Here is a link where you can hear what is probably Orson Welles only single, which was obviously never a hit, at least on Billboard’s top 200, but all the same it was issued as a CD single, which in my book, is enough to call it a hit for Welles.
Hearing it for the first time, I was astonished that it seems to have captured the touch of Welles genius, transforming what might have been utterly banal lyrics into a meditation about what Welles own work was most concerned about at the end of his life: Death.
So here is the master on that subject from his proposal to make his last unfinished movie, King Lear:
“Death” is our only dirty word. And King Lear is about death and the approach of death, and about power and the loss of power, and about love. In our consumer society we are encouraged to forget that we will ever die, and old age can be postponed by the right face cream. And when it finally does come, we’re encouraged to look forward to a long and lovely sunset.
“Old age,” said Charles de Gaulle, “old age is a ship wreck”—and he knew whereof he spoke. The elderly are even more self-regarding than the young. To their dependents the elderly call out for love, for more love than they can possibly receive, and for more than they are likely—or capable—of giving back. When old age tempts or forces a man to give away the very source of his ascendancy over the young—his power—it’s they, the young, who are the tyrants, and he, who was all-powerful, becomes a pensioner.
Link to the Youtube video of
I Know What it is to be Young:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMurd0OUbrQ&feature=related
I KNOW WHAT IT IS TO BE YOUNG
CHORUS:
When we are young age has no meaning
I never gave it a second thought
Until one day along came this old man
And this is what he said to me
Yes, this is what he said to me
ORSON WELLES:
I know what it is, to be young
But, you, you don’t know what it is to be old
Someday, you’ll be saying the same thing
Time takes away, so the story is told
I’ve asked so many questions
To the wise men I’ve met
Couldn’t find all the answers
No one has, as yet
There’ll be days to remember
Full of laughter and tears
After summer, comes winter
And so go the years
So my friend,
Lets make music together
I’ll play the old
While you sing me the new
In time
When your young days are over
There’ll be someone
Sharing their time with you
CHORUS
I know what it is to be young
But you, you don’t know, what it is to be old
Someday, you’ll be saying the same thing
Time takes away, so the story is told
I have so many questions
Of the wise men I’ve met
Couldn’t find all the answers
No one has, as yet
ORSON WELLES:
There’ll be days to remember
Full of laughter and tears
After summer, comes winter
And so go the years
So my friend
Lets make music together
I’ll play the old while you sing me the new
In time when your young days are over
There’ll be some one, sharing their time with you
CHORUS:
There’ll be some one, sharing their time with you