When all the clouds, darken up the skyway
There’s a rainbow highway to be found
Leading from your window pane
To place, behind the sun
Just a step beyond the rain?

Two of my most favorite songs of all time talk about the same thing – rainbows. The first, with the introductory lyrics quoted above, is Over the Rainbow, which was created for the film The Wizard of Oz. The other one is Rainbow Connection, which I’ll probably discuss some other time.

There’s this certain version of the first song that is widely popular – that by the late Hawaiian singer Israel Kamakawiwo’ole. His was a pretty laid-back take on the song, which incidentally was featured as a medley with another one of my favorites, What a Wonderful World. It’s a very pleasant version to listen to, but, to me at least, making it sound upbeat sort of diminishes the thought and the heart of the song.

When Dorothy sang the lines, “Somewhere over the rainbow; bluebirds fly; birds fly over the rainbow; why then, oh why can’t I?”, she was looking toward the horizon – both dreamy and sad – hoping for some better place than the depression-era farmland she was currently living in. She fears for her dog, Toto, and wonders what the evil neighbor will do; she worries for her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry, who are both getting old.

There’s something about the slow-paced melody that envelopes the duality of desperation and hope, the wide-eyed innocence amidst uncertainty, that Dorothy felt, and that I, in more than ways than one, has come to relate to. That’s why Judy Garland’s will always be the most definitive version of that song for me. A close second would be Eva Cassidy’s.

Call it a tendency towards overemotionality, but there’s no way I can see those lines taken lightly and/or stylized. But that’s just me. I’m sure others will feel differently.

I have uploaded a few song versions in my other blog.

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