It was 1980. I was teaching government at Watkins Memorial High School on December 8th<\/sup>, the day an assassin murdered John Lennon. It was shocking, one of the musical talents of a \u201cgeneration\u201d killed young and senselessly in front of his New York apartment building, across from Central Park. The next day, our Middle School guidance counselor came to school wearing all black. He was in mourning for the loss to music, and to our society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It seemed a bit \u201cover-the-top\u201d to me.\u00a0\u00a0I was younger, twenty-four, and while I certainly knew all of the\u00a0Beatles<\/em> songs, I was too young to be part of \u201cBeatlemania\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0That was my older sisters: but I still have the \u201cfamily\u201d copy of \u201cMeet the Beatles\u201d, the 1964 album so old it\u2019s in mono not stereo.\u00a0\u00a0I was eight when it came out \u2013 \u201cI Want To Hold Your Hand\u201d, \u201cAll My Loving\u201d, and \u201cIt Won\u2019t Be Long\u201d\u00a0\u00a0can still call out with some static from my updated turntable, even today.\u00a0\u00a0But I was not a \u201cBeatle-maniac\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0Going into full mourning for the loss of John Lennon just seemed too much.\u00a0\u00a0I didn\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMy music\u201d came later \u2013 the music of the Vietnam war protests, and the beginnings of the psychedelic era. I listened to electricity of Hendrix <\/em>and The Doors<\/em>, and the folk protests of Joni Mitchell<\/em> and Judy Collins<\/em>. But \u201cmy\u201d group combined both \u2013 the harmonies of the folk protests with the electrics of rock and roll. At fourteen, in 1970, I \u201cdiscovered\u201d Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They were a \u201csuper-group\u201d, made up of members from other highly successful groups. Crosby was from The Byrds<\/em> of \u201cEight Miles High\u201d fame. Stills and Young came from Buffalo Springfield<\/em>. Stills wrote and sang \u201cFor What It\u2019s Worth\u201d, opening with the era evoking lyrics, \u201cSomething\u2019s happening here. What it is ain\u2019t exactly clear\u2026\u201d Graham Nash was from the Hollies <\/em>of \u201cBus Stop\u201d fame. But they all left their respective groups to come together in a mix of talent, harmony, creativity and egoism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They were like a nuclear critical mass.\u00a0\u00a0CSN and CSN&Y authored some of the historic music of the era.\u00a0\u00a0The meshed in every way, in instrumental talents, three and four part vocal harmonies, their ability to \u201cfloat\u201d through complex acoustics, and to \u201cget down\u201d and jam to electric rock and roll.\u00a0\u00a0They could pound through Neil Young\u2019s \u201cSouthern Man\u201d and Joni Mitchell\u2019s \u201cWoodstock\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0They could float with David Crosby\u2019s\u00a0“Triad”\u00a0and\u00a0“<\/em>Lee Shore“.\u00a0<\/em>\u00a0The audience jumped into Nash\u2019s \u201cTeach Your Children\u201d, and stood for Young\u2019s \u201cFour Dead in Ohio\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0And there was the strength of Still\u2019s \u201cLove the One You\u2019re With\u201d and \u201cFind the Cost of Freedom\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n They began in 1968. And like every critical mass, they imploded, first in 1970. They flew off to make their own individual music, and to aid others like The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, <\/em>and Phil Collins . <\/em> And they re-combined, as the \u201csuper-group\u201d and pairing with each other for the next forty-six years, until their final meltdown only six years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Their music is the theme song of my youth and young adulthood.\u00a0\u00a0I played the live album, \u201cFour Way Street\u201d so much in college, that my roommate Charlie finally tossed it out the window (I responded by launching his\u00a0Bread\u00a0<\/em>album on the same trajectory).\u00a0\u00a0I timed long drives from Washington DC, to Cincinnati\u00a0\u00a0so that the tape would end in the pre-dawn morning hours, joining in the harmonies of \u201cFind The Cost of Freedom\u201d while I finished the last few miles.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n As a coach, I travelled all over the country with high school track athletes.\u00a0\u00a0Somewhere on a highway in Nebraska or Oregon or Virginia or Florida, I would challenge them to \u201cname that tune\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0Most failed, but the ones that knew me best always said \u201cCrosby-Still and Nash\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0It was a good guess for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And I was haunted by \u201cFour Dead in Ohio\u201d about the Kent State shootings for decades. It took a track recruiting visit to the Kent campus, then indoor track meets there year after year to exorcise the ghosts of those protests, but never the song.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I saw Crosby-Stills-Nash and Young in a couple coliseum rock concerts, then Crosby-Stills and Nash in a symphonic hall, more acoustic performance.\u00a0\u00a0I aged along with CSN, listening to their old ballads, and letting their new efforts have a chance as well.\u00a0\u00a0Even when Stephen could no longer hit the \u201cmedium\u201d notes, he could still play guitar.\u00a0\u00a0Even when Neil Young went off into strange projects about a fictional California town, Greendale, I went to see him in concert.\u00a0\u00a0I have tickets to see Graham Nash in May.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0My phone rings with the chorus from \u201cWooden Ships\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n But in the \u201cinside world\u201d of Crosby-Stills-Nash and Young, I was always a Crosby guy. His voice, in lead or harmony, never faltered in six decades of performance. His songs: ethereal, stoned, evocative, or \u201cstraight-up\u201d (\u201cAlmost Cut My Hair\u201d) <\/em>always resonated. Even when Crosby\u2019s own behavior fractured the four, three, and then two (Crosby, when interviewed, explained that he was the asshole) his music still moved on. He released a live album last month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And in our modern social media world, I followed Crosby on Twitter. I\u2019m not usually a \u201cgroupie\u201d like that. My usual mode is to listen to the new music, and make up my own mind. But having almost daily \u201cnotes\u201d from David Crosby led me to other music, through his musical interactions. I didn\u2019t directly communicate with him, but his constant contact made him feel close. I read how arthritis took away his guitars. But his voice never faltered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last week he tweeted about playing at a live concert in a California coast town in a couple of months. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Yesterday David Crosby died in his home in Santa Ynez, California. He was 81 years old. His wife said he was suffering from a long illness, but his recent Tweets gave no indication of disability. So it was a surprise last night to hear that Crosby was gone. He\u2019s a part of my life, the songs I was likely singing, the background music to the joy and the sadness of my last fifty-two years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n If I was teaching today \u2013 I\u2019d wear black in mourning. I get it now. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Too Late for Woodstock<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Super Group<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Probably Keep Us Both Alive<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Crosby<\/h3>\n\n\n\n