Stephen Stills at his finest. 4+20 was written in 1969 and first released on Déjà vu with Crosby, Stills, and Nash. Stills asked David Crosby and Graham Nash to back him on the recording but both said ‘they wouldn’t touch it’ recalled Stills in a later interview. That it was too good and stood on its own. He first sang it on the Dick Cavett show right after Woodstock when he was in fact ‘4+20’. According to Stills it tells the story of an 84-year-old man born into poverty and finds himself alone in old age.
Its played in open tuning (EEEEBE), the same tuning Stills wrote his magnus opus…Suite Judy Blue Eyes. I can’t remember when I first learned it but I was learning a lot of open tuning songs in the late 80’s so it might have been then. It was yet another of the great albums my father had in his record collection so I most certainly heard it much earlier. I often break the third string retuning because it is so far down. (When I was looking for background on this song I stumbled upon this quote from Stills about Jimi Hendrix which I thought was fascinating (nothing to do with 4+20)... He (Jimi Hendrix) was a very dear friend of mine, we were lonely in London together and hung out a lot. I left England suddenly, and years later I learned from Mitch Mitchell that Jimi had been looking for me everywhere – wanted me to join the Experience as the bass player, which would have been my greatest dream in life! It had something to do with a manager deciding it was a wrong career move and said, 'we don't know where he is.' I learned to play lead guitar from Jimi he showed me the scales and said things like, 'You begin by thinking about the chord position and base your improvisations on that.' Or he'd make some little remark like, 'F sharp is really cool,' and we'd develop a jam around that. We'd make up songs, play the blues. He'd improvise until the inspiration began to ebb, then he'd look at me and say, 'You drive.' You had to hear that cat play acoustic guitar! We once jammed for about five days, one long marathon session in my beach house in Malibu. The sheriff's deputy overheard our guitar playing. When he found out it was us he asked permission to park his police car directly outside the house so he could listen in while he fielded radio calls. Told us not to worry about a thing, he'd be looking out for us.
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In the early 1960’s Paul Simon moved to England to tour small clubs and venues. At one of these clubs, The Railway Inn Folk Club, he met Kathy Chitty, and as the story goes…immediately fell in love. He wrote Kathy’s Song for her and released it on the album The Paul Simon Songbook that he also recorded in England. Simon had already met Art Garfunkel by this time. In fact, they had known each other for most of their teens and even starred in a play together in the 6th grade. They later formed a duo called “Tom & Jerry” and had several singles with modest success. By 1964 Simon had written 30 songs and they released 12 of them on their debut album, The Sounds of Silence as ‘Simon & Garfunkel’. But the album initially went nowhere. This was what prompted Simon’s trip abroad as he said he couldn’t find anywhere in NYC to play…’they wouldn’t have me.’ As he was touring across England with Kathy the Sounds of Silence starting getting airplay in the US and Simon came back (with Kathy) to tour with Garfunkel. As their fame grew, Kathy eventually returned to England alone as she was uncomfortable with limelight and Simon’s new found success. They eventually parted ways. Some claim Kathy’s Song is his best work but I think he has too many ‘best’ songs to single out a single one. I would say it is one of his most powerful and heartfelt. And the fingerpicking arrangement is beautiful. It is certainly one of my favorites. The second part to this story is about a lesser known singer-songwriter from Washington DC named Eva Cassidy. She also sang in clubs and recorded a lot of well known standards like Time After Time, Fields of Gold, Over the Rainbow…and of course Kathy’s Song. She had a beautiful voice and her cover of Simon’s love song is spellbinding. Gives me goosebumps every time I hear it and her guitar work is haunting. Sadly, she contracted a rare form of melanoma and passed away in her early 30’s…relatively unknown outside of the DC area. Several years after she died, a couple of DJ’s in England (coincidental?) began playing several of her covers on the radio eventually landing taking them to number one in the UK. She has since sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. I first learned Kathy's Song sometime in 70's. As I’ve mentioned several times on this site, my father had this epic record collection and had all of Simon & Garfunkels albums which I wore out trying to learn the songs. I first heard Kathy’s Song there and the thought of trying to place the stereo needle in the right spot over and over to learn the notes gives me chills to this day. Simon plays in in standard tuning (G) but I tune it down a whole step because it seems to fit my voice better. Playing it never gets old. Information collected from many sources (and memory)...
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SONG STORIESThis is a collection of stories about songs I play and artists who have inspired me. It's a place I can honor them. From time to time I'll add new music I come across and various other ramblings...
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