Songful Style | “Sweet Baby James” by James Taylor & #SpreadTheKindness Link Up On the Edge #643

It is time for another song to inspire another outfit and you are invited to play along on March 27, 2023, with your own sartorial interpretations of the this month’s song pick. I am a day later than I had hoped sharing this (I have been painting my living room), so let’s get right to it. 

About Songful Style

Songful Style is an ageless style challenge series hosted by Suzy of The Grey Brunette, Shelbee of Shelbee on the Edge, Marsha of Marsha in the Middle, and Michelle of Funky Fashion Style. 

Each month we will share a song with the lyrics and video and we invite you to use whatever aspect of the song that inspires you to create an outfit. 

It is similar to Style Imitating Art where we use artwork to inspire our outfit creations. Except Songful Style gives you lyrics, music, video, and album artwork to inspire your fashion creativity. You may even find inspiration in a memory triggered by the selected song. It is all open to your own personal interpretation and just a fun way to discover new music and get a little bit more creative with your wardrobe.

Anyone is welcome to join us on a permanent basis or you can just play along without any obligation to do anything other than feel inspired. We are flexible and fun and just want to find more ways to play dress up because it’s what we enjoy doing! 

We will be posting on the last Monday of each month and will announce our song choice for the following month at the end of each post.

For this month’s Songful Style prompt, I chose “Sweet Baby James” by James Taylor. I became familiar with the music of James Taylor at a very young age and fell in love at first listen. Although I have no real recollection of which James Taylor song was my first listen, “Sweet Baby James” has always been one of my favorites. And then it became even more meaningful to me on May 1, 2011, after the birth of my first child, Sweet Archer James. On that date, I forever changed the lyrics from Sweet Baby James to Sweet Archer James. I sang the song to Archer every night during his infancy and now he hates when I sing it with the changed lyrics using his name!

Video Inspiration

The Lyrics

“Sweet Baby James” by James Taylor

There is a young cowboy, he lives on the range
His horse and his cattle are his only companions
He works in the saddle and he sleeps in the canyons
Waiting for summer, his pastures to change

And as the moon rises, he sits by his fire
Thinking about women and glasses of beer
And closing his eyes as the dogies retire
He sings out a song which is soft but it's clear
As if maybe someone could hear

Goodnight you moonlight ladies
Rockabye, sweet baby James
Deep greens and blues are the colors I choose
Won't you let me go down in my dreams?
And rockabye sweet baby James

Now the first of December was covered with snow
So was the turnpike from Stockbridge to Boston
Now the Berkshires seemed dreamlike
On account of that frosting
With ten miles behind me and ten thousand more to go

There's a song that they sing when they take to the highway
A song that they sing when they take to the sea
A song that they sing of their home in the sky
Maybe you can believe it, if it helps you to sleep
But singing works just fine for me

So goodnight all you moonlight ladies
Rockabye, sweet baby James
Deep greens and blues are the colors I choose
Won't you let me go down in my dreams?
And rockabye, sweet baby James

About the Artist and the Song

James Taylor is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, seven-time Grammy Award winner, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, and one of the best selling musical artists of all time. He was born on March 12, 1948, in Boston, Massachusetts, the second of five children to Isaac M. Taylor, a physician, and his wife Gertrude Woodard Taylor, an aspiring opera singer. In 1951, when James was just a few years old, his father accepted an assistant professor position at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, moving his family to the Chapel Hill area.

Before learning the guitar at the age of 12, James took cello lessons but his guitar skills and style quickly evolved and he penned his first song at the age of 14. By the summer of 1963, at only 15 years old, James Taylor was playing coffeehouses all around Martha’s Vineyard with his friend and fellow teenage musician Danny Kortchmar. And the rest is pretty much history with his big breakthrough happening around 1969-1970.

Before reaching the age of 21, James Taylor had battled addictions and depression and wrote some of his most famous and profoundly moving songs which launched him into stardom almost overnight. There is an amazing autobiography on Audible that talks all about his first 21 years of life, Break Shot: My First 21 Years, which is read by James Taylor himself with musical guitar interludes throughout. It is super short, only about 90 minutes, and totally worth it. I laughed and cried so hard at some points in the story that I actually had to pull my car over to gather my senses again.

With a career spanning six decades, this 75 year old prolific artist has an extensive discography that includes 20 studio albums, 4 live albums, 6 compilation albums, 15 music videos, and 40 singles. He apparently has written so many songs that I can’t even find a number. He won his first Grammy Award in 1972 and his most recent one nearly 50 years later in 2021. The man is a living legend and he has all the credentials to support that status.

I took my mother to see James Taylor in concert about 20 years ago and it is still one of my favorite live music shows that I have ever attended. I absolutely would go see him perform again given the opportunity. He goes on tour at the end of May but none of the venues are near me. Bummer.

That seems to be enough about the artist, now let’s talk about the song.

“Sweet Baby James” is the opening and title track on James Taylor’s 1970 breakthrough album, Sweet Baby James. It was released as the first single from the album but never charted. Nonetheless, the song is highly regarded as one of his best known and most popular songs. He considers it his best song ever written.

The song was written as a hybrid between a lullaby and a cowboy song. He thought of the lyrics during a drive through the Carolinas to meet his newborn nephew who was named after him. He tells the story himself in the first YouTube video above. Taylor admits to putting great effort into the construction of the lyrics, using the most intricate rhyming pattern of his career. The music is composed as a waltz in 3/4 time with the chorus echoing the sentiment of the lullaby.

Since the song’s release in 1970, Taylor has performed it at almost every live performance, often saving it for an emotional climax at the end of the show. And I cannot get over the fact that this song never charted!

Album Covers and Other Images

And that is all I have for inspiration. Of course, you are welcome to do your own research if you need more! If you want to join us with your own look inspired by James Taylor’s “Sweet Baby James”, we will be hosting a link party on our blogs on Monday, March 27, 2023, where you can share your post. We would love to see your Songful Styles!

Featured Favorites

Reader Favorite (Most Clicked): Alison of Midlife & Beyond

Fashion Favorite: Nancy of Nancy’s Fashion Style

Other Favorite: April of Stories of Our Boys

Keeping it on the edge,

Shelbee

Joining these Fabulous Link Parties.