Bob Dylan - Farewell Lyrics
Send this Ringtone to your CellOh it's fare thee well my darlin' true,
I'm leavin' in the first hour of the morn.
I'm bound off for the bay of Mexico
Or maybe the coast of Californ.
So it's fare thee well my own true love,
We'll meet another day, another time.
It ain't the leavin'
That's a-grievin' me
But my true love who's bound to stay behind.
Oh the weather is against me and the wind blows hard
And the rain she's a-turnin' into hail.
I still might strike it lucky on a highway goin' west,
Though I'm travelin' on a path beaten trail.
So it's fare thee well my own true love,
We'll meet another day, another time.
It ain't the leavin'
That's a-grievin' me
But my true love who's bound to stay behind.
I will write you a letter from time to time,
As I'm ramblin' you can travel with me too.
With my head, my heart and my hands, my love,
I will send what I learn back home to you.
So it's fare thee well my own true love,
We'll meet another day, another time.
It ain't the leavin'
That's a-grievin' me
But my true love who's bound to stay behind.
I will tell you of the laughter and of troubles,
Be them somebody else's or my own.
With my hands in my pockets and my coat collar high,
I will travel unnoticed and unknown.
So it's fare thee well my own true love,
We'll meet another day, another time.
It ain't the leavin'
That's a-grievin' me
But my true love who's bound to stay behind.
I've heard tell of a town where I might as well be bound,
It's down around the old Mexican plains.
They say that the people are all friendly there
And all they ask of you is your name.
So it's fare thee well my own true love,
We'll meet another day, another time.
It ain't the leavin'
That's a-grievin' me
But my true love who's bound to stay behind.
Song details
Farewell, also known as Fare Thee Well, is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. Dylan wrote the song in January 1963. He considered it for his third album, The Times They Are a-Changin', but only attempted a few takes during the album's first studio session. Dylan's earlier recordings of "Farewell" found their way onto various bootlegs, and a collection of demos that included the song was released in October 2010 on The Bootleg Series Vol. 9 – The Witmark Demos: 1962–1964.
Over the years, "Farewell" has been covered by about 20 other musicians wordwide, including Pete Seeger, Judy Collins, Lonnie Donegan, Dion, and Tony Rice.
Dylan's song is based on the traditional folk ballad "Leaving of Liverpool", also referred to as "Fare Thee Well, My Own True Love". The ballad's first verse and chorus tell the tale of someone leaving Liverpool for California, bound to miss the loved one left behind.
Dylan first recorded "Farewell" on February 8, 1963, along with 11 other songs, during a session that for many years was believed to have taken place in the basement of either Gerde's Folk City or the Gasight Cafe, Greenwich Village venues where Dylan performed during the early 1960s. His friend Happy Traum, then with The New World Singers, backed him on vocals and banjo. The recordings were eventually bootlegged under the title The Banjo Tape. Decades later, in interviews with author Michael Gray, Traum identified the session's location as the East Village apartment of Gil Turner, who worked at Gerde's and was an editor for the folk music magazine Broadside.
A month after the session with Traum, Dylan recorded the song as a demo for his music publisher M. Witmark & Sons. The demo version, which appeared on several bootlegs, was officially released on the Witmark Demos. During the time Dylan was making periodic trips to Witmark's Manhattan studios, between 1962 and 1964, he was also visiting Broadside to tape songs for publication. In April 1963, he recorded "Farewell" for the magazine, and a transcription of its lyrics and music appeared in that month's issue. Also in April, Dylan went to Chicago to appear at The Bear, a folk music club owned by his manager Albert Grossman. The next day, April 26, he was interviewed during a taping of author Studs Terkel's radio show on WFMT. He played seven songs on the show, opening with "Farewell" (the seventh was "Blowin' in the Wind"). Four months later during the first of six Times They Are a-Changin' sessions, Dylan recorded four takes of the song, none of them complete.
No live recordings of the song are known to exist. Dylan played relatively few concerts during 1963. Besides a couple solo dates that year and performances as a "surprise guest" at several Joan Baez concerts, he made appearances at the Brandeis Folk Festival in Massachusetts, Monterey Folk Festival in California and Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island. He began touring in earnest the next year, both solo performances and a series of concert dates co-billed with Baez. "Farewell" does not appear on the setlists from either year's concerts.
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