August 11, 2023 Chart #206
Hello Music Friends,
You may have noticed that I did not send my usual chart of the week email for the past two Fridays. I have not missed a Friday in over three years. Well, life got in the way lately as I cared for my aging father. In late July we lost my Dad, a huge loss for me. Dad was a best friend to me and I will miss him greatly. It’s hard to describe the hole he leaves inside, something that will take time for me to deal with. I know many of you have lost someone dear so you can relate to my pain. So excuse my absence for the past two weeks, it was for a fine man, a real music lover who taught me to appreciate good music of all genres.
Today we are going with a song that speaks to me and makes me think about Dad. “Turn! Turn! Turn!”, also known as or subtitled “To Everything There Is a Season“, is a song written by Pete Seeger in 1959. The lyrics – except for the title, which is repeated throughout the song, and the final two lines – consist of the first eight verses of the third chapter of the biblical Book of Ecclesiastes. The song was originally released in 1962 as “To Everything There Is a Season” on the folk group the Limeliters’ album Folk Matinee, and then some months later on Seeger’s own The Bitter and the Sweet.
The song became an international hit in late 1965 when it was adapted by the American folk rock group the Byrds. The single entered the U.S. chart at number 80 on October 23, 1965, before reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on December 4, 1965. In Canada, it reached number 3 on November 29, 1965, and also peaked at number 26 on the UK Singles Chart.
The lyrics are taken almost verbatim from the book of Ecclesiastes, as found in the King James Version of the Bible, (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8) though the sequence of the words was rearranged for the song. Ecclesiastes is traditionally ascribed to King Solomon who would have written it in the 10th century BC, but believed by a significant group of biblical scholars to date much later, up to the third century BC:
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, a time to reap that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to gain that which is to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time of love, and a time of hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
The Biblical text posits there being a time and place for all things: birth and death, killing and healing, sorrow and laughter, war and peace, and so on. The lines are open to myriad interpretations, but Seeger’s song presents them as a plea for world peace with the closing line: “a time for peace, I swear it’s not too late.” This line and the title phrase “Turn! Turn! Turn!” are the only parts of the lyric written by Seeger himself.
Judy Collins & Pete Seeger: https://youtu.be/n0xzyhoeu1Y
In 1999, Seeger arranged for 45% of the songwriting royalties for “Turn! Turn! Turn!” to be donated to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. He kept 50% of the royalties for his own music and took a further 5% for the lyrics because, in Seeger’s own words, “[in addition to the music] I did write six words and one more word repeated three times.”
The Limelighters: https://youtu.be/ZuzE5dwPCd4
The song was first released by the folk group the Limeliters on their 1962 album Folk Matinee, under the title “To Everything There Is a Season”. The Limeliters’ version predated the release of Seeger’s own version by several months. One of the Limeliters’ backing musicians at this time was Jim McGuinn (aka Roger McGuinn), who would later record the song with his band the Byrds and, prior to that, arrange the song for folk singer Judy Collins on her 1963 album, Judy Collins 3. Collins’ recording of the song was retitled as “Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season)”, a title that would be retained by the Byrds, though it was shortened to “Turn! Turn! Turn!” on the front cover of the album of the same name and the song became generally known by the shorter version, appearing as such on most later Byrds compilations.
“Turn! Turn! Turn!” had first been arranged by the Byrds’ lead guitarist Jim McGuinn in a chamber-folk style during sessions for Judy Collins’ 1963 album, Judy Collins 3. The idea of reviving the song came to McGuinn during the Byrds’ July 1965 tour of the American Midwest, when his future wife, Dolores, requested the tune on the Byrds’ tour bus. The rendering that McGuinn dutifully played came out sounding not like a folk song but more like a rock/folk hybrid, perfectly in keeping with the Byrds’ status as pioneers of the folk rock genre. McGuinn explained, “It was a standard folk song by that time, but I played it and it came out rock ‘n’ roll because that’s what I was programmed to do like a computer. I couldn’t do it as it was traditionally. It came out with that samba beat, and we thought it would make a good single.” The master recording of the song reportedly took the Byrds 78 takes, spread over five days of recording, to complete.
And oh, by the way, David Crosby was a member of The Byrds.
Dad, you were a huge fan of jazz and passed that on to me. This song is not jazz, but it still makes me think about you and our last weeks together. Love you dad.
Keep Rockin’,
Stan Bradshaw