Michelle Branch Sunday Sounds and Smiles session artwork

Sunday Sessions: Michelle Branch — The Game of Love

Michelle Branch, Santana and the place where I just completed one of the largest Agilysys projects of my career.

5 min read

Open the full Sunday Session — compare both recordings, read the story and explore the collection ↗

There are artists you enjoy, and then there are artists who become part of the soundtrack of your life. Michelle Branch is one of those artists for me. The Church is another. Different sounds, different chapters, but both have stayed with me.

“The Game of Love” is one of those songs I’m always glad to hear again. Michelle’s voice and Santana’s guitar make a combination that still feels full of life. I wanted this session to give the song a little room, with the official Santana video ready to play and a coastal setting that fits the spirit of Pacific44.

The pleasure of hearing it again

When a favorite comes on, I don’t always start thinking about the year it was released. Sometimes I’m simply glad to hear it. Then, somewhere during the recording, I begin to notice the life I’ve carried around it.

Michelle Branch belongs in that part of my collection. I can listen for the voice, enjoy the guitar and let the recording stand on its own. I can also think about how many things have changed since it first became familiar to me.

We collect music across working years, moves and relationships. The songs keep their place while everything around them changes. Hearing one again can make those changes visible in a way that looking at a calendar never quite does.

I’m enjoying that perspective now. I have a career behind me that has taken me through different kinds of work and places. I also have a publication I’m finally creating for myself. The music has room in both chapters.

A familiar song, a new connection

This week, the story has a connection to the life I’m living right now. Michelle Branch is scheduled to perform at The Stage at Zouk at Resorts World Las Vegas on Friday, October 9, 2026, at 8 p.m.

I just wrapped up one of the largest Agilysys installation projects of my career at Resorts World. It means something to see an artist whose music I’ve carried with me heading to a place where I’ve recently put so much of my working life.

A project like that becomes a chapter of its own. Now, alongside that professional memory, there is an opportunity to hear familiar music in the same setting. That connection is exactly the kind of thing I enjoy finding at this stage of life.

View Michelle’s show details at Resorts World ↗

Making room after the work is done

Finishing a major project gives me a reason to pause and recognize the work. I’m proud of this one. It belongs among the significant installations of my career, and I want to appreciate that before the next set of responsibilities takes over.

I’m also learning to leave room for the interests that have nothing to do with the next deadline. A concert. A story I want to write. An afternoon spent working on Pacific44 because I’m excited to see what it can become.

That balance matters to me. I still care about doing good work. I also care about building a life with things I want to do when the workday ends. Seeing Michelle on the calendar at Resorts World brings those two parts of my week unusually close together.

The show listing is an invitation to make another memory. It doesn’t replace what the song has meant over the years; it offers somewhere new for that connection to go.

The soundtrack keeps growing

One reason I wanted to create Sunday Sounds & Smiles was to make a place for the music that keeps following us through our lives. A song can still mean what it meant the first time we heard it, while picking up a new association along the way.

One song, two chapters

Michelle has now returned to “The Game of Love” with New Radicals. The new recording, produced by Gregg Alexander, is part of her Everywhere and Back Again project. I wanted both versions here because hearing them together gives us another way to spend time with a familiar favorite.

Start with Santana and Michelle. Let the guitar and her voice bring back the recording you know. Then choose the 2026 New Radicals version in the player beside this story. Notice where your attention goes: the voices, the arrangement, the way a familiar phrase lands when it comes around again.

You don’t have to choose a winner. You might love the associations you carry with the original and still find something to enjoy in the newer interpretation. I like the idea that a song can keep its history while making room for another chapter. That feels right at home in the journey we’re sharing here.

Read BMG’s announcement of the new recording ↗

The music doesn’t get old. The stories attached to it just get better.

I’m still working, still making plans and still finding things to be excited about on my own journey to 60 and beyond. Giving these songs a home on a website of my own is part of that.

Press play. Stay for the whole song. And think about an artist who has been part of your soundtrack.

What song is part of the soundtrack of your life?