💨Looking to refresh your skin, check out our deals ✨Green is great, but how about those fall colors! ⭐Looking for a campfire deal, click here ⬆️Rain darkens sky, but aquifer rejoices 💨Looking to refresh your skin, check out our deals ✨Green is great, but how about those fall colors! ⭐Looking for a campfire deal, click here ⬆️Rain darkens sky, but aquifer rejoices
Voice
Learn more

featured

featured

Rare footage of rising folk star

The thing about being a folk star …

It doesn’t pay the bills.

Bobby Angel practicing before the campfire

For that I’ll have to rely on hydrology for the time being, if not the indefinitely into the future. But early on I also knew: It’s impossible to be a folk star first and then turn into a hydrologist later in life. And really, to be a nature-folk artist of any acclaim, I knew I needed to spend a solid twenty to thirty years (possibly forty to fifty) immersed in understanding all the ins and out of water before I could ever dare to write a song about about the watery stuff, let alone all the other societal ills that only a well-rendered folk song has any chance of making heal.

Am I serious? Probably not. Or maybe a little. The backstory on this song: I wrote it about 15 years ago, almost as an afterthought, and with barely any time to prepare. The protagonist of the song Krista gave us all of a week’s notice that she’d gotten a new job. One day after the next I put the song off until the hour before I scribbled a bunch of notes on the page with just as many cross outs as there was anything legible to read. To my shock, everyone loved it. The only problem was I couldn’t give Krista the lyrics because even I could barely read them myself. And so I typed them up and gave them to her before she left. As I said that was fifteen years ago, probably more with it not being until the last year that I found the lyrics and finally sang it again. And not just sing it, I recorded it and made a musical video. It wasn’t actually until the video that the song “really popped.”

As much as Krista was surprised by the song at the time (and happy to get a copy of the lyrics to hang on her wall), you can image her response when fifteen years later I sent her the video, plus a 15-minute follow up exclusive Bobby Angel interview about the song. Ballad of a Florida Panther would go on to be featured as the first song on Side B of my first album, New Pangaea, released on my website in 2000.

Morale of the story: Try to not wait 15 years before playing a song for a second time. On the other hand, in this case, it worked pretty good.

contact artist | newsletter sign up | Twitter | Facebook

Gunpowder My Gunpowder

To be honest I was miffed:

How could cartographers leave the Gunpowder out?

As penned on the banks of the river

My response was to right this song. Yes, the Susquehanna River is the Chesapeake Bay’s largest tributary, and the Potomac River is bigger too and also drains the Shenandoah Valley. But to look at a map of the drainages of the Chesapeake Bay and to leave the Gunpowder out downright irked me on too many levels to count. But what is a hydrologist to do? And who do I complain to? My philosophy: Never complain and never explain, and rather get down to the business at hand. And specifically, that means telling the story of a pretty special river that sadly people don’t know exists, or sorely misunderstand. The opening line to the song came to me while hiking the river trail just above Jerusalem Mills. I refined the lyrics in the following days in the loft overlooking a brook that feeds the river. But it wasn’t until returning to Florida that I finally put the final touches on the song, and in particularly the last two lines.

Where does this song rank in the Maryland song canon? Behind the Star Spangled Banner and Maryland My Maryland, I’m having trouble coming up with a third. That being the case, I’ll rank it 2nd since Maryland My Maryland is a knock off of Oh Tanenbaum.

Rising to the occassion

When it comes to singing or writing a song …

It’s all about seizing the moment.

That doesn’t mean it ever goes down like planned. It never does. That’s what being an artist is all about. Sure, you have a concept in mind. That doesn’t mean it’s going to work … or at least come together like you thought it might. But let’s also be honest: The only regret is knowing that you decided not to do something instead of going out and doing your best. The truth is that we’re never as prepared as we like, but that’s also where the fun comes in. I have a hunch that fits in somewhere in the Tony Doctrine.

Third is a charm

For as quickly as my first two albums appeared …

The third one has become bogged down.

Listen to Album No. 2

The reason? For one I’ve been bogged down by other projects, with the most notable of those bringing Nature Folk Inc to life. And I’d like to say I’ve been working on big picture items, but it truth it’s always the little hiccups and roadblocks that consume most of my time. But recently, I feel like I’ve made major strides on a number of fronts. And yes, even better I’m working on a new song. The thing about this one: It stands a chance of becoming my big breakthrough. Or more than likely it will be just another forgettable song … until the musical landscape changes years from now and finally my music get’s its proper day in the sun. Here’s to dreaming!

Songwriter’s secret

Everybody asks me:

“Bobby Angel what’s your next song?”

Sometimes you just go with it

The truth is: I don’t know. It’s whenever the muse strikes. As for the topic? That too is anybody’s guess. For example, I’m currently working on a one hit wonder. I know what you’re thinking: Isn’t that being presumptuous? Actually, it’s the point of the song. How I got on the topic I’m not even sure other than I know if I don’t run with it, I’ll never get it done thus relegating it to the great dust heap of good ideas never acted upon. I’m not saying I’m a great song writer or even less a good musician. But I do think when this song is done it will be the cornerstone of my next album, tentatively titled One Hit Wonder Machine.

State of the artist

People always ask me:

“Bobby Angel what’s next?”

Origin story of how I got my name

The truth is, I simply don’t know. I could say I was working on something big, and describe it to the tee; but in my book saying isn’t doing and when it comes to doing I usually go with the flow. That doesn’t mean I don’t have a plan.

One thing you might notice about my songs: I’m not very good at guitar. Nor do I have a very good voice. Nor is there anyone really helping me out. Maybe that’s Bobby Angel at his core, charting things out as I go, like a lost sailor looking up at the stars. A key thing that I am always reminded of – I didn’t even give myself my own stage name. Somebody else gave it to me and I just went with the flow.

Sometimes in life you don’t question things.

And who really has time? Life is the art of not waiting for the next inspiration to strike. It will come while doing, and likely send you down a new path.

As always, forever and always,

© 2025 Marketer • Built with GeneratePress
Privacy Policy Terms Contact