Joan Osborne Songs - St. Teresa Lyrics

Joan Osborne - St. Teresa

Joan Osborne - St. Teresa Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Relish
Released: 1996

St. Teresa Lyrics

Sit down on the corner just a little crime
When I make my money got to get my dime
Sit down with her baby wind is full of trash
She bold as the street light dark and sweet as hash
Way down in the hollow leavin' so soon
Oh St. Teresa higher than the moon
Reach down for the sweet stuff when she looks at me
I know any man sees you like I see
Follow down the side street movin' single file
She say

That's where I'll hold you, sleeping like a child
Way down in the hollow, leavin' so soon
Oh, St. Teresa, higher than the moon
Just what I've been needin', feel it rise in me
She say

Every stone a story, like a rosary
Corner St. Teresa, just a little crime
When I make my money, got to get my dime
Way down in the hollow, leavin' so soon
Oh, St. Teresa, higher than the moon
You called up in the sky
You called up in the clouds
Is there something you forgot to tell me

Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me
Show me my Teresa, feel it rise in me
Every stone a story, like a rosary

Writer/s: BAZILIAN, ERIC M / HYMAN, ROB / OSBORNE, JOAN / CHERTOFF, RICK
Publisher: Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., Universal Music Publishing Group
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

St. Teresa

This song is about a woman who is down on her luck and trying to support herself and her baby by making money as a prostitute. The song explores how a woman who is overlooked and discarded is still very human and complex.

Osborne wrote this with Eric Bazilian, Rob Hyman and Rick Chertoff - the team who produced and played on Cyndi Lauper's first album. Says Bazilian, "On 'St. Teresa,' Joan was responsible for the lion's share of the lyrics, but we all worked through them very meticulously to make sure they made sense. 'St. Teresa' was one that just poured out of her, that was great. 'Right Hand Man' was a similar thing."

Bazilian: "St. Teresa started its life as Allman Brothers style Blues, based around a sort of organ riff. It lived that way for a while. I think Joan came in with the verse melody and lyrics written around that type of song, and then at some point the mandolin riff came, but I was still playing it over a kind of Jazz/Waltz/Blues. We tried to cut the song that way and we could never really catch a groove on it, and then one day I said, 'Let me play this mandolin to a click track.' I turned on my sampler with a percussion bank in it and was looking for just a shaker or something I could use for the click. My finger ran into the top key, which happens to be that sample that starts the record. I played the mandolin to that. A very unique rhythmic structure was born."

This was nominated for a Grammy for Best Female Rock Vocal, but lost to Alanis Morissette's "You Oughta Know." Morissette also beat out Osborne for Album Of The Year.

This was Osborne's second single. It followed up her hit "One Of Us," which was written by Bazilian. (Thanks to Eric Bazilian for speaking with us about this song. For more, check out www.ericbazilian.com.)