Don McLean - Vincent (Starry Starry Night) (Live on The Marti Caine Show BBC2 Apr 5, 1982)

If you enjoyed the video, please, give it a like and subscribe, and turn on notifications, so you'll know when I post a new video. I'd also very much appreciate you leaving me a comment and sharing the video with your friends. Thanks! 🙏❤ Subscribe to my channel: https://www.youtube.com/@musicfromthe... In a conversation with Bart Herbison of Nashville Songwriters Association International, McLean told the story behind "Vincent." DM: I had this book on Van Gogh and it was written by his brother, Theo. It was about how both of them had the same illness. I always thought he was the usual cliché. BH: I think you've described it as "garden variety crazy," but that's not what was happening with him or Theo. DM: He lost his mind over a woman, and of course he was high strung, because he was an artist. I understand. That's not what it was -- and the brother had it, too. So, I thought maybe I would write a song about this and set the record straight. I had always known his work and I had books on him, even when I had no money. I just felt something from him. Everybody does. BH: Can I interrupt? I feel like you are writing as much about yourself, sometimes, in that song, in parts of that song, as you were writing about Van Gogh. DM: Always. There is always something about me and what I can understand. I've had a lot of pain — everybody does — but a lot of emotional things, and I am a very emotional person. BH: We are gonna go back to Stockbridge. You are inspired. You are reading a book about Vincent Van Gogh, and you've gotta have another song on the "American Pie" album, and boom! DM: I would carry these papers with me, green paper, that I found in the garbage in New York. I threw it in my car because I thought they would be great to write songs on. If you see the "American Pie" lyrics that sold, they are on green paper, kind of brown around the edges now. So I had that stuff in the house and I jotted an idea or two down on a piece of paper somewhere, and I started to work on this. I was singing into the tape recorder and looking at the "Starry Night" painting (by Van Gogh) and it was telling me what to say. I got the wind and the circularity and the breeze and Ed Freeman, the producer, brought the strings, like wind coming in and riffling the curtains. It was very subtle. I'm not so subtle sometimes, but he was, and it was very nice. Anyway, we got the song written because I was there for a week or something, a long time it seemed like to me. I was singing for a bunch of high school students that night to pick up $50. Maybe it was $100. It was a prom or something, I don’t remember. I sang this new song and they weren't paying much attention. I sang the song and they all stopped. They looked at me. BH: So some disengaged teenagers, not really there to see you, not paying attention and this song comes on? DM: When that happened, I said to myself, "Wow, this is something nice, and I'm really happy with this." I started working on it. When you hear the record, it's just me and the guitar. It's just one take. Starry, starry night Paint your palette blue and grey Look out on a summer's day With eyes that know the darkness in my soul Shadows on the hills Sketch the trees and the daffodils Catch the breeze and the winter chills In colors on the snowy linen land Now I understand What you tried to say to me And how you suffered for your sanity And how you tried to set them free They would not listen, they did not know how Perhaps they'll listen now Starry, starry night Flaming flowers that brightly blaze Swirling clouds in violet haze Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue Colors changing hue Morning fields of amber grain Weathered faces lined in pain Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand Now I understand What you tried to say to me And how you suffered for your sanity And how you tried to set them free They would not listen, they did not know how Perhaps they'll listen now For they could not love you But still your love was true And when no hope was left in sight On that starry, starry night You took your life, as lovers often do But I could have told you, Vincent This world was never meant for one As beautiful as you Starry, starry night Portraits hung in empty halls Frameless heads on nameless walls With eyes that watch the world and can't forget Like the strangers that you've met The ragged men in ragged clothes The silver thorn; a bloody rose Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow Now I think I know What you tried to say to me And how you suffered for your sanity And how you tried to set them free They would not listen, they're not listening still Perhaps they never will #donmclean #vincent #americanpie #starrystarrynight #starrynight #vangogh #marticaine #folk #70smusic #70smusichits