“Turn! Turn! Turn!” is a song about the cyclical nature of life, which causes inevitable change. The song states there’s a season to everything, including love, hate, sorrow, and peace. The song was written by folk musician Pete Seeger, with lyrics taken from the Bible’s Book of Ecclesiastes (specifically Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). The only lyrics Seeger added were the song’s title and final lyric, which declares it’s not too late for peace.
The song was first recorded by The Limeliters in 1962, a few months before Seeger released his version of the song. The Limeliters’ then-backing musician Roger McGuinn later recorded the song with his band The Byrds in 1965. The Byrds’ version became a worldwide hit and topped the charts in the United States and New Zealand.
Pete Seeger approved of The Byrds’ version, which given the folk tradition of handing down songs, wasn’t a surprise. “Everyone who participates in the folk music process is a link in a long chain,” he once said. “All of us, we’re links in a chain. And if we do our job right, there will be many, many links to come.”
Origin
In Paul Zollo’s book Songwriters on Songwriting, Pete Seeger explained the origin behind the song. “I got a letter from my publisher, and he says, ‘Pete, I can’t sell these protest songs you write.’ And I was angry. I sat down with a tape recorder and said, ‘I can’t write the kind of songs you want. You gotta go to somebody else. This is the only kind of song I know how to write.”
Drawing from the Bible’s Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, Seeger nevertheless began writing a song. “I pulled out this slip of paper in my pocket and improvised a melody to it in fifteen minutes. And I sent it to him. And I got a letter from him the next week that said, ‘Wonderful! Just what I’m looking for. Within two months he’d sold it to the Limelighters and then to the Byrds.”
The Byrds
In 1965, Roger McGuinn – who had previously worked on “Turn! Turn! Turn!” with The Limeliters and Judy Collins – decided to cover the song with The Byrds. McGuinn changed the song’s arrangement (adding the introduction and transitional chords) and applied The Byrds’ distinctive folk-rock sound.
In a Professor of Rock interview, Roger McGuinn revealed The Byrds’ manager Jim Dickson didn’t want to release “Turn! Turn! Turn!” as a single. “He was afraid the rock audience would get turned off because of the biblical connotation,” McGuinn said. But producer Terry Melcher believed in the song and gave it to radio stations in California. Melcher’s assessment was right; “Turn! Turn! Turn!” became a regional hit and would later climb the national chart.
At the end of 1965, The Byrds’ rendition of “Turn! Turn! Turn!” topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The lyrics of the song are the oldest to ever top the US charts.
Turn! Turn! Turn!’s Legacy
Together with The Beatles’ Help! and Rubber Soul, The Byrds’ “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “Turn! Turn! Turn!” are archetypal releases during the mid-1960s folk-rock movement. When McGuinn was asked which track or album he was most proud of, he replied: “Turn! Turn! Turn!” I love the melody and it’s sort of a reassuring text.”
Part of McGuinn’s pride in “Turn! Turn! Turn!” likely partially came from the approval of his lifelong influence Pete Seeger, who also recognized the importance of the song. “We realize this world has to stick together and music is one of the best ways to learn this. A beautiful melody will leap language barriers or religious barriers or political barriers – Yes, a beautiful melody will help tie this world together. And sometimes extraordinary words will. I didn’t realize when I improvised a melody to a short poem in the Old Testament that these few words would be some of the most important words I ever would latch onto.”
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