LAURA ALLAN – REFLECTIONS 40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition

LAURA ALLAN ( 1952 -2008) was a gifted singer and songwriter who was a legend in the San Francisco Bay area in the early 1970s.

REFLECTIONS is her beloved first album, and features her original songs, one of which includes a collaboration with Paul Horn on “Passages”. Her voice and zither take center stage on “As I Am”, “ Waterfall” and “Nicasio” . Other artists, including Dallas Smith on Lyricon wind synthesizer, add to the mix.

It is my honor and privilege to bring her music back into the world.

I met Laura after her performance at a new age conference in 1975 held on campus at Sonoma State College. Her magical aura of angelic voice, luminous blonde hair and energetic strumming or meditative Celtic harp inspired zither, captured your attention instantly.

My first LP had just been pressed, and this was my first public presentation. Nevertheless, my instincts were right on. Even though I had only one album and no track record yet, I invited Laura to record her album on my label. 

It was too early for both of us. Several years later, she signed with another local label, Unity Records. They went out of business without having much success with any of their artists, all of whom that I spoke to were unhappy about not getting paid their royalties. 

After Laura regained the rights to REFLECTIONS, she contacted me in the mid-1980s to see if I were still interested. Of course I was!

She licensed the album to my indie label. I then re-released the LP and cassette on the Hear & Now imprint, (a division of Halpern Sounds) which was my main label name at the time.

Our deal was actually a two album deal, and I would record and produce the album combining her voice and zither and my arrangements.

Alas, that album was never completed. And when the master tapes were lost in the studio fire, I thought that was the end of the road.

But in July 2021, I found a long-lost, incomplete version of Pachelbel’s “Canon in D Major” on a ‘keep the tape rolling’ live reference cassette tape. After hours of restoration, a complete version was pieced together from a multiple partial segments and overdubs by my masterful engineer, Warren Kahn.

Our version of “Pachelbel’s Canon” was not on the original LP, but is an extraordinary bonus. This new album actually sounds better than the original LP ! It is free of annoying pops, clicks and tape hiss, and the rumbling truck noise leaking into the end of some songs.