“Vincent” is a song by Don McLean written as a tribute to Vincent van Gogh. It is often erroneously titled after its opening refrain, “Starry Starry Night”, a reference to Van Gogh’s 1889 painting The Starry Night. McLean wrote the lyrics in 1971 after reading a book about the life of Van Gogh. It was released on McLean’s 1971 American Pie album; the following year, the song topped the UK Singles Chart for two weeks. The song makes use mainly of the guitar but also includes the accordion, marimba, and strings. In July 2020, the original handwritten lyrics went up for sale for $1.5 million. McLean said the following about the genesis of the song: “In the autumn of 1970 I had a job singing in the school system, playing my guitar in classrooms. I was sitting on the veranda one morning, reading a biography of Van Gogh, and suddenly I knew I had to write a song arguing that he wasn’t crazy. He had an illness and so did his brother Theo. This makes it different, in my mind, to the garden variety of ‘crazy’ – because he was rejected by a woman [as was commonly thought]. So I sat down with a print of Starry Night and wrote the lyrics out on a paper bag.”
Songs with Banjo from Harold Hagler
