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Music luminary Lobo says his success has all been about a connection between the voice, the words and the melody

“At 63, I’m still doing it and that itself is a great accomplishment,” said singer-songwriter Lobo of his musical journey spanning over three decades. In Colombo this week, for his show at the Waters Edge, Kent LaVoie best known to the world as Lobo, the chart-topper of the ’60-’70s, continues to see his songs featured in popular radio shows.

The Floridian’s entry into the music scene was quite by chance.

A cycling pal invited Kent (as he is called among friends) to see his new electric guitar. Never having seen such an instrument before, the 13-year-old was captivated. When he visited the same friend to see a fancier model the next year, Kent spotted a discarded stringed instrument on a trash pile which the friend allowed him to take. It happened to be a Dobro – a sort of lap guitar with strings set wide apart. “I learnt my first chords on it,” Lobo relates.

In time, he found that “people listened to you if you could sing and play at the same time”. Playing with rock bands, “I eventually got to a point where I could make a living doing so,” he recalls. Not surprisingly, it was the Beatles who were his inspiration all along. Listening to them, “I can do this as a career,” Kent thought while simultaneously realising that if he wanted to sing good songs he had to write them himself. Most of his songs are based on emotions he has experienced. ‘How can I tell her’ came out of not being able to be with a certain airline stewardess who was in an Eastern Airlines flight that crashed in Everglades near Miami in 1972. “She survived the crash but the song came from the emotion of realising she was on that plane.”

‘I’d love you to want me’ however was an imaginary experience – the best kind according to him as we can wish anything we want. In this case it occurred when the 17-year-old saw a beautiful 23-year-old teacher come into class.

“Looking back, those were my most productive years as a writer,” Lobo reflects. Often, phrases that he picked up from conversations formed the base of a song and the lyrics simply flowed from there.

Why have his songs in over fifteen albums appealed to so many? “I can’t put my finger on it but when the audience makes a connection between the voice, the words and the melody, then the magic of music works.”

The singer however is modest about his skills. “Technically I’m not so good but emotionally I have it,” he says.

Of his upcoming album, Lobo said it would feature songs characteristic of their genre. “What you are is what you do,” he says. Their recording process today however is far different. Technology, he says, has reached the point where he can do the recording in his own home, the cost being miniscule. “It is a personal process but I enjoy doing it.”

Back at home Lobo and his band do not practise on a regular basis. They simply have rehearsals with background singers to make sure their harmony is right, prior to tours which they accept once a year on request.

With over 180 songs to their credit, Lobo admits that he sometimes has trouble remembering words and hence has to listen to his old albums to refresh his memory.

Will his Asian tour be an annual feature? “Considering that there are so many people younger than me dying, I am realistic and I think of each show as my last one. That’s why I enjoy it so much.”

And what of the man behind the musician? “I am quite boring to most people as I am simple,” says the father of a son and three daughters. However, when it comes to music, “if you sing from your heart, it goes to the heart,” he adds.