A flower blooming in my heart - That was the exact feeling I had when I first heard "Wonderful World" by Sam Cooke performed live by a British musician friend l in Da Nang Viet Nam!
A cold winter evening in December 2020 became bright and sweet!
I told myself: I’m gonna play this song. Oh yes! I’m gonna do it!
That was how I knew Sam Cooke – The legend
That was how I know such soulful music exists
That was how I started to feel like I’m always in love with someone, in love with everything in my life regardless I’m a long-term single person haha
"Wonderful World" (occasionally referred to as "(What A) Wonderful World") is a song by American singer-songwriter Sam Cooke. Released on April 14, 1960. The song was mainly composed by songwriting team Lou Adler and Herb Alpert, but Cooke revised the lyrics to mention the subject of education more. Lou Adler and Herb Alpert composed the song with the theme that neither knowledge nor education can dictate feelings, but that love "could make the world a wonderful place." Adler did not take the song very seriously, but Cooke appeared to be taken with it. "He’d say, ‘What about that song, you know?’ And then he'd start on it again".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonderful_World_(Sam_Cooke_song)
How special this song is to me?
I started playing and singing this since January 2021 – only a few days after I first heard it. It became my “hit-cover” in Da Nang - literally only my musician friend and I performed the song around. My friend had got so many signature songs himself, so this song was lost among his amazing tunes.
The lovely thing is whenever I came to his gigs, he always played this song for me, mentioning me in the crowd. But behind that scene, was me doing this song more “rock’n’roll” on other stages haha
I can say it became a song to spread infectious happiness to the audiences. There were nights I played Wonderful world with a band, and the crowd just danced to the song and sang along like they never felt that kind of joy before. I was always asked to play it all the time I came around. I played it too much. I loved it too much. I even forgot to learn new songs.
Later on I started to play The Beatles exploring the diversity of international music, Wonderful world is always a very special song of my life. I even started to pick up some British accent and started to switch from singing “I don’t know much” in American accent to British accent – subconsciously – making all my friends laugh.
I love how the song starts with “I don’t know much...” and the lyrics keep repeating “I don’t know much” until the end of the song. It’s so innocent the way it means to say “I don’t know, I don’t care, I don’t give a sht about anything in this world, but I do know my feeling for you and you’re everything I want and need”, right?
Oh my, this is such sweetest and cheesiest tune I ever play and I’m crazy in love with the way it is haha
My friends are so obsessed with me playing this song, and my mantra whenever someone asks me something that I don’t know the answer – or I want to pretend like I don’t know the answer, I’ll say: I don’t know much about history – or I’ll literally start singing the lyrics
What a wonderful world we live in to have this song “Wonderful world”. I hope you feel loved when you hear it just like I do!
Little Beatle ♫
The long & winding road
Lyrics:
Wonderful world – Sam Cooke
[Verse 1]
Don't know much about history
Don't know much biology
Don't know much about a science book
Don't know much about the French I took
[Chorus 1]
But I do know that I love you
And I know that if you love me, too
What a wonderful world this would be
[Verse 2]
Don't know much about geography
Don't know much trigonometry
Don't know much about algebra
Don't know what a slide rule is for
[Chorus 2]
But I do know one and one is two
And if this one could be with you
What a wonderful world this would be
[Bridge]
Now, I don't claim to be an A student
But I'm trying to be
For maybe by being an A student, baby
I can win your love for me...
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