It been over 40 years, when in 1972, Billy Preston, recorded a single entitled
“Will It Go Round in Circles” on his album
“Music is My Life.” The song became
number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for two weeks and sold over a million
copies. Preston was considered a virtuoso
keyboardist on a Hammond Organ and recognized as a top session musician in the
1960s. During this time, he played and
recorded with some of the greatest musical artists of his era, including Little
Richard, Sam Cook, Ray Charles and the Beatles.
The song was very popular among those of
us in high school or college during that time.
And if you loved to be on the dance floor, it was one of your best grooves
for it got you moving to the beat. Unlike
today’s music, the song was easy to sing along with because of its carefree melody
and lyrics. Similarly, this song was reflective of other songs of the early
1970s and came out while the Vietnam War was still going on, drug use was on
the rise, poverty was growing, public housing was booming, social unrest and injustice
was still common place.
Nevertheless, it was a song that gave us
something to think about in an abstract kind of way. It resonated with a lot of people because of
its unique meaning of progress and opened up our thinking about life and how to
see things. However, this song spoke to
us, even if we did not fully grasp its meaning at that time...“I’ve got a song, I ain’t got no melody...I’ma
gonna sing it to my friends.” And
yet, “I’ve got a story, I ain’t got no
moral... Let the bad guy win every
once in a while.” And further, “I’ve
got a dance, I ain’t got no steps, no, ... I’m gonna let the music move me
around.” And of course the chorus with questions, “Will it go round in circles? Will it fly high like a bird up in the
sky?
And when we think of where we are
today... many of our parents and grandparents were marching in the 1960s and 70s
for equal rights, respect, better way of life, future opportunities and the
America Dream, and guess what? We are
still marching today... Go figure! It’s seems that if we have not learn anything
from our past then our forward progress is even harder to measure. Amazingly, all the work done by our ancestors
toward progress continues to our struggle as well. “Will
it go round in circles?” is still the question. What do you think? 
No comments:
Post a Comment