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Simon & Garfunkel – Scarborough Fair

Simon & Garfunkel – Wikipedia tiếng Việt

About the Song

Scarborough Fair is a haunting and enigmatic ballad that has captivated audiences for centuries. Its origins remain shrouded in mystery, with versions dating back to the 17th century. The song’s melancholic melody and cryptic lyrics have fueled countless interpretations, adding to its enduring allure.

The most recognizable version likely comes from Simon & Garfunkel’s 1967 rendition. This version features the now-famous call and response, “Are you going to Scarborough Fair?” followed by the herbal refrain, “Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme.”

The lyrics themselves paint a picture of a lost love. The singer sends a message to a former lover through a visitor traveling to Scarborough Fair, a real marketplace town in North Yorkshire, England. The tasks the singer asks their former love to complete are seemingly impossible – sewing a shirt without needle and thread, finding land by the sea, and reaping it with a leather sickle. These impossible tasks can be seen as metaphors for the speaker’s own emotional turmoil and the hopelessness of rekindling the lost love.

Scarborough Fair’s enduring popularity lies in its ambiguity. The lack of specific details allows listeners to project their own experiences and emotions onto the song. The yearning for a lost love, the sense of helplessness, and the bittersweet beauty of unfulfilled desires all resonate deeply with audiences across generations and cultures.

The song’s mystique is further enhanced by the symbolism of the herbs mentioned in the refrain. While the exact meaning remains debated, some believe the herbs represent fidelity (rosemary), remembrance (sage), domesticity (parsley), and death (thyme). These interpretations add another layer of complexity to the song’s emotional core.

Scarborough Fair transcends the boundaries of a folk song. It’s a timeless exploration of love, loss, and the human desire for connection. Whether sung a cappella or accompanied by a simple guitar melody, the song continues to resonate with a primal yearning for something just out of reach.Paul Simon opens up on ending friendship with Art Garfunkel

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Lyrics: Scarborough Fair

Are you going to Scarborough Fair:
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.
Remember me to one who lives there.
She once was a true love of mine.On the side of a hill in the deep forest green.
Tracing of sparrow on snow-crested brown.
Blankets and bedclothes the child of the mountain
Sleeps unaware of the clarion call.Tell her to make me a cambric shirt:
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme;
Without no seams nor needle work,
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.On the side of a hill in the sprinkling of leaves.
Washes the grave with silvery tears.
A soldier cleans and polishes a gun.
Sleeps unaware of the clarion call.Tell her to find me an acre of land:
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme;
Between the salt water and the sea strands,
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.

War bellows blazing in scarlet battalions.
Generals order their soldiers to kill.
And to fight for a cause they have long ago forgotten.

Tell her to reap it with a sickle of leather:
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme;
And gather it all in a bunch of heather,
Then she’ll be a true love of mine.

Are you going to Scarborough Fair:
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.
Remember me to one who lives there.
She once was a true love of mine.

 

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What if the true miracle of Elvis Presley was never his dazzling face, his electric swagger, or the crown that history pressed upon his head? What if his greatest gift was something entirely unseen, living solely in the sound of his breath against a microphone? He possessed a voice of astonishing alchemy—capable of whipping an arena into a frenzy of wild, delirious joy one moment, only to strip a room down to absolute, breathless silence with a single, heartbreaking note. It was an instrument that carried the full spectrum of human endurance: the raw ache of loneliness, the quiet devotion of faith, the fever of first love, and the heavy sorrow of a broken heart, all articulated in ways mere language could never touch. Nearly half a century after his voice fell silent, millions still turn to his records and feel a strange, profound stirring they can’t quite name. Because when Elvis sang, he wasn’t just entertaining a crowd. He possessed the rare, uncanny magic of a soul looking straight into yours—making you feel, with every syllable, that he understood the deepest, quietest corners of your heart.

What cosmic alchemy creates a face so striking that, nearly half a century after he drew his last breath, strangers can still look at an old portrait and feel their hearts instantly surrender? Elvis Presley possessed a rare, breathtaking symmetry that defied mere description—anchored by those unforgettable blue eyes, faultless bone structure, and a smile that could disarm a room in a heartbeat. He held a paradoxical grace, effortlessly projecting both commanding power and profound vulnerability all at once. Yet his true magnetism lay far beyond the physical. Beneath the legendary looks lived an aching, radiant warmth—a quiet tenderness shadowing his confidence, and a subtle, lingering melancholy that often lingered in his eyes even when his lips were smiling. He looked like a dream the world had conjured, yet his deep, unmistakably human fragility made you feel as though he wasn’t just an icon to be admired from afar, but someone your soul already knew and deeply loved.

How does a man who laid down his microphone nearly half a century ago continue to claim the hearts of generations born decades after his final curtain? Elvis Presley drew his last breath on August 16, 1977, at only forty-two, yet his story refused to end with a gravestone in the Meditation Garden. Instead, something miraculous happened in his absence: the myth deepened, the music found new sanctuaries, and millions of souls who never lived a single day under his living sun learned to love him with a fierce, personal devotion. Every year, modern pilgrims still trace their way to the gates of Graceland, leaving flowers, letters, and tears on stone, while his voice continues to drift from bedroom turntables and digital screens into the ears of youth who weren’t even glimmers in their parents’ eyes when he passed. Yet perhaps the most poignant, quiet tragedy of all is that Elvis never knew. In his loneliest hours, wrestling with the crushing weight of fame and a life slipping through his fingers, he could never have imagined that long after he was gone, unborn generations would still be whispering his name, aching for a man they never touched, and keeping his brilliant, immortal spirit alive.

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