Saturday’s Song – Four Strong Winds by Ian & Sylvia and Also by Neil Young

I visited with my brother this week – a brother who’s a few years older than I. His memories of the music of the ’60s is much better than mine. Not unrelated to the topic of this post, he was showing me his new Roku streaming player. I pretty much never watch t.v. but the benefit of the simplicity and intuitive function of this player was not lost on me.

As my brother showed me how Roku worked, we saw a documentary in the screen offerings that we decided to watch:
Greenwich Village: Music That Defined A Generation.

It was a thoroughly enjoyable hour and a half film. Lots of interviews with the who’s who of the Village at the time – the early ’60s. Lots of talk about the biggest name to come out of that place and time, but no now-a-day interview with Dylan himself.

As we watched the show, my brother filled in lots of gaps and offered tangential stories to the film, some specific to his experiences of that time, others a broadening of a story touched on in the film. We were able to have these sidebar chats as Roku allows the viewer to pause a film for any length of time. It also allows for a 16 second rewind if you’ve miss hearing something or want to review a clip.

Anyway, a few days later, one song is still stuck in my head. I remember saying to my brother when the opening notes and lines began, “Oh, wow, I remember this. Hearing it is giving me the chills.” The specific meaning of “the chills” was “a shudder of emotion.” Some songs just absolutely nail the feel of the time in which they were released. The opening of this song caused a visceral reaction in me. It transported me to my youth. It’s a fantastic folk song with such a forlorn feeling and yet it is positively beautiful.

The song is Four Strong Winds by Ian & Sylvia – written by Ian (Tyson). A You Tube version of the song is the opening image of this post.

I’ll also share this great version by Neil Young – whose music I love.