“Maggie May” is a song written by singer Rod Stewart and Martin Quittenton and recorded by Stewart in 1971 for his album Every Picture Tells a Story. “Maggie May” expresses the ambivalence and contradictory emotions of a young man involved in a relationship with an older woman, and was written from Stewart’s own experience. In the January, 2007 issue of Q magazine, Stewart recalled: “Maggie May was more or less a true story, about the first woman I had sex with, at the 1961 Beaulieu Jazz Festival.”
Category: 1971
John Denver – Country Roads
“Take Me Home, Country Roads” (or simply “Country Roads”) is a song written by John Denver, Taffy Nivert, and Bill Danoff and initially recorded by John Denver. It was included on his 1971 breakout album Poems, Prayers and Promises; the single went to #2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, topped only by “How Can You Mend a Broken Heart” by The Bee Gees. It became one of John Denver’s most popular and world-wide beloved songs, and is still very popular around the world, considered to be John Denver’s own signature song. It also has a prominent status as an iconic symbol of West Virginia; for example, it was played at the funeral memorial for U.S. Senator Robert Byrd in July 2010.
Don McLean – American Pie (live performance)
“American Pie” is a song by American folk rock singer-songwriter Don McLean. Recorded and released on the American Pie album in 1971, the single was a number-one U.S. hit for four weeks in 1972. In the UK the single reached No. 2 on its original 1972 release and a reissue in 1991 reached No. 12. The song is a recounting of “The Day the Music Died” — the 1959 plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper (Jiles Perry Richardson, Jr.)—and the aftermath. The song was listed as the No. 5 song on the RIAA project Songs of the Century. “American Pie” is considered Don McLean’s magnum opus and his signature song.