Friday September 24, 2021 “A Change is Gonna Come” Sam Cooke
The number three song on the Rolling Stone list is from Sam Cooke, “A Change Is Gonna Come”
In 1963, Sam Cooke, America’s first great soul singer and one of the most successful pop acts in the nation, with eighteen Top 20 hits in the short span of five years, heard a song that profoundly inspired and disturbed him: Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind.” What struck Cooke was the challenge implicit in Dylan’s anthem, and that it was written by a white man.
Sam Cooke was among the first inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He was also inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987 and the Rhythm and Blues Music Hall of Fame in 2013. In 1994, he was honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Rolling Stone Magazine has listed him on both their “100 Greatest Artists of All Time,” and “Greatest Singers of All Time,” lists.
Sam Cooke was shot and killed by the manager of the Hacienda Motel in Los Angeles, on December 11th, 1964 in what can only be classified as bizarre circumstances. Decades of speculation, accusations, and finger-pointing have followed his death, which was determined to be “justifiable homicide,” by a hasty coroner’s inquest but the actual circumstances may suggest otherwise.
Stay safe and well...and Sam Cooke only performed “A Change Is Gonna Come” once, on the Johnny Carson Show before his death, but the performance did not get the attention it deserved because two days later the Beatles appeared for the first time on the Ed Sullivan Show and the world did change…but maybe not in the way Sam Cooke hoped for.