Glen Campbell and Stevie Wonder Sing "Blowin' in the Wind"

Creative Commons

In the years leading up to his election, Ronald Reagan would do a daily radio talk, much like people today do daily blog posts or daily podcasts. Wherever he went he carried with him a cigar box which contained clippings of newspaper articles which served as starter material -- kindling -- when he had a daily talk to give but lacked an idea or theme.

There's a sense in which I do the same thing, except I don't store my ideas in a cigar box. Instead, I use a virtual holding tank here on Blogger. It's called Drafts. That is, I begin more blog posts than I have time to complete. I tell myself I will get back to it one day, like unfinished business. As of this morning I have 945 drafts. This one was intended to be a memorial for Glen Campbell, who passed away in August 2017.

As I searched for something special to accompany my memories of Glen Campbell, I found this video of Campbell performing Dylan's Blowin' in the Wind with Stevie Wonder. Which derailed my blog post because as I read a little about Wonder a new story emerged. Then I set this unfinished idea aside, till this morning.

Glen Campbell's career exemplifies being in the right place at the right time. Stevie Wonder's story is about defying the odds.

Campbell, 1967. Public domain.

The cherub-faced Campbell was much older than we thought when he moved from studio musician with the Wrecking Crew to becoming a performer in his own right in the late 60s. Those studio musicians did an amazing amount of uncredited work. According to the Times piece cited above Campbell played or sang on nearly 600 recorded songs in 1963 alone.

In 1969 he got his own show called The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour. Like Johnny Cash and the Smothers Brothers, it became a venue for showcasing up and coming musicians. One of these megastars was Stevie Wonder, with whom he performed "Blowin' in the Wind" which aired on February 19, 1969.

Did you know that Campbell was 33 years old at the time? The Rhinestone Cowboy singer star was born in 1936, a few years younger than my parents. The boy wonder, Stevie Wonder, was born in 1950, and just two years older than myself.

Wonder's story is striking. Born a premie, he was put on oxygen the first weeks of his life. Unfortunately, medical science has since learned that you can damage an infant with too much oxygen as easily as not enough. The result for this little one was detached retinas. In other words, he was not born blind but ended up that way in the first weeks of life.

1973. Public domain.

His hardships didn't end there. At age four his parents were divorced. His mother moved to Detroit, Motor City. Broken homes don't automatically lead to juvenile delinquency and it's apparent his mother's nurturing did him good.

I neglected to mention that his mother was a songwriter, which factors into this story. At an early age he sang in church (age 4) and learned to play piano, harmonica and drums. He formed a group with a friend and performed on street corners and at parties when he was 11. He sang one of his own compositions to one of the Miracles, and soon was connected to Motown.

His stage name, Stevie Wonder, is not his real name, of course. His actual last name is Morris. (Dylan did officially change his stage name to become his real name.) Stevie Wonder was just 19 when he performed Blowing in the Wind with Glen Campbell on the latter's show.

Bob Dylan first conceived this song when he was 19, performing a two verse version at Gerde's Folk City a month before his 20th birthday. The full version was recorded in July and became one of the iconic songs of his iconic second album, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, which was released the following Spring.

* * * *

Here's Bob, not yet 22, performing this song on television, March 1963.


In the beginning... 
Meantime, life goes on. Make the most of it.
Mucho thanks to Bob, Stevie and Glen for all the Great Music
that has so enriched our lives over the years.