Released this week : CROSBY, STILLS, NASH & YOUNG released the album DÉJÀ VU (Mar 11, 1970)

 TEACH YOUR CHILDREN - Crosby, Stills and Nash

I will bid you all a very good night with this classic and I found this song incredibly moving upon first hearing it. [Check out Stephen's guitar playing solo over the top of the boys playing a straightforward rythm accompaniment here]

Play this at my funeral!

You, who are on the road

Must have a code that you can live by

And so become yourself

Because the past is just a goodbye

Teach your children well

Their father's hell did slowly go by

and feed them on your dreams

The one they pick is the one you'll know by 

 

Don't you ever ask them why

If they told you, you would cry

So just look at them and sigh

And know they love you

And you of tender years (Can you hear and do you care?)

Can't know the fears (And can you see?)

That your elders grew by (We must be free)

And so please help (To teach your children)

them with your youth (What you believe in)

They seek the truth (Make a world)

Before they can die (That we can live i

Teach your parents well

Their children's hell will slowly go by

And feed them on your dreams

The one they pick is the one you'll know by

 

Don't you ever ask them why

If they told you, you would cry

So just look at them and sigh

And know they love you

Don't you ever ask them why

If they told you, you would cry

So just look at them and sigh

And know they love you

Ooh, and know they love you

And know they love you, yeah

And know they love you

Songwriter: Graham Nash

Graham Nash explains his inspiration for the song in his 2013 autobiography:

The origin of the song came from my recent infatuation with art. I had begun collecting photographs around that time, powerful images that had an emotional effect on me. One, in particular, was a Diane Arbus image of a boy in Central Park. It spoke volumes to me. The kid was only about nine or ten years old, but his expression bristled with intense anger. He had a plastic grenade clenched in a fist, but it seemed to me that if it were real the kid would have thrown it. The consequences it implied startled me. I thought, ‘If we don’t start teaching our kids a better way of dealing with each other, humanity will never succeed.’Many feel the song is really about how the baby boom generation must teach their parents about the way the world should be. In fact, it’s a lesson for parents and for their children