiona Apple ( “Never is a Promise”).  In the mid-1990’s, Parks reconnected with an ex-songwriting partner who seemed to be disconnected from reality.

Before he collaborated with Brian Wilson on his Orange Crate Art album, Parks went to Brian’s home. “When I found him, he was alone in a room staring at a television. It was off.”

Parks then co-wrote a children’s book called Jump! The Adventures of Brer Rabbit.  But Van Dyke’s proudest achievement might be having a greyhound named after him.

When author Richard Henderson was researching his Van Dyke Parks’ Song Cycle (33 1/3) book, Van Dyke explained that a Florida man who owned racing dogs loved “California pop music” and named three of his canines after three bold-faced names of the genre: Van Dyke Parks, Randy Newman, and Harry Nilsson.  After Parks broke the news to Nilsson, whose songs on the Popeye film were arranged by Van Dyke, that the greyhound owner said Randy Newman was the fastest greyhound of the three, Nilsson demanded that Randy Newman, the dog version, take a drug test.

-Mark Daponte

Photo: Van Dyke Parks, 1967 (public domain)