Listen to a Sample: "Ingenue"

He writes songs about children. And criminals. He writes music about golf. And Norman Vincent Peale. He struggled for years, scrapping for gigs (and, in his words, "driving for checks") only to become the proverbial "overnight sensation" in a field he'd never dreamed of storming.

In the smiling face and surging talent of David Barrett, paradox has found a happy home. "It all starts with a guitar in my lap," says the ever self-effacing Barrett whose solitary musical musings have brought him into the national spotlight. That guitar in that particular lap has yielded hundreds of songs - some of which have ended up in unlikely places. So just how does a struggling singer-songwriter end up penning "One Shining Moment" - the theme of the NCAA Basketball Championships on CBS?

Barrett recalls, "I was staying with a friend in New York City who just happened to write for Sports Illustrated. We were watching the NBA Finals. I had written this song about sports and achievement ... six months later I got around to recording it and sent it to him. He took it over to CBS without me knowing, and they called me up out of the blue. I thought it was a joke. At that point they asked me for more material. The foodgates opened and I've written for the Olympics and the theme for the U.S. Tennis Open and their golf theme... From that, I got called in for CBC out of Toronto and I've written for ABC and PBS... I wish I could say it was career planning; but it's not. It just worked out that way and I'm grateful."

All well and good, but that's not the David Barrett we're here to talk about. Strip it all away - all the scores and TV glitz and major networks on phone - and you're back to basics: a handsome guy singing provocative, hauntingly beautiful songs, and playing the hell out of that guitar in his lap.

That guy has just released his latest album. The Fever Diaries is a lot more than a compendium of ten new Barrett songs. It's a crash course in sunsets, innocence and the horrors of child abuse. It tackles lost love, high comedy and the physics of life. It'll take you there and back, cradled safely in melody. The Fever Diaries (End Around Records) is quintessential Barrett: beautiful,understated and true.

David Barrett high-power commercial composer, low-tech folk club songwriter… Hey, what's a little paradox among friends.