A Few Paragraphs on Eva Cassidy

I'm a tree-hugger.I like granola. I think that Stonehenge is awe-inspiring.I will read any book about The Arthurian Legend.I believe that crystals can,indeed, have healing power.Yet,the sum total of all of those particulars does not equal a love of ethereal music.This is a pretty hard-and-fast rule for me.Chakras,yes.
Enya,no.
I also possess something of a misogynistic streak when it comes to singers.As a feminist,this is no easy thing for me to admit;however, we all have our peculiarities,our albatrosses to bear.This is one of mine.I am drawn to unique and often imperfect voices.Artistry,approach and an often inexplicable hold on my senses is what is required to win me over.This tends to happen within seconds,or not at all.Voices strike me to the gut,or they don't:there is no in-between.Most of the victors are males.Indeed,all of my favourite singers are men, with a few honourable mention slots going to women.There have been individual instances of me falling in love with a specific song sung by a woman, but that is where it rests.Every rule under the sun has an exception:Eva Cassidy is mine,and she breaks two rules.Her voice was heavenly,crystalline,and she covered airy,heart-rending songs.
Her version of "Fields of Gold" stops just shy of giving me chills.It is my personal favourite.I could easily listen to it ten times in a row, or fifty times in a day.It has a ridiculous hold on me,much more so than Sting's revered version.The lure for me is all in her voice,which mesmerizes but never cloys,as so many New-Age-y voices do.She was in a class by herself,and it is a class I was not even aware existed:until embarrassingly recently I had never heard of her.She has been dead nearly 13 years.
I am not upset that I missed being ahead of,or at least on top, of a trend, as I so often am.I am annoyed and grieved that I missed out on 15 or 20 years of that voice,that I was not aware of her at a time when I could anticipate her next great release.As it stands,and this is appropriate,her voice is a disembodied thing for me,a force of beauty and soul:it does not need concrete associations,and has none.She lived and died--oh very young,indeed--and there is nothing else that I wish to know,although I am normally insatiable for biographical detail.This is the lovely thing about music,and all art forms:it stands against time,and it always wins.