Never Too Late: Dennis Welch's Musical Journey at 69
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Cathy:Welcome to late boomers, our podcast guide to creating your third act with style, power, and impact. Hi. I'm Cathy Worthington.
Merry:And I'm Merry Elkins. Join us as we bring you conversations with successful entrepreneurs, entertainers, and people with vision who are making a difference in the world.
Cathy:Everyone has a story, and we'll take you along for the ride on each interview, recounting the journey our guests have taken to get where they are, inspiring you to create your own path to success. Let's get started. Hi. I'm Kathy Worthington, and welcome to Late Boomers. I'm here with my cohost, Mary Elkins, and we're welcoming a new guest to our podcast, author, songwriter, and recording artist, Dennis Welch, who at 69 years old has just released his latest album titled Strong.
Merry:And I'm Mary Elkins. After composing over 500 songs, recording and performing live worldwide, he says that if he could wave a wand on how the world would remember him, he would choose just one word, storyteller. Welcome, Dennis. We're looking forward to hearing your story.
Dennis Welch:Well, thank you, ladies. Thank you for having me on, and I love I love telling this story, and I always hope that it's encouraging to people, especially of a certain age, right, that you're really never done kind of thing, and so we'll get to that, but I appreciate you having me Thank
Cathy:you, Dennis, and please tell us about your early years and when you started writing songs. Was it a family music tradition in your family?
Dennis Welch:Well, my family loved music. They loved particularly country music, and I grew up I spent every weekend at my grandmother's, and she had a little green plastic radio that she turned on it way before daylight, and she would get the farm report, and she lived right in the middle of Houston. I thought, why is she doing this? Right? I mean, grandma, come on.
Dennis Welch:You don't need to do that. But eventually she she she got a farm. Even in her sixties she did, but anyway and so my family loved music, but nobody really played an instrument. And and so, you know and I loved listening to the radio, and I had certain songs that I liked, but the idea of writing songs was it never occurred to me. But I've always been a word guy, and so I, you know, I could read and spell before I started school, and my and my mother had me tested.
Dennis Welch:So I went to University of Houston. They tested me. They they did some tests at the the elementary school, little inner city elementary school that I went to. And I remember distinctly going to the principal's office with my mother before school started, and miss McRe, and I remember her because of what she did for me. But anyway, in this moment, she was very imposing and she she handed me a book and she said, okay, read that page, Dennis, and then close the book and tell me what you read.
Dennis Welch:And so so I did that, and when I finished reading it and telling her what I read, she looked at my mother and she said, he does not need to be in the first grade or the second grade. He needs to start in the third grade. So let's move him up to the third grade. My mother said, no. He already likes to play ball and sports, and he probably won't wanna play against kids that are bigger than him.
Dennis Welch:And so maybe there's another accommodation that you can do. And so anyway, on day one of the first grade, I'm sitting in my my first grade class, and you know, I just got there. And it was time for the reading circle, and in steps Ms. McRe, and she's called my name and said, you know, come with me. I thought I was in trouble.
Dennis Welch:Anyway, she we went out the hallway. I thought, I just got here. I'm already in trouble. So she she held my hand. I remember this.
Dennis Welch:She held my hand as she walked me down to the school library, and I had never been in a library. And we walk into this you know, it looked it looked cavernous, but it was probably just a little elementary school library. Right? And so we walk over to the far wall, and there's all of these children's books along there, and she says, look. Every day when your reading circle meets, come down here, excuse yourself quietly, come down to the library, and you can read.
Dennis Welch:These are for first, second, and third graders. But then this was the real crazy thing. She turn we turn around and we look out at the library and she says, and by the way, you don't have to read the Cat in the Hat. You can read anything in the library. And so by the time I got out of the sixth grade, I had read all the works of Mark Twain.
Dennis Welch:I read it such a gift. Know, I read the first time I was really moved by a book was Charlotte's Web. And I thought, wow, you can make people feel that with words? That's just I wanna try to figure out how to do that, right? And so anyway, saw I was always a word guy.
Dennis Welch:And then when I was about maybe 17, I was driving home from a date. And one of the themes, ladies, that you will hear in this conversation is that throughout my life, you know, people say, oh, this is just dumb luck. You know, your life is a random sample of events and all this stuff. But for me, it's I can't I really can't believe that, because the right person has shown up at the right time for me exactly when I needed them. And so this is the first example really of that, you know, musically was I write this song driving home from a date, and I was singing it in my car and trying to remember it, and it had a had verses and a chorus.
Dennis Welch:And I'm like, that's cool. That's that's kind of a song. Now what do I do with it? Right? So the next day, I went into my my little job.
Dennis Welch:I worked full time, and I was going to school, you know, full time, and the guy that I worked for always kept his ovation guitar under his desk. And so I sang this song all day because there weren't there weren't these that you could record something on quickly. Right? And so Yeah. At the end of the day, he says, what is that song you've been humming all day?
Dennis Welch:And I said, well, it's a song I wrote, you know, driving home a date last night. And he goes, well, let's play it. And he takes his guitar out, and he plays and sings the song with me. And that was that. It was I was like, wow.
Dennis Welch:And he said, hey, Dennis, this is a real song. And you know what? You should see if there's more of this that you can do. So go buy a cheap guitar, learn a few chords, see what happens. And and and I tried to learn chords, but as I learned chords, I could hear in the air.
Dennis Welch:I heard I heard the story. I heard the lyrics, and I started writing songs almost immediately. And and then eventually, you know, started recording some of that stuff and, you know, getting out and playing and all that, and every bit of that was encouraging. You know, was exactly what I needed.
Merry:Story. It it sounds like you were you were born that way. You're a musical genius. But Well,
Dennis Welch:I don't know about a genius, but but I am musical.
Cathy:You're tapped into where it comes from. You're tapped
Dennis Welch:into the
Cathy:universe to hear it.
Dennis Welch:Well, and the thing is this, you know what? I worked for the Gallup organization for thirteen years, and right when they were changing from being a not very profitable polling, but well known polling company to the consulting juggernaut they became with StrengthsFinder and engagement, all this stuff they did. And I was standing outside of a meeting room one day with with the late Don Clifton, the grandfather of positive psychology, inventor of the StrengthsFinder. He climbed every mountain, basically. There was nothing left for him.
Dennis Welch:He was around 80 at the time. And and so everybody walked away from us and went in the room and left just me and him, and I it was never just me and him. He was always had a crowd around him. I said, hey, Don. Look here.
Dennis Welch:I said, it's just you and me. I said, tell me the most profound thing you can tell me in two minutes before we walk in there. And he got a big smile on his face, and he held up his index finger. He said, Dennis, every single person on the planet, every single person, the guy that parks your car, the guy sleeping on the park bench, every person can do at least one thing better than 10,000 other people. Oh.
Dennis Welch:He said, that's the good news. He said, the bad news is most people don't have any idea what that one thing is. And, you know, and I'm thankful I'm thankful that I I found this stuff, but I don't think you find it on the road of safety. I mean, you know, everybody has a script for their life, and they go, you know, I'm gonna go to college. I'm gonna be a lawyer.
Dennis Welch:I'm gonna be a doctor or whatever they're gonna be. And, you know, or I'm gonna go to work for that company where I get a paycheck every two weeks, and I and, you know, and I'm never gonna have to worry about money and all that. And you know, we've never really done that. And stepping out like that, there are resources and people and things that show up to help you, and they're just invisible when you're on the road of safety. You can't even see that out there.
Dennis Welch:How cool it is. Been adventure for sure.
Merry:That is so true. Climb climb every mountain and and, you know, make sure that you don't fall, but keep climbing. Right? Yeah. Yes.
Merry:I think
Dennis Welch:I I don't want to live any other way, you know.
Merry:So so Dennis, you talked a little about your grandmother, but who influenced you in your early days? I assume some of she was an influence, but who else? And also, who are your influences now?
Dennis Welch:Well, one of the things I learned after I did so I did a I did a record that was kind of a gospel record, and it got played on the radio. In Houston, I heard it all day. If I was driving around, heard my music on the radio, which is so encouraging. But I really didn't wanna do gospel music, and so I made a rock and roll record. Well, when that record came out, I went to my mother's house, and and I walked in, and on her on the bar was a publishing contract, a one song publishing contract, and she had written a song with with Floyd Tillman, a famous singer songwriter at the time, and she'd never told me that.
Dennis Welch:And I said, mom, you see what I'm doing? I said, you you you could you could couldn't mention that you had done this? And she said, well, and only your mother will say this. She goes, really didn't wanna encourage you too much, you know, in the music business because it's hard. And she's right.
Dennis Welch:It is hard. And so but but here's my here's my first musical, real musical influence was a guy named Kemper Krabbe, a very unusual name. He was, and still is, one of the most talented people I've ever met. But and so he produced my first couple of albums. And, you know, before we started work on the first album, which was a miracle because I had somebody just give us money to go they loved my music and said, this guy had more money than he needed apparently, and said, just go make a record and send the bills to me kinda thing.
Dennis Welch:So Kemper produced it, and and about a week before we went in the studio, I was taking voice lessons from his wife, and I had to drive forty five minutes to and forty five minutes from like you do in Houston sometimes. And so it was late at night, we're walking out to the car, and Kemper had three albums under his arm, and I noticed he had them, And he was one of the maybe three or four people that have ever called me Denny. You know, my grandmother did. My 102 year old author that I'm gonna have lunch with on Wednesday, she calls me Denny, and I don't correct her, by the way. And so he so we get out to my car, and he says he said, Denny, can I ask a question?
Dennis Welch:He goes, do you think that you're really doing your best work? And I said, well, Kemper, this is a heck of a time to ask that. We're going to the studio next Tuesday. And I said, so why are you asking me this? And he said, well, look.
Dennis Welch:I trust you. He said, I I and I, you know, whatever you tell me, I'm gonna I'm gonna go with. He said, but I wanna give you these three albums to take home with you, and I want you to listen to them. And then I want you to call me tomorrow and tell me if you're doing your best work. And so he sent me home with the first two Dan Fockelberg records, souvenirs, Netherlands, really.
Dennis Welch:And, I mean, yeah, I had no chance. Right? And then he sent the other record was a was a Leonard Cohen record. And and so I went home with those, and I listened all the way through to all of those. And when I got when I got to the Leonard Cohen record, I was emotional.
Dennis Welch:I was thinking, man, my stuff is not like this. And so I called him and I said, you know what, Kemper? First, you made me mad. Okay? I said, but it took a lot of guts to say that to me.
Dennis Welch:And I said, that's iron sharpening iron. So one man sharpens another like Proverbs says. I said, you know what? I'm gonna remember this. And so you call off those sessions.
Dennis Welch:I'm gonna go back and revisit my music and these songs and all that. And so we we cut some other it it was so here's the crazy part. So I'm 69 years old now. I was 22 or three when we had that conversation. So almost fifty years later, when I'm writing a song, I still hear Kemper.
Dennis Welch:I hear his voice saying, hey, Denny, are you doing your best work? Like, don't settle for something that rhymes. Settle for what goes there and don't stop until you have it kind of thing. And so Mhmm. You know, so that that probably was was my earliest and maybe most important musical influence.
Dennis Welch:You know, Steve Martin said somebody Charlie Rose or somebody said, so do you get asked a lot to, you know, you have people come up to you and say, hey. I'm funny. You know, let's can you introduce me to your agent or something? And he goes, well, sometimes that happens, but he goes, if that happens he said, these people are asking the wrong question. He goes, because here's the right question.
Dennis Welch:He said, make yourself world class at something. Take the time and don't do any shortcuts and become world class at something. He said, the day you do, he said, the polls change. And he said you don't have to walk around with your hat in your hand anymore because people start coming to you. And you know, you think about it, but as you know, that guy has done it three times.
Dennis Welch:He was the top comedian in the world. He was top one of the top movie stars in the world, and now he's one of the top banjo. He's a Grammy winning banjo player. I mean, he might be the best banjo player in the world right now. And so yes.
Dennis Welch:And so, you know, and so he is terrific.
Cathy:And he's got a new show on TV that I love, Only Murders in
Dennis Welch:the Building. Oh, yes. Absolutely. Only
Cathy:that. You can't
Dennis Welch:seen the first two seasons, but I love it. And so
Cathy:I love it.
Dennis Welch:You know? And so that's that's a lot of it is that pursuit. And I think I think writers have a have a switch that goes on that that they cannot turn off. You know, I I mean, look, all my life, I've had people say, what are you doing? You're sitting in a room when dancing with the stars is on, and you could be sitting on your couch and watching TV, and you're in there parsing a a word or phrase in a song or a musical phrase or whatever.
Dennis Welch:And look, it's compulsion. I think it's obsession. It's an obsession. I'm obsessed. And if I start thinking about a song, I'm obsessed with it until it's done.
Cathy:And who else would you consider influenced your life that you learned some things from?
Dennis Welch:Well, I'll just tell you one more musical thing. So I met sort of by again, it felt like it was an accident. K? I was at a songwriter event, and the great Alan Chamberlain who wrote I Can't Make You Love Me and The House Had Built Me, and he walked on he's a hall of fame writer. And we met and became great friends.
Dennis Welch:We're still I talked texted with him today. And, you know, and he has been a huge influence on me. And I actually got to write a song with him. I he kept asking me. I'd known him for probably ten years.
Dennis Welch:I'd never asked for anything. I didn't ever I never even asked to write with him. And he called me one day while I was driving home from Louisiana. Susie and I were driving back, and he said, how can I help you with your songwriting career? And I said, Alan, look.
Dennis Welch:I said, I'm the one guy who doesn't really I wanna be your friend. I don't I don't need I mean, I appreciate you, but I don't really need anything. K? One week later, because I didn't know what I was talking about. That's the truth.
Dennis Welch:And so one within one week, I send a song in to this little couple in Nashville, an independent artist who were looking for songs, and they write me this big dim the lights email back, and they say, wow. We love this idea. We think that this could be I Can't Make You Love Me, but we also think you're not done writing this song yet. Are you willing to do some more writing on it? And I thought, well, you know what?
Dennis Welch:I've been singing this song. I even recorded it probably fifteen years before that. It was already chronicled somewhere in that form. So what I did is Alan said, how can I help you? I thought, you know what?
Dennis Welch:I'm gonna take him up on that. So I sent that version of the song and their note to him, and I said, you know what, Alan? I don't I don't still need your help on anything. I just wanna know. I said, listen to this song, read their note, and tell me if they're crazy.
Dennis Welch:Because if they are, I'm not tearing this song apart and redoing it. And so one week later, Alan Shandlin called me, this hall of fame songwriter. What a gift this is. Okay? He called me up today, and he said, okay.
Dennis Welch:You might wanna sit down. This is gonna take a while. He goes, first of all, they're right. This is a great idea. The song is called Worth My Time, and he said he said this song talks about giving people who are being abused or verbally or physically abused the strength to say that's enough.
Dennis Welch:We're not we're not doing this anymore. Okay? And he said, you have to finish writing. Yes. And they it does need some more writing.
Dennis Welch:So here's what he says. He goes, you know what? So I'm not gonna I'm not gonna co write this with you because nobody knows you. And so but they know me, and they're gonna think you sat in the room while I while I wrote the song. And so I'm gonna be your editor.
Dennis Welch:And he said, I'm gonna call you every night at 09:00, and I'm gonna see what kind of progress you've made on this song today. Well, he was not kidding. And I I write about this in my book on communication, so what do you say? And it's the last page I tell the story. So so we get the first two verses done and the bridge done, and then I cannot get the third I can't get the last verse written.
Dennis Welch:And I wrote 50 last verses, and none of them worked. And he would say, no. No. You know what? A great song puts you in a trance, and your last verses are taking me out of a trance.
Dennis Welch:You gotta figure out how to finish it right. We went to
Cathy:his Wow. Tough.
Dennis Welch:To their it was very tough. And, you know, and people think, oh, why don't they even get paid for that? This is just three minutes of stuff. That's they don't know. Okay.
Dennis Welch:So we go up to Nashville, and he and his wife invite us out to their farm for lunch. And I was thinking, man, I hope he didn't even mention this song. I'm tired of it. We've been doing it for six months. I had all these sticky notes on my car dashboard of ideas that I had on the way there.
Dennis Welch:I mean, I was talk about obsessed. And so anyway, we get there, and of course, he finished lunch, and of course, he says, hey. Let's go in my writing room, and let's hear that latest last verse. Right? And I get in there, and he and I I was reluctant, but I thought, no.
Dennis Welch:No. This this is a this is a privilege. Remember that. So we get in there, and he hands me a guitar. He said, look.
Dennis Welch:Mac Davis was the last guy to play this guitar, so don't mess it up. K? And I sing him the latest last verse, and he goes, no. That's not it. And I said to him, it's a great, great lesson.
Dennis Welch:K? I said, Alan, I said, do you guys write like this? We've been writing this song for six months every day. And he reached under his writing room, his table, and he pulled out a big, like, dictionary thick stack of legal paper, all in ballpoint pen, no technology of any kind. And he pushes it across the table to me, and he said, that is one song I've been working on for seven years.
Cathy:Yeah. He
Dennis Welch:said, oh, you know what? We do write like that. And he said, so stop whining and get back in there and fix this. You finish this song, you know. So anyway, what what I know is he called me one day, and we had cried on the phone.
Dennis Welch:We prayed one day on the phone. He was so put out. He was like, you you have to do this. Well, anyway, so one day, I I had it. I had enough.
Dennis Welch:And I said, you know what, Alan? I said, do you know what this last verse might be? And he goes, I probably do. I said, well, then why in the world don't you write it and put us out of our misery? Okay?
Dennis Welch:And he goes, okay. Give me two weeks. He leaves the phone for five minutes, and he comes back and he calls me. He goes, what about this? Is it worth this pain And your words that bruise, should I be the one you love to use?
Dennis Welch:If I have to ask, then I should know that it's worth my time to let you go. Are you kidding me?
Merry:Oh.
Dennis Welch:And I said, you thought of that in two minutes? And he said, well, my sword is sharper than yours. Oh. I do this I do this I love you, but you know what? You don't do this every single day like me.
Dennis Welch:And he said, so and so there, we're done. Go cut a demo of this. Let's see if we get somebody to record it. And so I finally put it on a record a couple of years ago myself. But he's been a huge influence.
Dennis Welch:Know, he's he's taught me how to not try to figure out what the market needs and all that, but to just write from the heart, basically.
Merry:Yeah. Is that what you learned? I mean, what is what if can you pinpoint exactly what you learned from that?
Dennis Welch:Well, one thing I learned is there's no shortcuts to greatness. You know, we live in a culture and I think humans are sort of wired. This is what worries me about AI, by the way, but that's another show, is that it's easy. It's easy to go ask some some faceless thing that doesn't know you to say, could you write that for me? And they write something that's pretty good, and you there you go.
Dennis Welch:But but somebody said this this week. Somebody said that Neil deGrasse Tyson said this, and I think this is really I'm still reeling from hearing it, but he said if Einstein had not discovered the theory of relativity, somebody would have down the road. K? Some scientists would have figured it out. He goes, but if Monet had decided not to paint, there would never be a Monet painting.
Dennis Welch:Isn't that profound? And and so, you know, to be really great at something, you you can't you can't take a shortcut. You you gotta do the hard stuff. You gotta work outwork everybody. You gotta spend time in a room by yourself and figure it out.
Dennis Welch:And so that's really the lesson, Mary, that I learned was was, you know, don't no matter how tempting it is, you know, don't just rhyme something because you wanna finish a song and go to the next one. Figure out what how to make that song the most impactful that it can be, and then you can be satisfied with that, and you can move ahead to something else. So that's that's a
Merry:good lesson. Lesson for for any artist out there or Yeah. And Dennis or project.
Cathy:Dennis, there was a period when you didn't record, but you wrote songs.
Dennis Welch:Yes.
Cathy:And how did that change you and the work you're doing now?
Dennis Welch:Well, look, you know what? I was so disappointed. I had a chance to go out as a bass tech with a band that was opening for Billy Squire and another band. And I'd never toured like that, and my kids were little. And I'd been with them twenty four hours.
Dennis Welch:I was mom and daddy. You know? And my wife was working and doing stuff trying to we're all trying to keep the lights on and all that. Well, I only lasted three weeks on that tour, Kathy, and I and I was like, you know what? I don't think I can do this.
Dennis Welch:And I called the manager who hired me, and the band was King's X spectacular three piece band, by the way. And I called this guy, and I said, hey, man. I said, look, I don't I've never been drunk, and I've never taken drugs. And I said, wanna tell you something. I said, if I stay out here a year, which is how long this is gonna be, I'm afraid I'm gonna be doing both, and it's probably gonna kill me.
Dennis Welch:And I said, so I gotta figure this out. He goes, well he was so sweet. And he said, look, why don't you go out the airport? I'll have a ticket waiting on you and come home. He goes, sometimes the ladder of success is against the wrong wall.
Dennis Welch:Go home and figure it out. Oh. And he's sitting that profound and he said, look, but I'm gonna ask you to do something for me because you kind of owe me. He goes, please don't stop writing songs. And so I I I kept writing.
Dennis Welch:First, I didn't write. I was mad about the whole thing. And I took a year, and I didn't write a word. And then I wrote a song called Jacob's Ladder that explained everything to me. And and then I made an album in '95, I made an album in February, and I made a decision when I walked out of the studio.
Dennis Welch:I came home and I told Susie, I said, I'm not going back in the studio again until I find somebody who can help that's an arranger. I'm not an arranger, I'm a writer. A producer, a real producer who can elevate this material, I'm not gonna do it. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna go back and do a b minus. Not that this was b minus, but we can do better, right?
Dennis Welch:And so I didn't know what I was saying because I went eighteen years without that. And so one day I came home and I I told Susie I was in my mid sixties and I said, you know what? I got a problem. I said, I'm worried about dying and all of this material being in a drawer somewhere and people and these kids just throwing it out because they don't really know what it is. And she said, well, you know, you have that prayer list that you pray through every morning for an hour with all these other people, and I want you to put something on there for yourself as a novel idea.
Dennis Welch:So I did. And within ninety days, I'm driving through Nashville, and we went to dinner with a friend of ours who's a super crazy talented guy who had been the guitar player in Little River Band for eighteen years. He was just he's just a gifted, humble person who could do anything musically. And we're sitting across the table from each other. I didn't make this happen, by the way.
Dennis Welch:I'm just having dinner. And he looks at me and he goes, what are you working on? Because I know you are always working on something. And I said, well, his name is Rich Herring. I said, well, Rich, I got a new song Susie likes a lot.
Dennis Welch:She thinks it's the best thing I've ever written. And he goes, what are you gonna do with it? And I said, well, I don't know what to do with it. That's the problem. And he goes, well, why don't you sing it for me?
Dennis Welch:I said, here in the restaurant? He goes, right now. Sing an acapella for me. And so I sang the first verse and chorus to one of me, and he put his hand up, was emotional, and he said, you stop now. He said, Susie's right as usual.
Dennis Welch:Okay? And second of all, I'm supposed to help you with this. Did you know this? And I said, no, I didn't. And he goes, okay, let's cut this song.
Dennis Welch:And I said, want some hotshot Nashville singer to sing on this? He goes, no, I want you to sing on it. So we recorded that song. It was immediately the best thing I'd ever done. We did a second song about forgiveness called I can't remember, and that was also right there at the top.
Dennis Welch:And and he called me after that, and he goes, look, I've been doing this for twenty five years. I know when something special is going on. And he goes, I didn't know you had this kind of material. He goes, let's make an album. So we made an album, came out in '21, called What Love Makes Us Do, and it it was on the first Grammy ballot in five categories.
Dennis Welch:And then '23, If I Live To Be A 100, also on the first Grammy ballot in five categories. I'm not gonna win a Grammy, but somebody inside NARIS thought it was worthy. And then and then right now, my new album Strong is gonna so we've recorded three albums and release them in four or five years.
Cathy:I wanted to ask you about that because you're in your sixties now and having a musical renaissance of sorts. Yes. So tell tell our boomer audience your thoughts on aging.
Dennis Welch:Well, look, I think that what most of what we're told let me see how to say this. If you don't proactively plan to be doing something that matters in your sixties, the momentum of the culture will sweep you out to pasture, and that's a shame. There's a lot of people, most of us are better than we were when we were 30. We're wiser, we have more contacts, more people will take our phone calls. We know more.
Cathy:We agree with you on that. Sure you do.
Dennis Welch:You should agree because it's the truth. And I think a lot of what we hear in the cultures of bald faced lie. And so you know what? I just have chosen not to believe it. I go to the gym five days a week to take care of myself.
Dennis Welch:And I'm not doing that so I can live to be a 100. I'm doing that so that right now while I'm doing what I'm doing in this world, that I can be good at it still, that I can still feel great and and, you know, feel some energy to do it. And so, you know, and it's it's one of the themes, Kathy, that comes up every almost every interview I do, people say, what? You're 69 years old and you're going on tour now. That's the other thing.
Dennis Welch:We're leaving. We've discovered house concerts. And I mean, people have invited us. We're going to Maine and Connecticut, and Nashville, and all over doing house concerts with people who've invited us to come to their house, and they fill it up with people, and we have a have a ball. So
Cathy:So how is how
Merry:is doing concerts now different than when you were younger?
Dennis Welch:Oh, this is a lot more fun.
Cathy:Mhmm. You
Dennis Welch:know? Is it a art or music playing No. Or It's not. You know? Because here's the thing.
Dennis Welch:I think when you plug into that thing that you know you're here for, there's a lot of there's a lot of energy there. You know? And, I mean, I did one Saturday night in in Houston, album release party, and there were there were people packed into the room, and they were from the widest swath in my life. So people from my high school were there. People from my first church were there.
Dennis Welch:My family, my grandkids were there. I mean, there was just this broad and it was just joyful. I mean, I I did ninety minutes, and I felt like I hadn't done anything. And I I think it's That's right. I think, you know, a lot of people think, oh, I just couldn't do that.
Dennis Welch:It's like, well, who told you that? You know, you should you should ignore the naysayers and
Cathy:Yeah. Great advice. Tell us more about your album Strong and how did that come about?
Dennis Welch:Well, Strong so we we were I mean, we're we've hit another gear now, Rich and I have, because we we've done a we've done a lot of work together, and he's so there's no drama. It's so easy to do. Well, we thought we had the title track relentlessly, which is is crazy. What he did with that song is crazy. Anyway, I thought that was the title track, and Susie did too.
Dennis Welch:So right before, we went up to cut the last three vocals, so we go back and forth from Texas to to Tennessee. And I sat down on my little piano, and I started doing some work on the piano now, which I've never done before and certainly not writing. And recently, I've been doing more of it. And when I sat down, I heard this not actual voice, but just something in here that said, you know, for an optimist and a man of faith, you sure live a fearful life. And so why don't you stop living a fearful life?
Dennis Welch:99% of what you worry about has never happened to you and never will. And why don't you write your manifesto? And so I wrote strong. You know, for too long, I've been fearing the shadows and running from the wind and feeling like I'm bound to lose again, you know? And so it's a very it's a and so I wrote it in two days.
Cathy:Those are some of the lyrics
Dennis Welch:that
Cathy:Yep. You just Are those some of the lyrics? Okay.
Dennis Welch:Yes. Yes. Good. Good. Yeah.
Dennis Welch:And so and so, you know, and so the first two choruses are I wanna be strong. I wanna feel invincible. For once in my life, I wanna feel like the battle is winnable. But then it has this bridge that says, when tomorrow's sun is rising, I'll still be standing. And with a faithful heart, I'll carry on.
Dennis Welch:And then it changes keys, and it sings, I'm gonna be strong. I'm gonna be invincible. Anyway, I can't Do tell you the
Merry:all of your songs on Strong have to do with that type of what you said a manifesto, your manifesto?
Dennis Welch:No, Mary, you know what I like I like to think about even in my gigs, I like to think about this. I have a song called blind. It is such an unhappy love song. And I really have to assume a persona for that because I've been I've been in love. I met Susie on a blind date.
Dennis Welch:I've never gotten over it. But this song Blind is she's gone basically. And so but what I think is, I think if you think about paintings, a painting doesn't work if it's all bright, and you know, it doesn't work like that. You gotta have some things in there to to give it some shadow and all that. Mhmm.
Dennis Welch:And so let me just say this, it's a very hopeful message mostly, and I think people will leave this album and also these gigs. They'll they'll leave hopeful. I mean, I heard from some people secondhand that were there Saturday night that said, wow. This is making me rethink what I'm doing, and these were not kids that were saying this. And so so I'm that's what I'm my hope is.
Dennis Welch:Somebody asked me one of a Nashville publishing person said, what do you how would you define success for what you're doing? And I said, look, success for me is saying for people what they can't say for themselves. They don't know how. And that causing a conversation that helps them get through whatever it is they're getting through. And she said, wait.
Dennis Welch:You didn't mention money, and you didn't mention hit records, and you didn't mention charts. You didn't mention any of that stuff. And I said, look. If that stuff happens, I'm of course, I'm fine with that. I said, but that's not that cannot be the focus for me.
Dennis Welch:I just can't. And I said, my focus is to to to hopefully touch people's hearts and encourage them.
Cathy:That's that's a real real blessing that you feel that way because it makes you you can find happiness so much easier having that as your definition of success. You're gonna be happy much easier. You're always gonna meet people that you're touching as you go out to these concerts and stuff that's perfect. And what what do you have to say to our boomer audience out there who might have a lifelong dream, but maybe they think it's too late to try to achieve it?
Dennis Welch:Wow. Well, I'm the I'm the right guy to say it, but I'll tell you something. I've got a 102 year old author, and she called me yesterday, and she's one of the ones who calls me Denny, and she called me up. She said, Denny, you know, I got a new book. Right?
Dennis Welch:Like, what? Wow. I thought you couldn't see. She's had macular degeneration, but you know what she did? She went to the Association for the Blind here in Austin and said, hey, I need some help here.
Dennis Welch:And when she found out she could get help, Kathy, you know what she said? This is a writer. Okay? We're sitting at her her dining room table with her publisher and me, and she had written 10 books in her late eighties and early nineties, and and not early, all through her nineties that were spectacular. She's a fantastic writer.
Dennis Welch:Okay? Babette Hughes is her name. So she goes, you know what? I think maybe my writing career is over because I've got macular degeneration I can't see. And her young publishers goes, wait, Babette.
Dennis Welch:This this a society for the blind is here in town. They can they can help you. And you know what her first statement was? Her first statement was, oh, this is so great because now I don't want burn the house down when I cook or I won't trip and fall or any of the things that you would think of. Right?
Dennis Welch:Yeah. She goes, oh, this is such good news. I got some short stories I wanna do. I'm like, what? So she has written a book on aging is what she's done.
Dennis Welch:And she said, you know what? Nobody else a 102. There's no better authority than me, okay, because I've done it. And so, you know, I
Cathy:What think call does that book? Because I think we should all get it
Dennis Welch:We haven't titled it Oh,
Cathy:so it's not out yet.
Dennis Welch:Oh, it's not out yet. No, She's just I'm going over there tomorrow to have lunch with her so she can tell me all about it. And so I think it's a if you you know, look. What you believe informs what you do. Right?
Dennis Welch:Mhmm. And so, you know, I'm very careful about what I take in. You know, I don't sit and watch the news all day and hear people argue about politics and stuff and and Facebook, people go on rants. K? I just don't have any interest in that, and I don't need that.
Dennis Welch:You know? What I need is I need encouragement. I need somebody to tell me the truth about what's happening. And so but if you let that stuff in, it's poison, and it will stop you from being it'll it'll stop you from being what you are supposed to be. And I and look, I this sounds maybe spiritual, and I'm okay if it does, but I think everybody's here for a reason, really, that, you know, you're uniquely wired to do something that nobody else can do in this world that needs you.
Dennis Welch:Right? And so what a what a a tragedy when people get to a certain age and go, well, you know, I just I could have done that, and I decided not to do it. I'll tell you a quick story. My my guitar player that I that was my rock and roll guitar player is the best blues guitar player I ever heard. K?
Dennis Welch:Well, he has not been doing well. He's down in Houston. He's lived with his daughter. He's been having a little issue with dementia and some things like that. And I called him, and I said, hey, Skip.
Dennis Welch:I'm playing Saturday night in Houston. I want you to come do my our blues song. Come do New York City with me. He goes, oh, no. No.
Dennis Welch:I can't I can't do that. I can't do it. He goes, my hands won't do what they used to do. And he gave me all the excuses why he couldn't. And I said, well, look.
Dennis Welch:What if I make you come? And he said he said, well, you you can't make me, but he goes, but if you ask me, you know I'm gonna do it. And I said, okay. I said, I'm asking. So he came Saturday night, and I I called him up.
Dennis Welch:His son helped him set up his amp and everything, and he sat down at this guitar, girls, and he started playing, and it was like angels from heaven. It was so beautiful. And when it was over, I said to him, I said, Skip, who is telling you? I said, you know what? You should be down doing open mic nights.
Dennis Welch:You should be playing three or four nights a week doing this work because you you haven't lost a single step, but somebody's told you or you believe something that's not true. And so a lot of it is getting past the the the barriers that we set up for ourselves. Mhmm. And, you know, and I've told this guy producing Rich Herring produced my records. I said, listen.
Dennis Welch:As long as I'm able to stand up and get to your house and get to your studio and make and and sing and my brain is okay, I said, you know what? I said, I'm going to do a record every two years. So I mean and I and I'm that's what I wanna do, and I I think I I can do it. And it's making me write more at this age. I'm writing a lot more now than I was when I was 30.
Dennis Welch:So just you have to believe the right things.
Cathy:Well It's fabulous.
Merry:Yes. It's just Thank you. To everyone listening. I'm inspired, and I can't wait to hear more of Strong and all
Dennis Welch:of the you. Thank you.
Cathy:And is Strong out now on all streaming music services?
Dennis Welch:That's a wonderful question, Kathy. You know what? It was supposed to come out last Wednesday, and because I've written two songs with a famous a pretty famous artist, the distributor comes back to my record company and says, we're gonna need some kind of note at least signed by Michael Peterson and Dennis Welch to say that they wrote this together so that we can prove it. Because you can imagine what now with streaming, I can say, hey. I wrote a song with Katy Perry, and I can put it up on streaming.
Dennis Welch:And by the time a week goes by and you sold a 100,000 downloads, they find out it's Katy Perry, your next door neighbor or something. And so I can see it being a problem. And so I understand why they did it. And so we quickly signed a little thing and sent it in, and and hopefully, any day now, today is Tuesday. Right?
Dennis Welch:So probably within the next couple of days, it'll be on and this is what I love about music now is that you my record company pushes a button, and it goes to the whole world. People you don't know are listening to your music. And so Do you ever get
Merry:letters from them?
Dennis Welch:Yes. Yes. I do. Yes. I do.
Dennis Welch:I I I friended a guy on Facebook that I recognized I recognized this guy's name, but I don't know where from. But I I I know that he's the top radio promotion guy in in contemporary Christian music now. And so he he he accepted my friend request, and and I did an album called Man of Steel. That was my rock and roll album with was went everywhere. And and so anyway and so I said, hey.
Dennis Welch:You wanna Zoom and and talk talk about I just like to know what you're doing. So we get on this call, and you know what the first thing he said, Mary, to me? He looked he looked straight at me. You could tell he was emotional. He said, listen.
Dennis Welch:You don't know you probably don't even know who I am. He goes, I was a a young disc jockey in Syracuse, New York when the Man of Steel LP came in, and he said, I put my arm put the arm down on that on that LP, and he said it changed my life. Woah. And that was you know? Because look.
Dennis Welch:The artist all artists have an amp that sit on their shoulder that says, why are you even bothering to do this? Nobody cares. I mean, every author I've ever worked with, every musician, it's all that kinda like nobody really cares about this stuff. And then you hear something like that. And so yeah.
Dennis Welch:So I do hear from people from time to time, Mary, and it's it's always a very humbling. You know?
Merry:Well, I hope that all of our listeners gain that type of, accolade from at least one person after listening to this podcast. Thank you so much, Dennis.
Dennis Welch:You're welcome. Thank you.
Merry:Our guest today in Late Boomers has been songwriter, recording artist, and author Dennis Welch. If you want to connect with Dennis and learn more about him and where to see him perform or listen to his music and buy his music, go to his website, denniswelchmusic.com. And I'll spell it. That's d e n n I s w e l c h, music, m u s I c, dot com. Thank you.
Cathy:And thank you for listening to our Late Boomers podcast and subscribing to our Late Boomers podcast channel on YouTube. Listen in next week when you'll meet the former first lady of Nice, France, Aileen Medecin. You can listen to late boomers on any podcast platform and look at our new website lateboomers.us where you can find all our episodes and descriptions. Please follow us on Instagram iamkathywarthington and IAMMaryElkins and at Lateboomers. And thanks again to Dennis Welch.
Dennis Welch:Thank you. Enjoyed it very much. Thank you.
Cathy:Thank you for joining us on late boomers, the podcast that is your guide to creating a third act with style, power, and impact. Please visit our website and get in touch with us at late boomers dot us. If you would like to listen to or download other episodes of late boomers, go to ewnpodcastnetwork.com.
Merry:This podcast is also available on Spotify, Apple Podcast, and most other major podcast sites. We hope you make use of the wisdom you've gained here and that you enjoy a successful third act with your own style, power, and impact.
