Big dreams

By Elizabeth Stieber
Times Staff Writer

Most musical artists take a few years to release an album.
Not Joe Pokorny. He has nearly two dozen albums in the works right now.
"I have seventy-four new songs I have to record," Pokorny, 61, said from the basement-turned studio of his Wissinoming home.
For a long time, the musician had the ideas and the sheet music, but a meeting last year with Neal Voron changed that.
"He’s got a treasure chest of songs here. Now, we’re starting to bring it out," said Voron, who has formed RyKy Records with Pokorny to help him get his music to the public.
The record company "is a small, relatively unknown independent music label with big dreams and a big heart to make a difference in people’s lives," said Voron, a Parkwood native.
Voron, a former Northeast Times marketing specialist, and Pokorny first met in 1986, when Pokorny submitted a song called We Love Ya, Northeast Philly! inspired by Voron’s Love Ya, Northeast Philly! slogan for the Times.
The Times hired Pokorny to be master of ceremonies for the Times’ 50th anniversary celebration in Pennypack Park, Voron said. There, the Greater Kensington String Band played Pokorny’s song.
Then, about a year later, Voron, who also dabbles in creative writing, wrote lyrics titled We Thought She’d Live Forever and asked Pokorny to put it to music.
Pokorny composed the song and a year later he sent a tape to Voron, who was touched by the musician’s work.
The two lost touch for about 15 years but reconnected when Pokorny called Voron to tell him that a woman from Brooklyn heard We Thought She’d Live Forever through Pokorny’s Web site.
The woman was moved by the song because her mother had died suddenly and she wanted to dedicate it to her mother at her upcoming wedding and distribute copies of the song to her guests.
Voron and Pokorny met in Pokorny’s home studio in April 2003 to talk about making copies.
There, Voron discovered Pokorny’s massive collection of more than 700 songs and dozen musicals set to sheet music.
Voron was so intrigued by Pokorny’s musical passion that they launched RyKy Records through Voron’s Internet site development and publishing firm, Voron Communications.
"Many people can write music, but few can do it the way he can," Voron said.
In just over a year, RyKy Records — short for Remarkably Key Records — released six albums of Pokorny’s songs.
Pokorny even found a spot for Voron’s We Thought She’d Live Forever in a musical he recorded with a few local artists and singers called Wind Dance.
"Now, my song is in a musical," Voron said.
Pokorny also created a musical based on Voron’s inspirational novel, The Obstacle Course, which he plans to publish soon.
Already, they put song lyrics from Pokorny’s albums online at www.RyKyRecords.com
Currently, they are working on Pokorny’s newest initiative, Spell Philadelphia, an educational venture to teach kids across the country all about the City of Brotherly Love, including a song on how to spell Philadelphia.
He also is preparing to release a CD of another musical he wrote, Philadelphia, The Rock And Roll Musical.
The idea was inspired by a renaissance in Philadelphia, Voron said.
Such amenities as the new sports stadiums, the Kimmel Center, Penn’s Landing development and more "are surely components of a renaissance that makes old notions of previous-era Philadelphia unfair descriptions of what Philadelphia has become today and will be in future years," Voron said.
Pokorny’s musical creativity has also expanded to yet another musical he wrote called Save the Earth, in which he incorporates music and interpretive dance with a backdrop of pictures portraying the earth. He gathered the pictures and organized them in a slide show set in time with his lyrics.
It is that type of vision that Pokorny believes he will continue for years to come.
After all, his motto is, "Dream the dream only you can see." ••
RyKy Records is looking for singers ages 7 to 70 to record Pokorny’s songs. For more information, call 215-535-8499 or visit www.RyKyRecords.com
Reporter Elizabeth Stieber can be reached at 215-354-3036 or estieber@phillynews.com