The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

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"The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"
WreckEdmundFitzgerald.jpg
Single by Gordon Lightfoot
from the album Summertime Dream
B-side "The House You Live In"
ReleasedAugust 1976
RecordedDecember 1975
Studio Eastern Sound Studios, Toronto
Genre
[1]
Length
  • 6:30 (album version)
  • 5:57 (single edit)
Label Reprise
Songwriter Gordon Lightfoot
Producers
Gordon Lightfoot singles chronology
"Rainy Day People"
(1975)		"The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"
(1976)		"Race Among the Ruins"
(1976)
Audio
"The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" on YouTube

"The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" is a 1976 folk rock ballad written, composed and performed by the Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot to memorialize the sinking of the bulk carrier SS Edmund Fitzgerald in Lake Superior on November 10, 1975. Lightfoot considered this song to be his finest work.

Contents

Appearing originally on his 1976 album Summertime Dream , Lightfoot re-recorded the song in 1988 for the compilation album Gord's Gold, Vol. 2 . "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" was a hit for Lightfoot, reaching number 1 in his native Canada in the RPM chart and number 2 in the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States.

Following Lightfoot's death, the song had a new peak in popularity that same year, reaching number twenty on the Billboard magazine's Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart in May 2023. In commemoration of Lightfoot's writing of the lyrics to the ballad, the Great Lakes Maritime Academy now follows the commemoration bell count of: "29 for the lives lost that day back in 1975 on Lake Superior, once for all lives lost at sea, and once for singer Gordon Lightfoot, who wrote the ballad of the ship’s sinking". [2]

Composition

The song chronicles the final voyage of the Edmund Fitzgerald as it succumbed to an intense late-season storm and sank in Lake Superior with the loss of all 29 crewmen. Lightfoot drew inspiration from news reports he gathered in the immediate aftermath, particularly the article "The Cruelest Month" published in the November 24, 1975 issue of Newsweek . [3] Lightfoot could also draw upon his personal experience with recreational sailing on the Great Lakes [4] . Lightfoot himself considered this song to be his finest work. [5]

Recorded before the ship's wreckage had been studied, the song reflects some speculation about how the disaster transpired. In later interviews, Lightfoot recounted how he had agonized over possible inaccuracies while trying to pen the lyrics until his lead guitarist Terry Clements convinced him to do what Clements' favourite author Mark Twain would have advised: just tell a story. [6]

In March 2010, Lightfoot changed a line during live performances to reflect new findings about how the ship had foundered. The original words, "At 7 p.m. a main hatchway caved in; he said...", Lightfoot began singing as "At 7 p.m. it grew dark, it was then he said...." Lightfoot learned about the new findings when contacted for permission to use his song for a History Channel documentary that aired on March 31, 2010. Lightfoot stated that he did not intend to change the original copyrighted lyrics; instead, from then on, he simply sang the revised lyrics during live performances. [7] Lightfoot also changed the words "musty old hall" (referring to "the Maritime Sailors' Cathedral", in fact the Mariners' Church of Detroit) to "rustic old hall". [8]

SS Edmund Fitzgerald (1971) Edmund Fitzgerald, 1971, 3 of 4 (restored; cropped).jpg
SS Edmund Fitzgerald (1971)

Melody

The song follows 6/8 time with a straightforward arrangement described by Adam Perlmutter in Accoustic Guitar as "this arrangement of 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald' is pretty simple—just five open shapes in the key of A major (sounding as B, due to a second-fret capo). Instead of an A chord (A C# E), there’s an Asus2, a type of suspended triad in which the third (C#) is replaced with the second (B). Then there’s the G6/A, or a G6 chord (G B D E) with an A as the lowest note, used only in the intro/interlude section". [9] The melody for the song was later adapted by Bobby Sands for his song "Back Home in Derry". When asked about the similarity and why he did not pursue copyright infringement, Lightfoot said that the melody was "just an old Irish folk song; an old Irish dirge. I think I took it from that. It's all folk music and it's all out there for everyone to enjoy." [10]

Lyrics

The song narrates the final and difficult journey of the Edmund Fitzgerald through the storm and the frantic moments before the shipwreck. The seven stanzas of the song are written with eight verses each, with the first verse of the first stanza reading: "The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down". The lyrics were strongly inspired by the article "The Cruelest Month", which appeared on 24 November 1975 in Newsweek magazine, which in addition to reporting the disaster also illustrated the legends of the Ojibwe Native Americans (termed "Chippewa" by white Europeans) on Lake Superior, which are in fact mentioned in the song. A recurring theme of the song is the violence of the bad weather in the late autumn season on the Great Lakes in November, which would ultimately lead to the catastrophe of the Fitzgerald. For example, one of the central laments in the lyrics of the song speaks of the nearness of safe harbor in the presence of imminent disaster, stating:

Does any one know where the love of God goes
when the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
if they'd put fifteen more miles behind her.

Lightfoot, unable to know exactly how the tragedy had unfolded, by his own admission took some artistic liberties in recounting the sequence of events, for example by describing a collapse of a hatchway prior to the wreck. [11] Over time Lightfoot made slight modifications to the lyrics as more information about the disaster became available.

During the following years the composer, who was surprised by the enormous success of the song, was open to rework the lyrics in light of new developments in the investigations into the disaster and the public's sensitivity. [12] Although he declared that he did not want to modify the original lyrics of the song officially, often during live performances Lightfoot varied some verses to "update" them or to meet the requests of the public and the families of the victims. [13] For example, in the original lyrics the church that commemorates the shipwreck is "a musty old hall"; after the complaints of a parishioner, Lightfoot changed the passage to "a rustic old hall". The song was written with no choruses, and no lyrical bridge or change of key; it was written without any lyrical intro or outro.

Production

The song was recorded in December 1975 at Eastern Sound, [14] a recording studio composed of two Victorian houses at 48 Yorkville Avenue in a then-hippie district of downtown Toronto. The studio was later demolished and replaced by a parking lot. [15] Pee Wee Charles and Terry Clements came up with "the haunting guitar and steel riffs" on a "second take" during the evening session. [16]

Chart success

Lightfoot's single version hit number 1 in his native Canada (in the RPM national singles survey) on November 20, 1976, barely a year after the disaster. [17] In the United States, it reached number 1 in Cashbox and number 2 for two weeks in the Billboard Hot 100 (behind Rod Stewart's "Tonight's the Night"), making it Lightfoot's second-most successful single, behind only "Sundown". Overseas it was at best a minor hit, peaking at number 40 in the UK Singles Chart. [18]

Canadian indie rock band Rheostatics did an early cover of the song in 1991. [30] Another early cover of the song was done by the Indianapolis hard rock musicians Simon Bar Sinister in 1997 for Sage records which includes a lead guitar rock solo after the end of the fourth stanza; in the closing verses of the song the cymbals are intoned in the background 29 times at half-second intervals to honor the 29 dead sailors lost at sea. [31] The Cantus vocal ensemble did a pensive cover of the song in 2006 accompanied by acoustic guitar, cello and fife. [32] In 2018 the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club recorded a live performance of the song featuring a baritone soloist and accompanied by two acoustic guitars, cello and piano. [33] In 2019, the Canadian rock group Headstones covered the song and released a single of their cover. [34] The American band Punch Brothers did a cover of the song in 2022 with a solo tenor voice accompanied by a mandolin, violin and acoustic guitar. [35] The song was covered in 2023 by the English folk group The Longest Johns with an associated music video. [36] The song was also covered in 2025 by the a cappella group Home Free with an associated music video. [37] American bluegrass artist Billy Strings performed a 12-minute cover of the song in August 2025 featuring a 3-minute extended instrumental introduction to the song played on acoustic guitar, and a second 4-minute acoustic guitar solo at the end of the fourth stanza. [38]

Although the lyrics of the song memorialize the 29 lives lost, since Lightfoot's death in 2023 the sinking has been commemorated with 31 rings of the memorial bell at the Great Lakes Maritime Academy: "29 for the lives lost that day back in 1975 on Lake Superior, once for all lives lost at sea, and once for singer Gordon Lightfoot, who wrote the ballad of the ship’s sinking." [2] [39] [40] [41] Following the singer-songwriter's death, the song had a new peak in popularity that same year, reaching number twenty on the Billboard magazine's Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart in May 2023.

Personnel

Original version from 1976 on Summertime Dream (5 min, 58 sec):

The 1987 version released on the 1999 Songbook album updated the Personnel notes for the re-recorded version (6 min, 28 sec):

See also

References

  1. ↑ Person, James (January 1, 1998). "Gordon Lightfoot". In Knopper, Steve (ed.). MusicHound Lounge: The Essential Album Guide. Detroit: Visible Ink Press. p. 294.
  2. 1 2 "Edmund Fitzgerald memorialized with 31 rings of its bell at Great Lakes Maritime Academy". 910News.com. Archived from the original on August 17, 2024. Retrieved November 10, 2025.
  3. ↑ Jennings, Nicholas (2016). Lightfoot. Viking. p. 148. ISBN   9780735232556 . Retrieved May 3, 2023.
  4. ↑ Weiss, William R. (1979). "This Goose Is Golden". Yachting. Archived from the original on March 30, 2024. Retrieved October 17, 2025– via Lightfoot.ca.
  5. ↑ DeYoung, Bill (March 2, 2010). "If You Could Read His Mind: A Conversation with Folk Music Legend Gordon Lightfoot". Connect Savannah.
  6. ↑ Casey, Chris (November 10, 2000). "25 Years Later, Lightfoot Content with Popularity of Fitzgerald Ballad". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved August 31, 2023. [Clements] said Mark Twain would say, 'Tell a story'.
  7. ↑ Stevenson, Jane (March 26, 2010). "Lightfoot Changes 'Edmund Fitzgerald' Lyric". Toronto Sun . Archived from the original on March 28, 2010. Retrieved May 5, 2023.
  8. ↑ Balunda, George (November 2011). "Mariners' Church of Detroit". Hour Detroit . Retrieved April 20, 2011.
  9. ↑ Perlmuter, Adam (September 22, 2023). "Learn to Play Gordon Lightfoot's "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"". Acoustic Guitar. Retrieved November 5, 2025.
  10. ↑ "Gordon Lightfoot & Bobby Sands | Bobby Sands Trust".
  11. ↑ Heather Sparling, Disaster Songs as Intangible Memorials in Atlantic Canada, New York, Taylor & Francis, 2023, ISBN 978-1-032-11120-9.
  12. ↑ Heather Sparling, Disaster Songs as Intangible Memorials in Atlantic Canada, New York, Taylor & Francis, 2023, ISBN 978-1-032-11120-9.
  13. ↑ Heather Sparling, Disaster Songs as Intangible Memorials in Atlantic Canada , New York, Taylor & Francis, 2023, ISBN 978-1-032-11120-9.
  14. ↑ "Album Recording Notes". Lightfoot!. Retrieved October 23, 2016.
  15. ↑ "Recording Studios used in Toronto: Eastern Sound". Bruce Cockburn & Toronto: A Historical Tour. Retrieved October 23, 2016.
  16. ↑ Charles, PeeWee (November 10, 2012). "Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald....37 years ago today!!". The Steel Guitar Forum. Retrieved October 23, 2016.
  17. 1 2 "Item Display. RPM". Library and Archives Canada. Archived from the original on October 15, 2012. Retrieved August 18, 2010.
  18. ↑ "Official Singles Chart Top 50: 23 January 1977 - 29 January 1977". Official Charts Company. Retrieved November 26, 2016.
  19. ↑ Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992. Australian Chart Book. ISBN   0-646-11917-6.
  20. ↑ "RPM Adult Contemporary - Volume 25, No. 26". Library and Archives Canada . July 17, 2013. Retrieved November 6, 2024.
  21. ↑ "RPM Country Singles - Volume 26, No. 6". Library and Archives Canada . July 17, 2013. Retrieved November 6, 2024.
  22. ↑ "Gordon Lightfoot Chart History (Hot 100)". Billboard. Retrieved November 6, 2024.
  23. ↑ "Gordon Lightfoot Chart History (Adult Contemporary)". Billboard. Retrieved November 6, 2024.
  24. ↑ "Gordon Lightfoot Chart History (Hot Country Songs)". Billboard. Retrieved November 6, 2024.
  25. ↑ "Cash Box Top Singles - 1976". Tropicalglen.com. December 20, 1963. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved February 23, 2017.
  26. ↑ "Gordon Lightfoot Chart History (Hot Rock & Alternative Songs)". Billboard. Retrieved May 9, 2023.
  27. ↑ "Top Singles – Volume 26, No. 14 & 15, January 08 1977". RPM . Library and Archives Canada. Archived from the original on March 19, 2016. Retrieved June 13, 2016.
  28. ↑ Whitburn, Joel (1999). Pop Annual. Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin: Record Research Inc. ISBN   0-89820-142-X.
  29. ↑ "The CASH BOX Year-End Charts: 1976; TOP 100 POP SINGLES (As published in the December 25, 1976, issue)". Archived from the original on August 25, 2012. Retrieved June 5, 2016.
  30. ↑ Rheostatics . Cover for "The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald". 1991.
  31. ↑ Simon Bar Sinister. Cover for "The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald". 1999. Sage Records.
  32. ↑ Cantus (vocal ensemble). Cover for "The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald". 2006.
  33. ↑ University of Michigan Men's Glee Club. Cover for "The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald". 2018.
  34. ↑ Headstones (band). Cover for "The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald". 2019.
  35. ↑ "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald." Punch Brothers. 2022. Boston, Mass.
  36. ↑ "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald". The Longest Johns. February 2023.
  37. ↑ "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald". Home Free. October 2025.
  38. ↑ Billy Strings. "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald". August 2025.
  39. ↑ "Detroit Church Broadens Its Scope Marking Edmund Fitzgerald Anniversary". USA Today . Associated Press. November 13, 2006. Archived from the original on February 5, 2013. Retrieved January 18, 2011.
  40. ↑ Bulanda, George (November 2010). "Great Mariner's Church Remembers Edmund Fitzgerald on 35th Anniversary of Sinking". Hour Detroit . ISSN   1098-9684. Archived from the original on November 6, 2010. Retrieved November 8, 2010.
  41. ↑ Mackay, Hannah (May 2, 2023). "Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society Pays Tribute to Gordon Lightfoot". The Detroit News. Archived from the original on May 5, 2023. Retrieved May 4, 2023.

Further reading

Rauch, Alan (June 2023). "'Fellas, it's Been Good to Know You': Gordon Lightfoot's Edmund Fitzgerald". The Newsletter of the Charlotte Folk Society. 28 (6): 4.

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