COVER STORIES – Part 2 of 6.

Definition of a cover version – A particular recording of a song is later re-recorded by someone else, in such a way that the new recording brings something new to the meaning of the song or the feelings it invokes. This is a series of posts about striking cover versions of songs usually better than the originals.

Part 1 about the nature of cover stories, with examples – https://thekiddca.wordpress.com/2023/11/18/cover-stories-part-1-of-6/

In this post a dozen specific covers are analysed. I love the old songs of my youth but most of the songs here are examples of how more recent musicians have done a better job of interpreting those old songs than the people who recorded the songs originally.

• 1. HURT (by Trent Reznor). The first example is a sort of contradiction. The newer version, the better version, the cover version, is delivered by an old campaigner but it could never have been performed like this until this person had put a lot of troubled years behind him. This is a poignant, powerful cover of a Nine Inch Nails song by Johnny Cash, a man with a history of selfish and self-destructive behaviour. It was recorded shortly before Johnny’s death in 2003 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AHCfZTRGiI&ab_channel=JohnnyCashVEVO . Here is a version of this 1995 song performed by Nine Inch Nails with harmony vocals by the song’s composer / lead singer Trent Reznor and guest vocalist David Bowie live in 2008. It is also very good but very different from the Cash version – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhhEHuChFck&ab_channel=redsails2008
• 2. GET RHYTHM (by Johnny Cash) – This not particularly good two minute clip from the 1950’s features Johnny Cash again, this time in his twenties, with The Tennessee Two – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Roug4qG7qCY&ab_channel=Roadie . Now here is an excellent music video with consummate guitarist Ry Cooder covering the same song. Note the backing musicians, particularly the backing singers. Note the camera angles and wonderful lighting effects. The hapless saloon owner is the veteran film actor Harry Dean Stanton – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG91Y62T4C0&ab_channel=DirkJung .
• 3. MASTERS OF WAR (by Bob Dylan). In his early days Dylan recorded some important music. I find his later work, and behaviour, highly problematic but that’s a matter for another day. Here is an extremely angry song from Dylan condemning America’s unethical war in Vietnam. When my wife, a professor of Political Communication, played this for her American students in 2000, they were blown away by Dylan’s bitterness and rage – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4uMQRQzVmc&ab_channel=RVibes . Here is a powerful cover of the same song by Eddie Vedder, lead singer of the Grunge band Pearl Jam – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwa2jK0xglk&ab_channel=director%27scat
• 4. A HARD RAIN’S A’GONNA FALL (by Bob Dylan). The original version of this song, released by Dylan in May 1963, has a tone of resignation and foreboding. To put the lyrics of this song into context, in the five years following the release of this song the following events took place:
• 1963 – On September 15, the KKK murders four small girls ages 11 to 14, and injures 22 others by bombing the 16^th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, and on November 22 President Kennedy is assassinated.
• 1964 – On September 11 The Beatles in Jacksonville, Florida refuse to perform to a segregated audience.
• 1965 – On March 8 the US sends thousands of ground combat troops into Vietnam, and on April 28 the US occupies the Dominican Republic.
• 1966 – Huey Newton and Bobby Seale found the Black Panther Party.
• 1967 – On April 15 hundreds of thousands of anti-war protesters demonstrate at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York
• 1968 – The Tet Offensive (January 30) and the My Lai Massacre (March 16) occur in Vietnam, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated on April 4 setting off several days of race riots in major cities across the US.
• Here is Dylan’s recording – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXn9ZKPx6CY&ab_channel=MridulChitranshi . Here is a 1977 cover of the song by Roxy Music led by Bryan Ferry, a version which, unlike the Dylan version, has a more positive tone of determination to persevere and improve things despite the hard rain – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUR5uu8tOh8&ab_channel=BryanFerry .
• 5. ALL ALONG THE WATCHTOWER (by Bob Dylan). Here is the original version by Dylan (released 1967) recorded with a simple band including an acoustic guitar – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jff6pZJvrWk&ab_channel=XxLeahwxX . Now here is a celebrated cover by Jimi Hendrix (released just a year later) with electric guitar pyrotechnics, a cover many said was better than the original – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLV4_xaYynY&ab_channel=JimiHendrixVEVO
• 6. WHILE MY GUITAR GENTLY WEEPS (by George Harrison). Here is the fairly mediocre original version by The Beatles (released 1968) with guest soloist Eric Clapton, the only major outside artist to appear on a Beatles track up to that point – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFDg-pgE0Hk&ab_channel=TheBeatles-Topic . Here is a much later (1990) and I think much better blues infested cover version by short-lived blind Canadian guitar virtuoso Jeff Healey, a track that so impressed George Harrison that he later contributed a guitar line to the recording – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rGS24vNwjs&ab_channel=JeffHealey .
• 7. YOU CAN’T DO THAT (by John Lennon and Paul McCartney). Here is another original Beatles track, released back in 1964 on the soundtrack of their film ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ performed here live – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8Dpt7TI9q0&ab_channel=clubpenguinBoy11 . When The Beatles were asked in 1967 who their favourite American group was they all said it was a computer programmer named Harry Nilsson who worked in a bank and who who was trying to carve out a music career but was still relatively unknown. Nilsson had an incredible vocal range and a wonderfully sounding voice, and he often did dozens of intricate background vocal overdubs on his own songs. He eventually did have a successful music career but sadly he died at age 52 heavily in debt and in bad shape physically. Here is a Nilsson cover of ‘You Can’t Do That’ from 1967 which cleverly incorporates many other Beatles song titles into the background vocals – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ue0Mf7_EHk8&ab_channel=Andr%C3%A9Fialho
• 8. I’VE JUST SEEN A FACE (by John Lennon and Paul McCartney). Here is the original version by The Beatles (released 1965) from the soundtrack of their film ‘Help’ – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_MjCqQoLLA&list=RDA_MjCqQoLLA&start_radio=1&ab_channel=TheBeatlesVEVO . Here is a cover of the song by Canadian chanteuse Holly Cole which is more thoughtful and I think generally superior to the original – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngm29TVagMc&ab_channel=HollyColeVEVO
• 9. WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS (by John Lennon and Paul McCartney). On the famous ‘Sgt. Pepper’ album by The Beatles, after a short introduction of the band, we are introduced to the fictional band’s lead singer singing this track. The vocals are by Ringo Starr, and the song created a stir at the time because in this song the famous Fab Four, in a casual and upbeat way, were encouraging people to use illegal drugs (the singer’s friends) at a time when songs that did that got condemned and banned – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIizdazLTeU&ab_channel=TheFabFour14 . Two years later Joe Cocker covered this now famous song in such a startling different way it launched Cocker’s career which lasted decades until his death in 2014. Here is Cocker’s cover, with Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin on guitar and B.J. Wilson of Procol Harum on drums: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXV4WyQMHFM&ab_channel=JoeCocker-Topic
• 10. MONA (by Bo Diddley). Highly successful British rock bands grew up worshipping African-American blues, soul and rock and roll singers. The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, The Animals, Cream, The Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin and so many more covered songs by those American musicians who had not had much success in the United States because of their race. The British recordings gave many of those African-American artists a new lease on life, and some financial success. Here is the song Mona (by Bo Diddley) recorded originally by Bo Diddley and his phallic guitar – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luMQUzJzZLQ&ab_channel=0coincidences . Here is a cover version of the song by The Rolling Stones recorded in 1964 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcEjz1NZdDY&ab_channel=kg441
• 11. SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL (by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards). This is one of the more famous, and literate early Rolling Stones songs. The Satanic lyrics enraged a lot of adult Americans at the time and therefore many American teens loved the song. Here is the original version by The Rolling Stones plus Nicky Hopkins on piano (released 1968) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgnClrx8N2k&ab_channel=ABKCOVEVO . 26 years later Guns ‘N’ Roses released this cover of the song used in the film ‘Interview With a Vampire’ – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhWPSyPHQAs&ab_channel=nathancorp

12. Final thoughts. Is there such a thing as the definitive version of a particular composition? What if someone composes a work for solo piano (call it Londonderry Airship), releases it, people perform it and listen to it, then a few years later the composer makes what he considers to be improvements in the work creating a second version. What, then, does the title Londonderry Airship refer to, the first version or the second? What if the composer comes up with an orchestral arrangement of the work (version three) without changing the original words and melody? Is that also Londonderry Airship? Is the composer covering himself somehow since both versions two and three are bringing something new to the original work? Here are four examples of composers updating compositions:

PAUL SIMON – THE BOXER

The original version recorded by Simon and Garfunkel was released in 1970. Years later, in concert, Simon and Garfunkel performed the song with eight new lines of lyrics added to the original.

GEORGE GERSHWIN – RHAPSODY IN BLUE

Gershwin began composing this work on January 7, 1924, and he initially wrote a version for two pianos. However, Paul Whiteman asked him to come up with an arrangement of the piece for Whiteman’s 23 member orchestra. Amazingly, Gershwin was able to do that in time for the work’s orchestral premiere on February 12, 1924, about five weeks later, with help from Ferdie Grofé. Gershwin himself played the piano at that premier, improvising a bit as he did so. Musical legends Igor Stravinsky, Fritz Kreisler, Leopold Stokowski, Victor Herbert and John Philip Sousa were in the audience. Later Gershwin also composed an arrangement of the piece for solo piano. Covers?

PROCOL HARUM – A WHITER SHADE OF PALE

This extremely popular song was released in 1967 in its original form but since then Procol Harum has performed the song live many times and on a few occasions performed the song with two extra verses.

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN – FUR ELISE

This is one of Beethoven’s most popular and well-known pieces but very few people realize that Beethoven wrote two versions of the work. The version he came up with in 1810 is the one that most people know. In 1822, however, he came up with a slightly different version which he thought was better than the 1810 version. Ironically it is the 1810 version that we remember and the 1822 version that is virtually unknown. Here are the two versions, and an orchestral arrangement of the work as well:

– Lang Lang performing Fur Elise 1810 version

– Sergey Kuznetsov playing the 1822 version of the work, with slight changes at the 1 minute 5 second, and the 2 minute 38 second marks:

– The Berliner Philharmonie orchestra, arranged by Georgii Cherkin who is playing the piano

Now, let’s make things even more complicated. What happens, say, if two people in a symphonic rock band compose a song, and when they record it, a third band member, who is a first rate instrumentalist, comes up with a wonderful improvised solo when it is recorded. Then, when the record becomes a million seller and the reviews consistently mention the brilliance of that third band member’s solo? Is the song with the solo a cover of the song without the solo? It brought something new to the song.

Here’s a related question. Should Jimi Hendrix get co-composing credits on the many songs he didn’t compose but which he delivered breathtaking, innovative solos on? What about all the great solos delivered by saxophonist Paul Desmond on songs composed by Dave Brubeck when Desmond was a member of The Dave Brubeck Quartet? What about the incredible solos delivered by trumpeter Harry James when he was the star soloist in the Benny Goodman Orchestra in the 1930’s? What about Louis Armstrong’s amazing solos on songs he didn’t write? What about all the high quality performances by lead vocalists on songs that they didn’t compose, performances that turned mediocre songs into hits? There are a number of such compelling vocalists who could keep listeners mesmerized – Frank Sinatra, Billie Holiday, Bing Crosby, Judy Garland, Liza Minnelli, Edith Piaf, Freddie Mercury, George Michael, Robert Plant, Whitney Houston, Harry Nilsson, Celine Dion, Aretha Franklin, Adele.

I could link to the famous clip of a teenage Judy Garland singing Over the Rainbow but instead here is Judy Garland with daughter Liza Minnelli – Get Happy / Happy Days Are Here Again. Incredible stuff. Judy Garland’s life was full of tragedy giving these lyrics added poignancy. She is 42 here, and only lived to 47.

What I have described above is what happened to Procol Harum, the creators of symphonic rock. Procol Harum had an enormous worldwide hit with the song A Whiter Shade of Pale. It has been covered more than a thousand times, and sold more than ten million copies worldwide. Gary Brooker wrote the music, Keith Reid wrote the words, and Matthew Fisher, one of the great rock keyboardists, came up with the solo. More to the point, should Fisher be given co-composing credit? Fisher thought he should, Brooker disagreed, Fisher sued Brooker and the court found in Fisher’s favour though needless to say Fisher was no longer a member of Procol Harum. Fisher had a degree in computer programming from Cambridge University, so he went back to programming computers.

To finish off, here is an excellent live version of Procol Harum performing the song A Whiter Shade of Pale, with a lot of footage of Fisher at the Hammond organ. As you listen to this, think about the following – what would the song be like without the organ parts? Do the organ parts contribute enough to the song for the version with the organ parts to be counted as a cover of a version without the organ? Would the original have been a massive hit without Fisher’s contributions? Could the same be said of other musicians who played on the original recording? You be the judge. Brooker is the singer:

COVER STORIES – Part 1 of 6

Take a listen to this please. This is a powerful performance by the band Disturbed, released in 2015. Note the range and voice control of lead singer David Draiman – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9Dg-g7t2l4&ab_channel=Disturbed

This is the song The SOUND OF SILENCE (by Paul Simon) and the video has an entirely different feel about it than Simon and Garfunkel’s original recording of the song, their first hit record (released in 1966). When I first heard this song in 1966 I had a vision of gritty New York streets where the homeless are ignored and live short, meaningless lives. Disturbed puts the song’s lyrics into an entirely different, though still negative, context. One of the new insights brought to the song seems to be that the power of political music is useless if the audience are without hope or have been propagandized into callousness or indifference. Paul Simon himself, for example, has written intensely political songs (America, American Tune, My Little Town, War Prayers) but to what extent are those songs now forgotten, or dismissed by a cynical or misinformed listening audience? Here is the original Simon and Garfunkel Sound of Silence track – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ukmjBSQY-c&ab_channel=VincenzoLeggio

Definition of a COVER VERSION – A particular recording of a song is later re-recorded by someone else, in such a way that the new recording brings something new to the meaning of the song or the feelings it invokes. This is a series of posts about striking cover versions of songs.

Most cover versions are recorded out of admiration for a band’s musical heroes. Originally, however, when a song came out and was popular, a cover version was often recorded simply as a way of cashing in on the popularity of the original. These days there are many tribute bands which attempt to copy the original recordings of a popular band as faithfully as possible, particularly if that band is no longer performing. There are also many Elvis Presley impersonators. In a few cases a band copies a previous band’s music but adds an entirely new twist. Dread Zeppelin performs reggae versions of Led Zeppelin songs. Beatallica performs heavy metal fusions of tracks released by The Beatles and Metallica. Tribute bands often cater to aging fans looking for nostalgia and the good times they experienced as teenagers. Revivalist bands, on the other hand, cater to youthful audiences in an attempt to interest people in a particular band which new fans haven’t been able to experience first hand. Sha Na Na, The Blues Brothers, and the Black Crowes are revivalist bands.

In the 1950’s popular non-English songs were re-worked, with new lyrics in English, to sell more records. DER FRÖHLICHE WANDERER was a big hit in 1954 in the English speaking world as The Happy Wanderer. Here is the German original (fortunately it’s not very long) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqxati5Ir14&ab_channel=HerrFriedrich and here it is in English – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPfGL0tDP30&ab_channel=GoldenOldiesOn45RPM . Other examples of this: Hymne à l’Amour, Mutterlein, Volare and L’Amour est bleu.

There have been many covers of older traditional or standard songs composed prior to the twentieth century. For example, AMAZING GRACE has words written by English Anglican clergyman John Newton in 1772 as a Christian hymn. It has been set to more than twenty melodies but the melody heard most frequently today was composed by American William Walker in 1835. Here is one of the many extraordinary covers of this work – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKKvt8W0zXg&ab_channel=PROMUSICAARTIS .

By most accounts the most covered modern song is YESTERDAY by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, recorded by The Beatles. By 1986 1600 covers had been made so who knows what the total is by now. In 1999 the song had been performed approximately seven million times on American television and radio. The song was voted the Best Song of the 20^th century in a 1999 BBC radio 2 poll.

When Bach was alive not many people took much notice of his music. After his death the composer Felix Mendelssohn revived interest in his work, and organized a lengthy performance of Bach’s most monumental work, The St. Matthew Passion. Bach’s music has been covered by many people in different ways. Here is a highly unusual cover of Bach’s ‘JESUS BLEIBET MEINE FREUDE (Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring)’ as part of an ad in Japan. This short work is performed using elevated slabs of different pitches of wood in the middle of a forest – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2BWrmNhyXU&ab_channel=jemyao . The whole point of a cover, however, is to bring something new to the music. Here is a very well executed cover of a BOURÉE by Bach interpreted by the progressive rock band Jethro Tull – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXOpaZUwsm4&ab_channel=JethroTull

Twenty of Beatle George Harrison’s songs were covered at the 2002 tribute concert held in his honour after his early death in 2001. These covers were rendered by many rock luminaries from the past, plus George’s son Dhani on guitar. Here is Sam Brown, with Jools Holland on piano and drummer Jim Capaldi (of Traffic) performing with great energy the George Harrison song ‘HORSE TO THE WATER’. Less than two and a half years later Capaldi was also dead. This is a song that Sam Brown sang backing vocals on when George originally recorded the song with her shortly before his death – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvDSsxL3Hc8&ab_channel=YuriTabak .

Similar cover-laden tribute concerts were held for Jon Lord of Deep Purple, and Freddie Mercury of Queen upon their deaths. SOMEBODY TO LOVE (by Freddie Mercury) was originally released by Queen in 1976 with vocals by Freddie Mercury, one of the greatest of the rock vocalists, and here they are performing it from a concert in 1979 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIbmfBODyTk&ab_channel=Queenbootlegsvaluables . Here is a later version by Queen fronted by another great vocalist, George Michael, who put a huge effort into every song he performed. This is from the Tribute Concert held for Mercury shortly after his death in 1991 and this performance has a very powerful ending so much so that Brian May can be seen applauding Michael at the end – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIb4gM84-o0&ab_channel=Remasteredvideos .

In the 1950’s white parents were worried about their teenagers clandestinely listening to a new kind of music called Rock and Roll often being played by African-Americans such as Chuck Berry and Little Richard on small southern radio stations. A white squeaky clean male conservative religious singer named Pat Boone took advantage of those fears by releasing his own toned down versions of what were then called Race Records. Boone became the second biggest-charting singer of the 1950’s second only to Elvis Presley. Pat Boone’s covers mollified the parents, made Boone a lot of money, and denied lucrative exposure to a lot of black singers. Here are two examples of this white appropriation of black music:

– Little Richard – LONG TALL SALLY – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOy5j3XSiWA&ab_channel=LouBlackMusic%26Videos

– Pat Boone – LONG TALL SALLY – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKKVi6ycECg&ab_channel=TheUnforgettablesTv

– Fats Domino – AIN’T THAT A SHAME – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FDYyf8Kqrs&ab_channel=ClassicHitsStudio

– Pat Boone – AIN’T THAT A SHAME – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8dx0oE–VI&ab_channel=DoowopRick

Some covers are not recorded out of respect, but I think are designed to take the mickey out of a particular band. If the lyrics of the original song have been changed then we have a parody, which is not quite the same as a cover. Parodies will be talked about in a later post. However, here is a cover which I think is making fun of the original:

SATISFACTION (by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards) was the first big hit of The Rolling Stones, released in 1965. Here is a clip of The Rolling Stones performing this song LIVE in Ireland in 1965 complete with the hysteria around those early Stones performances. Jagger was 22 years old at the time. Now he’s eighty – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzYWTIHqutA&ab_channel=ABKCOVEVO .

Just four years later the Rolling Stones were very different. Here is a clip from 1969 as they cover themselves. The most musically talented member of the band, the multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones, the one who created The Rolling Stones (it wasn’t Keith or Mick), had just died at the age of twenty-seven. This is from the Stones’ free concert in Hyde Park in tribute concert to Jones. This is the first concert that Mick Taylor, their replacement guitarist, played with the band. He didn’t last long, saying that their hedonistic lifestyle was just too much to handle. This is Satisfaction 1969, just a few months before the Rolling Stones brought the swinging sixties crashing to the ground with their death-riddled concert at Altamont (note the audience shots here) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0MyKX3zqS4&ab_channel=BrunoRecifense .

Here is a much different version of this song by Devo released in 1978. The Rolling Stones were a straightforward blues rock band from London. Devo was a new wave art punk band from Ohio known for their deadpan social satire, and therefore very different from The Rolling Stones. Here is their rendition of Satisfaction – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmKQ2Z1odSc&ab_channel=WarnerRecords .

Do not go gentle into that good night

EUBIE BLAKE (1887 – 1983)
By Unknown author – This image has been downloaded on English Wikipedia by en:user:Emerson7 from the website of the the U.S. Library of Congress at [1], Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3943796

• “In me thou seest the glowing of such fire
• That on the ashes of his youth doth lie”
• – William Shakespeare, Sonnet 73, lines 9-10

A few quick thoughts on creativity. I can’t believe I’m saying this in November 2023 but less than a week ago The Beatles released a NEW record, and a week before that The Rolling Stones released an album of NEW material. The leader of The Beatles, John Lennon, died 43 years ago, and the lead guitarist, George Harrison, died 22 years ago, but they’re both on this new record. Brian Jones, Charlie Watts and Ian Stewart, three original Rolling Stones, are all deceased but the Stones keep Rolling. Both new records are OK but not great. Ringo Starr is eighty-three and Paul McCartney is eighty-one, Mick Jagger is eighty and Keith Richards will turn eighty next month. The Beatles first five albums were full of forgettable music, the early Stones stuff was better but not that great – their best stuff came later. So, when is one most active and creative during one’s lifetime? That depends on how you define active and creative.

One can be active and creative at any age even if one isn’t at the head of the class. In my teens and twenties I participated in political demonstrations, protests, attempts at public education and so on. In my thirties and forties I was doing boring behind the scenes but productive political stuff as a member of various community organizations. I’ve slowed down physically lately but I hope that I’m more effective at political analysis than previously because of my accumulated experiences and ongoing reading and talking to others. I’ve also been a multi-instrumentalist, composer, and active musician my entire life.

NIGERIAN MASTER DRUMMER TONY ALLEN IN OSLO AT THE AGE OF 75
By Tore Sætre – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=42566184

To return to music, some great musicians, similarly, may slow down physically with age but their accumulated musical experiences, and life experiences, can lead to a deeper, more subtle, more substantive level of music in their later years. In that sense they are as creative as they ever were. In the last decade of Bach’s life he composed what I think is his greatest work, The Goldberg Variations. He also did the final revisions of the St. Matthew Passion which is arguably one of the greatest if not the greatest musical composition ever created. Beethoven, though he was deaf at the time, began composing his greatest work, the Ninth Symphony, just five years before he died. Jazz legend Benny Goodman was still performing into his seventies, Dave Brubeck was still performing into his eighties, Eubie Blake was still performing into his nineties. The great Nigerian drummer Tony Allen who invented Afrobeat was still recording albums at the age of eighty in 2020 the year he died. Many of the old blues musicians also kept performing most of their lives.

JON LORD IN 2007
By Menerbes – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6228696

Rock musician Gary Brooker (Procol Harum) was performing into his seventies, Steve Winwood (Traffic, Blind Faith) was still performing this year a week before his seventy-fifth birthday, the greatest of the rock drummers (IMHO), Ginger Baker (Cream), was still touring in 2014 at the age of seventy-five. Jon Lord, the greatest of the rock keyboardists (IMHO), who started out as a founding member of the heavy metal band Deep Purple, released the last of his large scale classical compositions, To Notice Such Things, a six movement suite for solo flute, piano and string orchestra, two months before his sixty-ninth birthday, about two years before his death in 2012. Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) is eighty and he is still touring, headlining concerts in front of massive audiences using enormous multi-sensory technology.

THE TEMPEST, ACT I SCENE ii, FERDINAND COURTING MIRANDA – CALIBAN ON THE FAR RIGHT
By William Hogarth – 1. The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202.2. frankzumbach.wordpress.com, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=152823

In terms of other disciplines, I remember my secondary school English teacher telling me that though Shakespeare’s most famous work was Hamlet, his most thoughtful and nuanced work was The Tempest which was written in 1610-1611 near the end of his life. In the process of completing my Masters in Philosophy I discovered that though Plato’s most famous work was the Republic, arguably his greatest work was his last and longest dialogue, the Laws. The last book that George Orwell wrote shortly before he died was arguably his greatest work, Nineteen Eighty-Four. Karl Marx was still working on his magnum opus, Das Kapital, when he died and volumes 2 and 3 were published posthumously. Ronald Reagan began the first of two terms of his American presidency when he was seventy. Bertrand Russell, one of the greatest logicians in the twentieth century, received his Nobel Prize for Literature (not Peace) when he was 78, and he went to jail when he was 89 for participating in an anti-nuclear arms race demonstration. Of course I am a senior citizen myself so I am biased.

So, sometimes it’s just nice to listen to something a musician created as a senior citizen if only because it reminds one of that musician’s other great works from years past.

Do not go gentle into that good night

Rage, rage, against the dying of the light

– Dylan Thomas