SONG OF THE DAY
“Same Old Lang Syne” by Dan Fogelberg (The Innocent Age, Full Moon/ Epic, 1981). Written by Dan Fogelberg.
INTERESTING FACTS (a la wikipedia)
– The song is a narrative ballad told in the first person and tells the story of two long-ago lovers meeting by chance in a supermarket on Christmas Eve.
– The melody phrase at the beginning of each verse is taken by Fogelberg from Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture”.
– During its debut, the song peaked at #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 Chart and is now frequently played during the holiday season and is integrated with traditional Christmas songs, despite having little to do with the holiday other than a brief mention of Christmas Eve.
– The song ends with a soprano saxophone solo by Michael Brecker based on the melody from the original “Auld Lang Syne”.
– As Fogelberg stated on his official website, the song was autobiographical. He was visiting family back home in Peoria, Illinois in the mid-’70s when he ran into an old girlfriend at a convenience store.
– After Fogelberg’s death from prostate cancer in 2007, the woman about whom he wrote the song came forward with her story. Her name is Jill Greulich, and she and Fogelberg dated in high school when she was Jill Anderson. As she explained to the Peoria Journal Star in a December 22, 2007 article, they were part of the Woodruff High School class of 1969, but went to different colleges. After college, Jill got married and moved to Chicago, and Dan went to Colorado to pursue music. On December 24, 1976, they were each back in Peoria with their families for Christmas when Jill went out for eggnog and Dan was dispatched to find whipping cream for Irish coffee. The only place open was a convenience store at the top of Abington Hill where they had their encounter, located at 1302 East Frye Avenue. Today, the store is still in business and is now called Short Stop Food Mart. They bought a six pack of beer and drank it in her car for two hours while they talked. Five years later, Jill heard “Same Old Lang Syne” on the radio while driving to work, but she kept quiet about it, as Fogelberg also refused to reveal her identity. Her main concern was that coming forward would disrupt Fogelberg’s marriage.
– Dan Fogelberg plays piano, bass, electric piano, as well as sings lead and background vocals.
– The Innocent Age is the seventh album by American singer/songwriter Dan Fogelberg.
– It was one of his most successful albums; three of his four Top 10 singles on the Billboard pop chart (“Hard to Say” (#7), “Same Old Lang Syne” (#9), and “Leader of the Band” (#9)) were from this album, as well as another Top 20 single in “Run for the Roses” (#18). All four also reached the Top 10 on the Billboard adult contemporary chart, with “Leader of the Band” reaching Number 1 on that chart.
– The Innocent Age drew its inspiration from Thomas Wolfe’s major novel Of Time and the River. Fogelberg captured on this album Wolfe’s protagonist’s search for meaning, for self, and the inexorable passage of time.
– The album also features Glenn Frey, Emmylou Harris, Don Henley and Joni Mitchell on vocals, and the UCLA Marching band.
– Daniel Grayling Fogelberg (August 13, 1951 – December 16, 2007) was an American singer-songwriter, composer, and multi-instrumentalist, whose music was inspired by sources as diverse as folk, pop, rock, classical, jazz, and bluegrass music.
– Dan Fogelberg, the youngest of three sons, was born in Peoria, Illinois, the son of a classically trained pianist and a high school band director.
– His father would later be the inspiration for the song, “Leader of the Band”.
– After graduating from Woodruff High School in 1969, he studied theater arts and painting at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and began performing as a solo acoustic player in area coffeehouses, including the Red Herring Coffeehouse, where he made his first solo recordings as part of a folk festival recording in 1971.
– He was discovered that year by Irving Azoff. Fogelberg and Azoff—who started his music-management career promoting another Champaign-Urbana act, REO Speedwagon—moved to California to seek their fortunes. Azoff sent Fogelberg to Nashville to hone his skills, where he became a session musician and recorded his first album, with producer Norbert Putnam. In 1972, he performed as an opening act for Van Morrison. Fogelberg’s second album was very successful—the 1974 Joe Walsh–produced album Souvenirs and its song “Part of the Plan” became Fogelberg’s first hit.
– After battling prostate cancer for three years, Fogelberg succumbed to the disease on December 16, 2007, at his home in Deer Isle, with wife Jean by his side. He was 56 years old.
– Soon after his death, his widow announced that a song written and recorded for her by Fogelberg for Valentine’s Day 2005, “Sometimes a Song”, would be sold on the Internet and that all proceeds would go to the Prostate Cancer Foundation. The song was released on Valentine’s Day 2008 and was also included in a collection of eleven previously unpublished songs (nine originals) on a CD released in September 2009 titled Love In Time.