Killing Me Softly With His Song (Music Video of the Week)

Music Video of the Week, 6 Feb 2017

Roberta Flack – TRANSCEND Media Service

This song is about Don McLean’s big hit, American Pie–The Day the Music Died.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpNdMIAnKko

This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 6 Feb 2017.

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2 Responses to “Killing Me Softly With His Song (Music Video of the Week)”

1. arnie says:

   8 Feb 2017 at 06:21

   Likely, an urban legend:
   http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=71

   “It really didn’t happen that way. Norman Gimbel and I wrote that song for a young artist whose name was Lori Lieberman. Norman had a book that he would put titles of songs, song ideas and lyrics or something that struck him at different times. And he pulled out the book and he was looking through it, and he says, ‘Hey, what about a song title, ‘Killing Me Softly With His Blues’?’ Well, the ‘killing me softly’ part sounded very interesting, ‘with his blues’ sounded old fashioned in 1972 when we wrote it. So he thought for a while and he said, ‘What about ‘killing me softly with his song’? That has a unique twist to it.’ So we discussed what it could be, and obviously it’s about a song – listening to the song and being moved by the words. It’s like the words are speaking to what that person’s life is. Anyway, Norman went home and wrote an extraordinary lyric and called me later in the afternoon. I jotted it down over the phone. I sat down and the music just flowed right along with the words. And we got together the next morning and made a couple of adjustments with it and we played it for Lori, and she loved it, she said it reminds her of being at a Don McLean concert. So in her act, when she would appear, she would say that. And somehow the words got changed around so that we wrote it based on Don McLean, and even Don McLean I think has it on his Web site. But he doesn’t know. You know, he only knows what the legend is.”

   • Antonio C.S. Rosa says:

     8 Feb 2017 at 12:03

     Arnie, many thanks for this update. Urban legend or not, it is a beautiful song that took off and acquired a life of its own; still talking to hearts this many years after.

     I, for one, am a fan of all of them: Roberta, Don, Norman, Ritchie…

     Cheers!