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about

Having grown up in a fairly rural area near Muscle Shoals, Alabama, I took these shy creatures for granted until one evening I was driving across northern Mississippi. I had been working in Houston for several years where the sonic back ground consists largely of road noise from the multitude of vehicles that travel the tangled web of freeways. There is a constant drone of semis, cars, ambulances and an occasional train horn.

That evening I had flown into Memphis and was heading across northern Mississippi where I made a rest stop off the main highway on a dirt road in literally the middle of nowhere. What struck me was the dead silence. And then, some distance away, the call of the whippoorwill broke the stillness. All kinds of memories came flooding back from my youth in North Alabama.

In November of 2016, I was visiting the town of San Miguel de Allende in the highlands of central Mexico. San Miguel is a fertile haven for the arts, and it's fertility must have affected me. I had already been working on a chord progression using arpeggios to define a melody, but I had no lyrics.

A hummingbird happened to fly past the porch of the room we were staying in which had been converted from a dormitory of an old convent. As I played, the hummingbird's flight took me back to that scene in Mississippi from years ago, and the lyrics came to me in less than an hour.

After a little more polishing and some studio time, we produced one of my favorite tracks on this record.

lyrics

Whippoorwill

Copyright Robert Lindsay Nathan
November 2016

If I were a whippoorwill
I’d sleep beneath your window sill
And dream of you throughout the day.
At dusk when mister sun goes down
I’d sing my little whippoor sound
And hope that you’d come out to play

Oh whippoorwill
A night so still
A forest dark and grey
He sings his song
Of love gone wrong
So in your heart he’ll stay

If I were a moonlit night
I’d shine a moonbeam oh so bright
Down upon your window sill
You’d hear a happy whippoor sound
About a love that’s lost then found
A darkened night his song will fill

Oh whippoorwill
A night so still
A forest dark and grey
He sings his tune
To sister Moon
So in your heart he’ll stay

Break

If I were a hummingbird
I’d hum some little humming words
Along with my friend whippoor-bird
In harmony with whippoorwill
Our melody would climb and fill
Your heart and those around the world

Oh whippoorwill
And hummingbird
They spend the day and night
With mister sun
And sister moon
A flame, your heart, they’ll light

Oh whippoorwill
A night so still
A forest dark and grey
He sings his song
Of love gone wrong
So in your heart he’ll stay

credits

from Front Porch Songs, released December 3, 2017
Music and Lyrics by Robert Lindsay Nathan
Lead vocals and nylon string guitar by Robert Lindsay Nathan
Electric guitar by Andre Moran
Uke bass, whistle, mellotron, and harmonies by Mark Hallman

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Robert Lindsay Nathan Canyon Lake, Texas

Robert Lindsay (Bama) Nathan was born in New Orleans on September 24, 1952. He was raised in Muscle Shoals Alabama and formally educated in Texas (Gig 'em Aggies). He has been writing songs since the early 1970's and has circled the globe playing them.

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