This song has had at least two very successful lives.  But let's start with the first one.  It was written and recorded in 1974, and released on an album called Caribou.  It was dropped as the first single from the album, where it climbed all the way to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US, only to be held from the top spot by another of my all time heroes, John Denver and his career love anthem, "Annie's Song".  It peaked at #16 in the UK and topped the charts in Canada.

Musically, Elton was showing his love for Gospel & Soul music on this one.  The verses are wide open for tasty bluesy licks and fills on both piano and guitar, and the choruses have a wall of backing vocals worthy of a black church choir (seriously, they should have brought one in....it would have been epic!).  As it was, they had a star studded small group including Carl Wilson, Billy Hinsche, & Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys, and Toni Tennille of Captain and Tennille fame.

Almost 20 years later in 1991, George Michael was performing this song regularly on a tour he called "Cover to Cover", where he was including a lot of covers of other people's songs in his sets.  On the final night of the tour in London at Wembley Arena, he invited Elton on stage to sing this with him as a duet, and recorded it to release as a single.  It went bonkers and hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, introducing the song to a new generation of fans.

The first time I ever saw this song performed was in August of 1994 in Ames, IA during the first ever "Face to Face" tour with Elton and Billy Joel.  They came out on stage and did two songs with just piano & vocals, and then the bands came out and "Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me" was the first full production song in the set, which they did together as a duet.  It was fantastic.  Then, years later when I developed my own Elton John Tribute show, I always closed with this song.

However, probably my favorite performance of this song was in 1986 in Sydney, Australia with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.  It was the final night of this Australian tour, and Elton was facing a serious vocal injury.  You can hear in his voice that he has some kind of damage.  It required surgery to fix, and the procedure was very risky, so Elton had reason to believe that this might be the last time he would ever be able to sing.  Even though his voice is rough, the scope and power of the music behind him with the full orchestra is nothing short of breathtaking, and he makes up for the scratchy edge on his voice with heart and expressiveness.

I love this song....I love to play it, I love to listen to it, and I love to witness it being played live.  It's a treasure of modern popular music and will be considered a "Standard" in another 20 years.  Hats off to Elton & Bernie for once again creating some solid gold.

Enjoy my cover of this song from a livestream show I did on July 22, 2020 during the COVID-19 Pandemic, and then check out two amazing performances by Elton himself.  The first is from 1986 in Sydney, Australia backed by his touring band and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the night he thought may be the final time he was ever able to sing.  The second is the iconic duet performance with George Michael in 1991 at the Wembley Arena in London, UK. 

If you'd like to explore my piano method more deeply, my best students use my video courses and join me for conversation and twice monthly Q&A Livestreams in my private community...you can find it all HERE. Thanks.

 

If the video doesn't show above, use THIS LINK to see it on YouTube

If the video doesn't show above, use THIS LINK to see it on YouTube

If the video doesn't show above, use THIS LINK to see it on YouTube