this interview was conducted through e-mail
from questions collected from CTW Members in June 1999...
Everyone at CTW would like to thank Donovan
for taking the time to answer our questions...
"I reply to the questions from CTW
1. Are you planning to record some more material in the near future?
when is your autobiography coming out??
I won't be recording new work for a few months as I am completing
the archive searches for lost tapes.
2. Before you got the Ready Steady Go spot you were playing in a few venues
together with a group known as Cops'n'Robbers...they got a recording
contract and released a single called I Found Out...when I play that song
I am knocked out by the great harmonica playing...would that be you, by
chance, assisting your friends?
Yes. I think I play harmonica on this track. Can you send me a copy?
3. Is there anything in particular you are reading at the moment, or any titles
that have particularly touched you recently? I'm talking fiction, non-fiction, poetry,
anything. I just love to know what is enjoyed by the people I admire.
I am reading a crime novel by Ed McBain and also Modernism a
Pelican book in the Penguin Publisher series. I can't remember the
editors. It is a lengthy treatise on modern art, ;literature, theatre and
poetry.
4. Many many times in my life i've had a personal crisis-great or small. I've always
found that a message came to me from one of donovan's songs. For example, when
my father died, the song The Light came out just a few days later. I always felt that
i t was like a personal message to me. My question is--and I do realize that Donovan
has many many fans- but in all your mystic travels, visions, quests, or intuitions- do
you ever feel that you are connecting with someone you don't know ( a fan)-
answering a question from some psychic medium-- or in any way getting messages
to answer from people in need of answers?
Yes, my music is expressing the universal journey we all are on. The
mythic quality of the songs at times reflects exactly the listeners life
journey. We all are living the same hopes and dreams and experiencing
the same joys and sorrows. This is why a song or work of art can
transcend the ages and touch us with the universal truth.
5. For me, the collection of your songs that comprise the For Little Ones
portion of A Gift From a Flower to a Garden remain among the most cherished
songs I know by you or anyone. There is an ore, if you will, that runs
through your music - a precious metal of sorts to me - and For Little Ones
is the motherlode. What it is exactly I can't really say, but it seems a
combination of wistfulness, gentleness, love of created things -of life
itself and of beauty, combined with your gift for melody. A rare alchemy in
short. There are poetic gems here and there are melodies that carry one away
to some familiar-as-home melancholy shore. So my question -what circumstances
in your life, what mind set, what physical setting perhaps, led to the composition
of this set of songs? Were they meant from the beginning to be 'children's songs'?
How do you view them now yourself?
Yes the work which is described as fr children is in fact a re-affirmation
in the Oh so familiar land we call our imagination, the formless dreamlike
reality which the mystics call awareness. The awareness with no
questions asked, like the childs consciousness. Thanks for your
understanding. My father read my poetry of noble thought and
William Blake and i read Robert Louis Stevenson's children's poems.
And of course I became a father when I wrote the songs from For
The Little Ones. I wanted to relate to my generation who were
becoming parents. And I remembered my own childhood once
again and the dreams of clear pure mind.
6 . Donovan, it seems clear that yoga, Buddhism, and related Eastern philosophy
and practices have influenced your music and poetry, informing them in a
contextual or intellectual way, but that Celtic traditions, which are oral, not
written, have shaped them in terms of imagery, metaphor, color, style, and
especially the role of the singer (shanakee or seanchai) in relation to the song
and the listener.
How do you see the relationship of the Eastern/yogic/Buddhist influences and
the Celtic/bardic influences in your work and life?"
I am Celtic - Buddhist perhaps. The rich seam of Celtic storytelling
has all but vanished. We have so many tales still but it is a tiny portion
of the living art that was the spiritual path of the Celtic peoples. It is in
the telling of the tales and the chanting of the songs that the Celtic
spiritual path was presented. In the east it is the clearing of the field
of thought by meditation which opens the consciousness to the pure
land. In the west it is the following of the hero in the tales to where the
goddess lives in her deep cave below the material world which leads
to fairyland. Both the journey arrive at the same place through different
means. In the 1960s our generation embraced Buddhism as the Celtic
path had disappeared as it were beneath centuries of overgrowing
thickets of ignorance and christian suppression. It was up to me, i thought,
as a lad, to clear some of the undergrowth and show the bright path
once again, which always leads to where it begins, inside us all. And of
course to present eastern forms of meditation as the east preserved
the living practice which leads to awareness, mindfulness and
compassion. The dichotomy of east and west is harmonized in my work
to the extent to which the listener gives ear and heart to the truths
reflected in the song.
7. I have always imagined Donovan to be on a spiritual quest. He has dabbled
in Zen, Eastern philosophy and the hippy counter culture experience. All of
these include vegetarianism as an integral part of their belief system and
Donovan has been a vegetarian of sorts, on and off, throughout his career.
However, his attitude to this has been ambivalent. Note the line in Song
For John, where he sings," Vegetarian by choice not by fashion, it's not so
much what you eat as what you balance on."
Vegetarianism, and especially veganism, implies a respect and concern for
the welfare of the other creatures that share our planet. Sometimes
becoming a vegetarian leads one to exploring other philosophical and/or
religious beliefs. Sometimes it's the other way round. But in the end, it
is this unselfish approach to living in the universe that is at the root of both.
So my question would be, "What's your favorite colour?" No, only joking. My
real question would be, "What importance do you attach to vegetarianism on
the spiritual path?"
My favorite color is white as it contain all others.
Vegetarianism is essential to de-tox the body before purification.It is a
practice to prepare the mind to realise inner truths. Of course humans
do not need meat for protein. the cow eats only grass.The panda eats
only leaves. What's going on?)
8. I sense a significant change in his songs that takes place sometime right
after HMS Donovan and Open Road - a change from songs inspired by fantasy,
childhood, and the natural world to songs that are more about the every
day world. At the same time, a spiritual thread which was always there
to a degree really began to emerge in albums like Essence to Essence
and has continued, being most evident in Sutras. I'd like to hear what
Donovan has to say about this evolution - about his growth as a song
writer, and his own spiritual path.
The songs change as one grows into maturity. One tries to keep the
clear view. As one looks back the work can become autobiographical.
I see myself as a role in the play we call life. I have a song for all the
seasons and all subjects. You have only heard the songs that were
released on recordings. There are many more than one can release.
I still write clearly as the thought and poetry appears to describe the
pause between the thought and the action. I continue the path to
where it begins. Inside me.
9. I'm sure you must realize the people on this list are devoted fans
of yours. Your music has touched each of us in many ways and speaking for
myself, I thank you deeply for all the joy you've brought me. My question is,
is there any one person in particular that has made a difference in
your life - someone you are a devoted fan of? And if so, whom?
Thank you for your reflection. The muse has influenced me more than
any other. Her name in this incarnation is Linda, my wife.
10 11?. I wonder what Donovan would feel has been his biggest impact
on the world, to date? I wonder what he feels would stand as his
greatest legacy, in particular, so far? Of all he has accomplished,
in his personal as well as professional life, what is he the MOST
proud of? And, what, in particular, would he like to be best
remembered for?
My most important achievement in my work so far is to have focused
millions on the one point in time which matters and that is the
present moment. Through certain tempos in my music and certain
vocal inflections in my voice I have centered you who know my work.
This is simply a great deed to do in such a dark age as we live though.
Om Mani Padme Hum indeed.
12. If you were asked to choose just one of your songs (and it doesn't
have to be a well-known song), which one of your songs would you want the
world to remember you by, and why do you feel that way about that particular
song?"
The world thinks of my song Mellow Yellow when they hear my name.
The In crowd think of many more levels of my work. I think of styles of
songs and have my favorites in all styles. There is not one song which
I would have the future remember me. The body of an artists work
cannot be ascertained until his death. Then the life's work can be
seen as one long work, one ling song which had many verses, which
only in retrospect can be seen clearly.
Other Questions.....
1. How are you doing?
I feel fine today.
2. Do you think you've made your life be what you wanted in the sixties ?
The future does not exist until we think it. Beware of what we dream
it could be a nightmare. Instant Karma. I make each day as i think it.
3. Are you happy?
Happiness runs in a circular motion.
4. I think I would ask if don ever realized when he was first starting out how
much beauty, peace, happiness and tranquility he would be able to
spread to so many people for the past 35 years. And if he knows how much
he continues to affect so many of us, here on this website and out there among
the others that don't know about us, but do know donovan and his music.
I know what I have done and never cease to thank you for seeing me
clearly. I am your healer in song. Hello.
5. Who or what is Barabajagal?
Barabajagal is my name for a herbalist, a healer who mixes
the herbs and chants the thousand names of the balance which
we all need in our consciousness.
6. Anymore readings of classics on tape..like Herman Hesse...?
The Company Audi Literature wants me to read Hesse's Siddhartha next
Do you know the book?
7. What was the inspiration for The Promise
The Promise is a song about my muse. It covers a period between
love and loss. Eventually all was revealed.
8. Gypsy Dave... Dippy? where are they now...?
Gypsy Dave is in Paros Greece and a sculptor. Dippy I lost touch with.
9. Where and when was your largest crowd?
Largest audience must have been a festival, half million? Isle Of Wight?
I don't know.
10. Can you speak of Pete Seeger and influence on your career...
Pete Seeger and many others influenced me. Too many to tell.
Maybe later when my own site is up and running soon,
11. The biggest question for don is if he will authorize a tablature edition
for his songs. i'm just dying for it.
All my songs in tablature. Yes soon in the next millennium.
12. Who is the John in "Song For John?
John is John Sebastian of the 60's US band The Loving Spoonful.
13. When is Open Road going to be reissued on CD?
Open Road out 2000 keep in touch with this site.
14. After producing such a great body of work over the last 35 years and
taking us all on countless magical, mystic trips and voyages in your
enchanted world, if you had the chance, what would you say to that
fresh-faced young man who performed "Catch the Wind" on Ready,
Steady, Go and had that whole career ahead of him?
The future is ahead of us all if the past can be the present.
15. Erika, you might ask If he plans to re-release The Pied Piper that he did
in 1971. Otherwise, all I'd like to know is what are his plans for 2000,
concert wise, so I can start making my plans early!
Concerts not planned yet but yes in 2000. and Pied Piper as a
video soon.
16. I've just got one quick question for Don - When are you going to play
in Philadelphia again?!?
Philadelphia will be on the tour in 2000
17. Could you describe a typical "day in the life" of Donovan?
A day in the life of me is not typical.
Well, that's it
Regards,
Donovan"
