A Band on the Roof

 
                When this old world starts getting me down

                    And people are just too much for me to face

                I climb way up to the top of the stairs

                    And all my cares just drift right into space

                

                On the roof, it's peaceful as can be

                    And there the world below can't bother me

                

                Let me tell you now                
                When I come home feelin' tired and beat

                    I go up where the air is fresh and sweet 

                I get away from the hustling crowd

                    And all that rat race noise down in the street 

                 On the roof, the only place I know

                    Where you just have to wish to make it so

                Oh, let's go up on the roof

               At night the stars put on a show for free

                    And darling, you can share it all with me

                        I keep on telling you

                

                Right smack dab in the middle of town

                    I've found a paradise that's trouble proof 

                So if this world starts getting you down

                    There's room enough for two

               

                 Up on the roof, everything is all right

                    Up on the roof, oh, come on, baby

                        Up on the roof

                Everything is all right

                    Everything is all right

                        Everything is all right

                            Up on the roof

Up On The Roof

Words and Music
by Gerry Goffin and Carole King 

The name and place of this brass band
(the two little E-flat clarinets don't count)
is unknown.
All we can see on this postcard photo
is a line of 19 bandsmen and friends

perched precariously along an upper floor ledge of a building.

That's not a common site for a bandstand.
The strange illusion is caused, I think,
by a canvas awning hanging below their feet
and a telephone line just over their heads.
It likely dates sometime around 1905-1915. 

Carole King's song "Up On The Roof",
originally recorded by The Drifters in 1962,
seemed appropriate to accompany this photo. 
Here is a great performance of it 
with both Carole King and James Taylor
at a benefit concert in Boston on 30 May 2013

for the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing.

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where building bridges is a useful thing to do.