The Composer
Elton John - Dave Laing†
Dave Laing† [+]
University of Liverpool
Dave Laing, who died suddenly in January 2019, was a writer, editor and lecturer, and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Liverpool. His works include The Sound of our Time (1969), Buddy Holly (1970), One Chord Wonders: Power and Meaning in Punk Rock (1985) and (with Phil Hardy) The Faber Companion to 20th Century Popular Music (1995). He is an editor of the Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World whose first volumes were published in 2003.
Description
This chapter examines Elton John’s oeuvre, and in particular his songwriting partnership with Taupin. The range of their compositions and the recurrent motifs to be found in them is discussed, as will Elton’s collaborations with other lyricists, from Tom Robinson to Tim Rice. The accounts of specific songs will not involve detailed musicological analysis and are designed to be intelligible to the non-specialist.