Entertainment For Lively Minds
The late, truly great Sandy Denny
I've had something of a renaissance in my love for Sandy Denny recently, mainly through discovering that the second Fotheringay album [this being the band she formed after leaving Fairport Convention], which hadn't been released in her lifetime, has now been issued, and furthermore is on Emusic. Long story short: get the songs with odd numbers, on which she sings; skip the even-numbered songs, which Trevor Lucas sings. Six songs ranging from very nice (Silver Threads And Golden Needles) to stunning (John The Gun, Late November). The latter is one of my favourite of her songs and has been since I bought the four LP box set Who Knows Where The Time Goes as a student about 25 years ago. It's been remarked on these boards that the fate of box sets is generally to be listened to once, then put away neatly for ever. With Sandy it was different: those records were played a lot, including on student radio. They were songs with legs.
The other thing that made me think about her again was seeing her name mentioned in the Musical Truisms thread, the gist being simply "Sandy Denny is vastly overrated." Well, I'm not having that, I thought. And now I've found something beautiful which I'd never thought to look for on youtube, which is footage of Sandy singing and playing, live and solo. The clip below is a lovely introduction to her, containing three songs, the last of which is the aforementioned Late November. I watched and listened to it with goose pimples, realising when the song ended that I'd been holding my breath, and also was feeling very emotional.
If you only have the time/inclination for one song, skip to Late November. It's a gorgeous song, with a wonderful melody and chord changes, and a lyric that keeps you riveted. And her voice! Utterly English, crisp, brisk, fresh, autumnal; extraordinary timbre, lovely timing; non-sentimental, with very little vibrato, but with some of that exquisite folky melisma. It's a thing of rare beauty. Please give it a try!
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Agreed
The most beautiful voice and a fascinating character. Shame she was snuffed out so young.
She lit - but didn't fully smoke - about 200 cigarettes a day.
count me in
a voice that never fails to stun me
stunning
Sandy was,is and always will be! the truism thing was taking the piss surely?
Count me in too.
Anyone putting Sandy Denny and the word 'overrated' in the same sentence will be ignored by me, I'm afraid, unless it's a deliberate invitation to refute the suggestion and announce my complete love for her music.
I watched Fairport do 'Who Knows' at Glastonbury many years ago with a guest vocalist singing Sandy's part (anyone know who it was?). I didn't feel at all embarrassed by the tears streaming down my face.
It might have been Vicki Clayton.
The last paragraph on this page is of interest:
http://www.vikkiclayton.co.uk/biosandy.htm
Fotheringay 2 is on Spotify:
http://open.spotify.com/album/16mSnXwTfuXxsBcdimYABR
(I like the Trevor Lucas tracks as well)
And live at the BBC video footage is on this excellent box set:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Live-At-BBC-Sandy-Denny/dp/B000RHR7W0/ref=sr_1_1...
A word about Vikki Clayton
She's great. Two words, wasn't it? Here are a few more. She has a beautiful voice, which is very redolent of Sandy's, though, crucially, it doesn't seem like she's trying to sound like Sandy. She's also a bloody good guitarist, as can be heard to great effect on Midsummer Cushion, an album of John Clare Poems set to her music. She's developed into a very good songwriter too. Spotify link is http://open.spotify.com/album/1iopg867jVjZnWg5iF2dac
Thanks for that.
As I recall it, Simon Nicol actually called whoever it was up out of the crowd right in front of the Pyramid stage to sing a couple of Sandy's numbers. The ensuing performance was obviously rehearsed, so it wasn't the first time they'd done the numbers together. I think the lineup included Nicol, Pegg, Swarb? and Mattacks, but I can't recall the full gang.
This is probably my favourite song ever, ever, ever...
The spectral Next Time Around.
Mr C - it may be mine too
and I started a thread on her a while ago - and used that very clip.
Clive James in a contemporary review got it spot on
"Notes were hit dead centre with a white-hot needle and held while they burned and faded. It was an open space, low-volume, high-intensity vocal style"
Along with Bonnie Raitt and Dusty - and the Joni of Hissing, Hejira,Don Juan - my favourite white female voice.
For me...
...it's this one
or perhaps this one
Actually, it's this one, which is the greatest song ever.
Oh man...
Crazy Man Michael, what a sublime song, one of RT's best. The aforementioned Vikki Clayton does a lovely version too.
It's gratifying to see such fulsome tributes to Sandy. I'd never heard of her by the time she died (when I was 13), and the only song on which I'd heard her voice, though not knowingly, was Led Zeppelin's The Battle Of Evermore, on which her voice meshes uncannily with Robert Plant's. So, let's bung that on here as well:
Lump in throat
This hits the spot. Thank you to Azeem for the thread and for finding that wonderful footage of Sandy. It has genuinely moved me - what a great community this is. Not just some nostalgia fest, we are keeping this music alive and enriching each other in the process.
(edit) or at least I thought we were. Turns out this thread stalls at 12 comments. Ah well, as someone said, there's no rhyme or reason to it.
Yes.
All of the above. Yes, yes, yes.
I love (yes, that word) Fairport, but the Denny/Thompson years are untouchable. Genius? I think so.
Extraordinary cover of her greatest song
I've got John Malkovich to think for this. I was looking at info about Desert Island Discs, and seeing his name I was intrigued as to what his taste might be. I was delighted and surprised to see that he'd chosen Nina Simone singing Who Knows Where The Time Goes. It's uniquely Nina.
I hope it's OK etiquette-wise to plug a sponsored event I'm doing next weekend. Please have a look at my profile page if interested. Ta.
Quiet Joys Of Brotherhood
A few years ago at Cropredy, they played 'The Quiet Joys Of Brotherhood' over the PA which features Sandys voice on its own,while a montage of pics of Sandy were shown on the big screen. It was a very moving and peaceful moment as 25,000 people fell silent and just listened to the crystal clear vocal float over the top of the crowd. Many people that night seemed to have 'something in their eye' at that moment. Sublime.