"American Tune" | ||||
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Single by Paul Simon | ||||
from the album There Goes Rhymin' Simon | ||||
B-side | "One Man's Ceiling Is Another Man's Floor" | |||
Released | November 9, 1973 | |||
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Recorded |
1972
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Length | 3:45 | |||
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Paul Simon singles chronology | ||||
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"American Tune" is a song by the American singer-songwriter Paul Simon. It was the third single from his third studio album, There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973), released on Columbia Records. The song, a meditation on the American experience, is based on the melody of the hymn O Sacred Head, Now Wounded. The song reached number 35 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The lyrics offer a perspective on the American experience; there are references to struggle, weariness, hard work, confusion, and homesickness. The bridge conveys a dream of death and of the Statue of Liberty "sailing away to sea". The song ends with an assertion that "you can't be forever blessed" before the lyrics return to the idea of work, tiredness, and resignation.
The tune is based on a melody line from a chorale from Johann Sebastian Bach's St Matthew Passion, itself a reworking of an earlier secular song, "Mein G'müt ist mir verwirret," composed by Hans Leo Hassler. The melody used for "American Tune" can be heard quite distinctly in part 1, number 21 and number 23 and in part 2, number 54. The melody to "American Tune" is practically identical to that of "Mein G'müt ist mir verwirret" and "O Sacred Head, Now Wounded," although Simon expanded on the tune.
Eventually it became a concert favorite, both for Simon and in reunion concerts with Simon's former singing partner, Art Garfunkel. The song appears on several of Simon's solo live albums and on Simon and Garfunkel's post-breakup live albums, most famously The Concert in Central Park. Simon performed the song live on November 18, 2008, during the airing of The Colbert Report, and on September 11, 2015, to close out the last show of the first week of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Video Here.