james taylor long ago and far away backing vocals
Long Ago and Far Away (James Taylor song) Taylor wrote "Long Ago and Far Away" in 1970, about a year before it was recorded for Mud Slide Slim.[1] Joni Mitchell sings background vocals and Carole King plays piano.[2][3] It is a sad song that Taylor biographer Timothy White calls "among the most wistful of Taylor's vast catalogue of secular hymns."[3] The theme of the song is how things don't turn out as planned, how dreams don't usually match the ultimate reality and how expectations don't last.[4] The lyrics evoke a motif common in Taylor's songs, that of the sea and sailing away for one reason or another.[3] Other images in the lyrics include "tender dreams" and "broken glass."[3] Towards the end of the song the singer asks why his song is so sad.[3] The phrase "long ago and far away" never appears in the lyrics.[4] Rather, Taylor sings that "Long ago a young man sits and plays his waiting game."[4]  In 1998 Taylor noted that the lyrics in the second verse "Love is just a word I've heard when things are being said" was the "most coherent" part of the song for him at that time, stating that "it is a musing on the nature of expectations, and how they don't last.[5]