Gordon Lightfoot wrote this song after his marriage to Brita Ingegerd Olaisson ended in divorce. After the breakup, she took their two young children back to France. “If Children Had Wings” is a beautiful, heartbreaking reflection on the pain Lightfoot felt when he was separated from his children. Lightfoot often flew across the Atlantic on the supersonic Concorde to visit his son, Fred, and daughter, Ingrid. Perhaps Lightfoot dreamed of his children having wings so they could fly to him.
As a side note, the breakup with Oliaisson inspired one of Lightfoot’s most famous songs, “If You Could Read My Mind.”
I’m an ardent Lightfoot fan, yet I’d never heard this song until I found it on Pandora. recently. Its tender melody and lyrics captured my heart immediately, and I decided to play it here.
This episode is also available as a blog post: http://davidgittlin.net/2021/02/17/feeling-the-heart/ --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/david-gittlin/message
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