Then she met an excellent young man named Billy Jack Pierce and they married in 1962. While Billy Jack was work- ing as an air traf- fic controller near New Orleans in 1964, they wel- comed their daughter Carrie to the family.
After moving back to Waco, TX for about eight years, until Laurie’s brother, who played the French horn for Frank Sinatra for decades, was diagnosed with cancer and retired. So, in the mid-1990’s they moved to care for her brother in Port Townsend, WA.
While going thru some old records in a vintage music store one day in 2003 Laurie discovered VSOP Records, a small record label that had acquired the original recordings from Mode Records. Suddenly determined to find her lost re- cordings, she found a man named Peter Jacobsen.
Jacobsen told her he would love to re- lease the album, but he only had about half of the recordings. He then reached out to Bones Howe, who engineered all of the Mode releases. He found the ses- sion tapes and performed the mastering that was required to complete the al- bum. Then, in August 2004, almost 50 years after it was recorded, “Paradise” was released on CD. The quality of the music is remarkable and sang with a
12 Kalon Women Magazine
depth and feeling only a rare few accom- plished during that era. As a result, Lau- rie Allyn’s “Paradise” was not only finally released, but nominated for a Grammy Award.
We all have dreams and aspirations to leave behind contributions that live long past our simple existence. Therefore, it is no less than a gift from God for a life of sacrifice so well lived that Laurie Allyn was allowed to experience Paradise found.
Paradise by Laurie Allyn is currently available as both a CD and an MP3 download on
Amazon.com.
Henry Piarrot is a hotel executive liv- ing in New York State. Please send all story recommendations to hpiar-
rot@gmail.com
Oct/Dec 2014
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