Tuesday, July 15, 2025

"Mind Gardens"

There are a number of instances in "Mind Gardens" where musical or poetic characteristics match the meaning of the lyrics.

The word "high" in the phrase "On a high hill" is sung to the highest pitch in the phrase (C# D E B).

The phrase "rain pourin' down" is sung to a descending melody, with "down" sung with a descending glissando (D C# B B~A).

The sequential words "safely" and "securely" alliterate and rhyme, and these repeated sounds lend a sense of that steadfastness.

Monday, July 14, 2025

"Have You Seen Her Face"

Yester-day was Roger McGuinn's birthday, so I listened to Younger than Yesterday, and I noticed a handful of small features.

In the line "A style made up to capture all she needs" in "Have You See Her Face," the phrase "all she needs" is sung to notes of all different pitches (G A F#), giving something of a sense of breadth.

The same sort of feature is present in the phrase "All the sights and sounds" in the third verse:  "sights and sounds" is sung to the notes B A# A.  That the A# is an accidental (I'm pretty sure the song is in D major) lends a further sense of this entirety.

Wednesday, July 2, 2025

"I Am a Pilgrim"

I wrote about a number of Biblical allusions in "I Am a Pilgrim" in my initial series of posts, but when I listened to Sweetheart of the Rodeo yester-day, I remembered an-other passage that may be related.  The first two lines of the song are "I am a pilgrim and a stranger / Travelin' through this wearisome land," and these bear some resemblance to what Moses says in Exodus 2:22:  "I have been a sojourner in a foreign land."