| "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" | |
|---|---|
| Song by Sandy Denny | |
| from the album Unhalfbricking (by Fairport Convention) | |
| Released | 1968 |
| Songwriter(s) | Sandy Denny |
"Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" is a song written by the English folk-rock singer and songwriter Sandy Denny.
Denny recorded a first demo of the song in 1966. [1] It was the second song she ever completed. [2] She again recorded the song as a demo in 1967, singing and playing guitar on the track.
In 1967 she joined the folk band The Strawbs, and in 1968 she re-recorded the song, again with only her voice and guitar, for what became the Strawbs album All Our Own Work , which was not released until 1973. (This version has the opening line "Across the purple sky..." [2] )
The American folk singer Judy Collins heard a tape of the original demo recording in 1968 and decided to cover the song.[ citation needed ] She recorded her version in New York City on August 26, 1968, at A&R Recording's 799 7th Avenue studio. [3] She released her recording first as the B-side of her version of "Both Sides, Now", and then as the title track of her album Who Knows Where the Time Goes , both released in 1968. Hers was the first commercially released recording of the song.
In 1968, Denny joined the folk-rock band Fairport Convention. She recorded the song on her second album with the band, the 1969 album Unhalfbricking . This version had more of a rock influence.
The song became a signature song for both Denny and Fairport Convention, and was subsequently covered by many artists.
It was the last song Denny sang at her last ever performance, [4] before she died at age 31.
The song is a reflection in three verses on observed events ("Across the evening sky all the birds are leaving"). [5] Denny writes that she does not count time ("Before the winter's fire, I will still be dreamin'; I have no thought of time" [6] ) and in the last line of the short chorus asks rhetorically, "Who knows where the time goes?". The last verse includes the lines "I am not alone while my love is near me, I know it will be so until it's time to go.” [4]
 | This section needs additional citations for verification .(April 2021) |
Versions have been recorded by, among others, Eva Cassidy, Judy Collins, Nana Mouskouri, Susanna Hoffs and Matthew Sweet, Deanna Kirk, Eddi Reader, Julianne Regan (with Fairport Convention), Kate Rusby, Nina Simone (on her 1970 live album Black Gold ), Barbara Dickson, The Lasses, [7] Heather Masse (on the radio program A Prairie Home Companion ), [8] Dez Mona, [9] and Kate Wolf (on her 1983 live album Give Yourself to Love). [10]
In 2007, the Unhalfbricking version was voted "Favourite Folk Track of All Time" by listeners of BBC Radio 2. [11]
Rufus Wainwright called it "one of the saddest songs ever written"; Nina Simone called it a "lovely, lovely thing"; and Linda Thompson said "I don’t find it to be sad. Great music is always uplifting to me. She was so young when she wrote it but it pinpoints exactly the feelings I have now, at 71. It also resonated strongly with me when I was a teenager. Love and loss portrayed so sweetly. A song for all ages." [4]
 |
Fairport Convention are an English folk rock band, formed in 1967 by guitarists Richard Thompson and Simon Nicol, bassist Ashley Hutchings and drummer Shaun Frater. They started out influenced by American folk rock, with a set list dominated by Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell songs and a sound that earned them the nickname "the British Jefferson Airplane". Vocalists Judy Dyble and Iain Matthews joined them before the recording of their self-titled debut in 1968; afterwards, Dyble was replaced by Sandy Denny, with Matthews later leaving during the recording of their third album.
Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
What We Did on Our Holidays is the second album by British band Fairport Convention, released in 1969. It was their first album to feature singer-songwriter Sandy Denny. The album also showed a move towards the folk rock for which the band became noted, including tracks later to become perennial favourites such as "Fotheringay" and the song traditionally used to close live concerts, "Meet on the Ledge".
Trevor George Lucas was an Australian folk singer, a member of Fairport Convention and one of the founders of Fotheringay. He mainly worked as a singer-songwriter and guitarist but also produced many albums and composed for the film industry toward the end of his career. He married three times, his first wife was Cheryl, his second wife was fellow folk musician Sandy Denny (1973–1978), and his third wife was Elizabeth Hurtt (1979–1989). Lucas died on 4 February 1989 of a heart attack in his sleep, in Sydney, aged 45. He was survived by Elizabeth Hurtt, his daughter, Georgia Rose Lucas, and his son, Daniel 'Clancy' Lucas. According to Australian rock music historian Ian McFarlane, Lucas "was one of the most acclaimed singer-songwriters Australia ever produced and although he was held in high regard in UK folk rock circles, he remained virtually unknown in his homeland".
(guitar, vocal) is a 1976 album by Richard Thompson. It was released by Island Records as a career retrospective after he and his wife Linda had gone into semi-retirement from the business of making and performing music following the release of Pour Down Like Silver (1975).
Unhalfbricking is the third album by the British folk rock band Fairport Convention and their second album released in 1969. It is seen as a transitional album in their history and marked a further musical move away from American influences towards more traditional English folk songs that had begun on their previous album, What We Did on Our Holidays and reached its peak on the follow-up, Liege & Lief, released later the same year.
Liege & Lief is the fourth album by the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. It is the third album the group released in the UK during 1969, all of which prominently feature Sandy Denny as lead female vocalist, as well as the first to feature future long-serving personnel Dave Swarbrick and Dave Mattacks on violin/mandolin and drums, respectively, as full band members. It is also the first Fairport album on which all songs are either adapted (freely) from traditional British and Celtic folk material, or else are original compositions written and performed in a similar style. Although Denny and founding bass player Ashley Hutchings quit the band before the album's release, Fairport Convention has continued to the present day to make music strongly based within the British folk rock idiom, and are still the band most prominently associated with it.
Sandy is the second solo album by British folk rock musician Sandy Denny. It was released in September 1972.
All Our Own Work is an album by Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, recorded in 1967 but not released until 1973. The album was recorded in Copenhagen, Denmark, and contains an early recording of one of Sandy Denny's best known songs "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?". Denny later recorded this song as a member of Fairport Convention. The album was released by Pickwick Records, who in the 1970s specialised in budget releases of deleted record company catalogues.
A Taste of Strawbs is a box-set album by Strawbs. Instead of being a "best of" album, the compilers have attempted to present alternative versions of some well-known songs plus some previously unreleased material. Included are some very old songs by The Strawberry Hill Boys, with Dave Cousins, Tony Hooper and Ron Chesterman, also are some very interesting songs by Sandy Denny and The Strawbs, and outtakes from different periods of the band's career.
"Meet on the Ledge" is a song written by British singer-songwriter Richard Thompson and recorded by British folk rock band Fairport Convention in 1968 on Island Records. It was their second single.
Who Knows Where the Time Goes? is a retrospective compilation of the work of English folk rock singer Sandy Denny issued in 1985. It is a four LP boxed set released on the Island Records label in the UK and Germany and on Hannibal/Carthage Records in the US, later reissued as a three CD set. It includes released and previously unreleased recordings from 1967 to 1977, live performances, outtakes and demos from Denny's solo career, and with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and Strawbs.
Gold Dust is a live album by the late English folk rock singer Sandy Denny. It documents one of Denny's last public performances and was recorded at London's "Sound Circus" venue at the Royalty Theatre, Portugal Street, near Aldwych, London on 27 November 1977. The album features many of her classic songs both as a solo artist and as a member of Fairport Convention and Fotheringay and remains the most extensive documentation of Sandy's live work with a backing band. The album was not released on the label originally planned owing to stated technical problems with the master tape, and was only released on a different label twenty years after her death after various guitar and backing vocal tracks parts were re-recorded by Jerry Donahue and others.
"A Sailor’s Life" is an English language folk song which describes the attempt of a young woman to find her lover, a sailor. Eventually she hears that he has drowned and mourns him.
Fairport Chronicles is a 1976 compilation album of the British folk-rock band Fairport Convention, including songs from 1968 to the departure of the last original member in 1972. The double album is unique in that it was only released in the USA, features original material and American covers over the traditional material usually associated with Fairport, and includes songs from side projects. All of the material was originally issued in the USA on A&M Records, which explains the exclusion of songs taken from their first, pre-Sandy Denny album, which was only later released in the United States.
Gottle O'Geer is the eleventh studio album by English folk rock band Fairport Convention. The album was released through Island Records in May 1976.
"Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" is a song written by English folk singer Sandy Denny in 1967.
Sandy Denny is a 2010 compilation box set of recordings by folk singer Sandy Denny and comprises all studio material and recordings made during her time both as a solo artist and as a member of Fotheringay, Fairport Convention, and other groups, together with home demos and live recordings.
The Sandy Denny discography chronicles the output of British folk rock singer Sandy Denny. Her brief career, spanning 1967 to 1978, saw the release of 4 solo albums and 4 singles on several record labels.
