Vanlose Stairway

Last updated
"Vanlose Stairway"
Song by Van Morrison
from the album Beautiful Vision
ReleasedJanuary 1982 (1982-01)
Genre Celtic, blue-eyed soul [1]
Length4:10
Label Warner Bros.
Songwriter(s) Van Morrison
Producer(s) Van Morrison

"Vanlose Stairway" is a song written by the Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison, and included on his 1982 album Beautiful Vision . It has remained a popular concert performance throughout Morrison's career and has become one of his most played songs. [2]

Contents

Recording and composition

It was recorded in the summer of 1981 at the Record Plant in Sausalito, California. [3]

Morrison wrote the song about his Danish girlfriend, Ulla Munch, from Vanløse district in Copenhagen who lived on the fourth floor of an apartment building with no lift. [2] [4] [5] Clinton Heylin remarks..."he turned this mundane set of stairs in an uninspiring block of flats into a 'Stairway that reaches up to the moon/And it comes right back....to you'. [6] Peter Mills, author of the Morrison biography Hymns to the Silence, refers to "Vanlose Stairway" as this "dark horse of a song". [2]

The singer also includes the lines "Send me your Pillow" which referenced bluesman John Lee Hooker's influence on his music. [7]

Live performances

The song has been performed by Morrison over seven hundred times, making it the seventh most played song at his concerts. [8] He performed a baroque rendition of this song with the Dallas Jazz Orchestra at the 1989 Montreux Jazz Festival. [9]

Other releases

A live performance of "Vanlose Stairway" was included on the Morrison's 1984 album, Live at the Grand Opera House Belfast . Morrison often performed the song as a medley with "Trans-Euro Train" and Ray Charles' "A Fool for You". Live versions of the song in this format appeared on the 1994 album, A Night in San Francisco , and the 2019 deluxe edition of The Healing Game , from Morrison's 1997 performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival. It was remastered and released on the 2007 compilation album, Still on Top - The Greatest Hits .

Personnel on original release

Notes

  1. ↑ "Vanlose Stairway - Van Morrison | Song Info | AllMusic". AllMusic. Retrieved 10 July 2021.
  2. 1 2 3 Barton, Laura (2011-03-31). "Hail, Hail, Rock'n'Roll". The Guardian . Retrieved 2011-04-01.
  3. ↑ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence?, pp. 523-524
  4. ↑ Rogan, No Surrender, p.342
  5. ↑ E/F Markskellet
  6. ↑ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence?, p.371
  7. ↑ Janovitz, Bill. "allmusic review: Vanlose Stairway". allmusic.com. Retrieved 2009-01-10.
  8. ↑ "Top played songs". ivan.vanomatic.de. Retrieved 2009-01-10.
  9. ↑ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence, p.465

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References

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