Certainly one of my favorite projects of my life has been my work with The Jenny Burton Experience. This truly inspirational group broke all box office records and played to packed houses in their more than seven year run at one of New York City’s top clubs.

In 1996 The Jenny Burton Experience swept all the major music awards in New York City for best vocal group including the MAC Award, The Back Stage Bistro Award and The Critic’s Choice Award. Named as one of Theater Week Magazine’s Top Ten Acts of the ’94/’95 season, they also won the CAB Award for Entertainers Of The Year.

I had the great privilege of being the principle writer, director and producer for this amazing act and gladly sat through hundreds of their performances over that 7 year span. People would come up to me all the time after shows and say things like, “This is the 9^th time I’ve seen the show” or “ This is my church.”

For a composer, it was a deeply rewarding experience because the music was presented on such a high caliber by Jenny and her 9 voice choir of singers made up of the best recording session vocalists that NYC had to offer. This group rocked the house.

When I set up a concert running order of songs I always pay special attention to the first 4 songs. With them, you set the whole concept for the night, set the mood and most importantly, grab your audience by the throat and never let go. The 3^rd and 4^th songs are key. They are the Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth of your line-up. They’re the sluggers – the homerun hitters. With them, you win or lose the game.

For most of those seven years, our “Babe Ruth” was a song called “Tear Down The House”. With it, each performance, we did just that – we tore down the house. The song, written for the show as a tour de force show-stopper was just that, and it never failed to get the audience on its feet and cheering at the end.

If for any reason we started slow or the audience was a little sleepy, the number shifted the show into high gear and impassioned the audience. I never saw the number fail to lift the roof from its moorings. It was simply a show-stopper.

There’s nothing like a show-stopper. It is the ultimate rush. When the number starts, the audience is in one place and 3-5 minutes later, the audience has been transported to a whole new space, energy and level of inspired living.

Night after night, Ms. Burton rose to the occasion and her wonderful choir followed suite and knocked our socks off with this simple idea:

If ya’ have something that doesn’t work in your life, tear it down, start all over again and build it back – but on a higher ground, with a higher sense of integrity.

The Lyrics: “Tear Down The House”
Music & Lyrics by Peter Link

If you’d like to listen as you read, click here.

Once and for all yeah we built it
Built it from a mighty stone
Through heaven ‘n’ hell yeah we built it
We built it to stand the test of time
All of mankind helped us build it
It stood for all the good we’ve known
But something happened along the way
Something happened along the way
Something managed to slip away for good

Now we gotta tear down the house
Better build it back up on a higher ground
Oh yeah tear down the house
Tear it up and start it again
But if we’re gonna tear down the house
We got to love and guard life
Yeah we gotta change this hard life
Before we build again

Tear it up
Uh uh yeah we gotta tear it up
Break it down ‘n’ start it again    (oh yeah)
Tear it up
Uh uh yeah we gotta rip it up
Break it down ‘n’ start it again

Once and for all yeah we’ll build it
Build it for the child in you
Innocent hearts now will build it
They’ll build it for all the world to use
Once in the past those who built it
Did the things they had to do
(With the highest intentions in view)
But something happened along the way
Something happened along the way
Something managed to go astray it’s true

And now we gotta tear down the house
Better build it back up on a higher ground
Oh yeah tear down the house
Tear it up and start it again
If we’re gonna tear down the house
We must respect and guard life
Yeah we gotta change this hard life
Before we build again

Ashes to ashes
Dust to dust
What have we done in the name of love?
Ashes to ashes
Dust to dustWhat have we done in the name of love?
What have we bourn with the richest of dreams
With the wisest of schemes
That has turned to a travesty?
Ashes to ashes
Dust to dust
What have we done in the name of love?

Uh uh we built a tower of corruption
Uh uh for a den of thieves
Uh uh in a house of ill repute
Uh uh yeah it’s hard to believeUh uh we built a pillar of injustice
Uh uh on a cornerstone of lies
Uh uh with a bogotified foundation
Uh uh an’ now we can’t believe our eyes

It’s a shanty it’s a shack
It’s a flop house it’s a dump
For a blinkie in the gutter
For a skeezer for a chumpIt’s a world of confusion
It’s a city of sin
Yeah it’s a tower of corruption
An’ it’s easy to get in

An’ we built it
We built it
An’ now what have we done in the name of love?
We built it
We built it
An’ now what have we done in the name of love?

We’re the architect of ruin
The builder of jive
The designer of catastrophe
The last to survive
Fire is our symbol
Our medium is rust
Ashes to ashes
And dust to dust

The word in the streets is ‘demolition’
It’s a wrecking ball party
It’s a holy mission
So flatten it level it
Bring it to the ground
Roll up your sleeves
An’ tear the damned thing down

Yeah tear down the house
Cause the moment it falls
We all will then rise up
Tear down the house
Better build it back up on a higher ground
Oh yeah tear down the house
Cause the moment it falls
We all will then rise up
Tear down the house
Better build it back up on a higher ground
Oh yeah tear down the house!!!

The Jenny Burton Experience was on the cutting edge of new thought at the turn of the century. Not a “religious” group but instead an inspirational and positive lift into the Millennium for the man-in-the-street, for the young, for the aged, for the addict… as The Village Voice put it, “This is an affirmation for the morally infirm and the firmly moral”.