In my opinion, this is one of the finest songs written in the decade of the 1990s.  Garth Brooks teamed up with a "Shero" of mine named Victoria Shaw, who is a brilliant songwriter, and they penned one of the greatest anthems of inspiration ever captured on tape.  Garth wanted to write a song reminiscent musically of something his initial musical hero might have written, James Taylor.  The song was a smash hit, topping both the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in the US and the Country Chart in Canada.  In addition to appearing on 3 different albums that sold over 10 million copies in the US alone, Garth got to experience a fairytale dream of having James Taylor perform a rendition of the song for him when he was given Kennedy Center Honors in 2021.  You literally can't make something like that up!

I was head over heels in love with this tune the first time I ever heard it, and it's been a reasonably consistent fixture in live performances for me for over 30 years.  What can I say....I'm a dreamer.  I always have been, and I always will be.  What I love most about the message of this song is that it doesn't really talk so much about "achieving" something, as much as it does the constant pursuit....meaning, you never get "there"....you just create the illusion of a destination to give yourself an excuse to go for the ride.  "I will sail my vessel, 'til the river runs dry".....it just means that I'm chasing this thing and every other thing that I want until I breathe my last breath....and not because I can't live with not getting it....but because the pursuit is what makes life worth living!

I'm 47 now, and it's an interesting age.  I'm old enough to have a fair amount of hindsight....but young enough to still see a lot of road in front of me.  I assumed when I was 20 that by now I would have accomplished most of my goals and would be looking to hang it up and coast for the rest of my life.  The actual truth is, I've failed more than I've succeeded, but even more importantly, I've just kept adding dreams to my queue, and they are much MORE important to me now than they ever were then.  In fact, I've never been more excited about my work, my aspirations for adventure and travel, and my capacity to love and connect....I'm 100x better at all of it now than I was in my 20s or 30s, and nothing matters more to me now than simply doing the work. 

Making a pile of money would be great, and I certainly intend to do so....going on big vacations has been and will be lots of fun, and it's certainly pleasing to drive nice vehicles and live in nice homes.  But none of that counts nearly as much as the privilege of waking up every day and expending effort in service of "work that matters for people who care" (nod to Seth Godin for that amazing phrase).  I LOVE making music and teaching people things I've learned, and I don't want a single day to go by without doing at least one thing that accomplishes one or both.  And I want to continue to enjoy the new dreams that emerge.

When I made the cover video I'm sharing with you below, I was in pursuit of a dream of healing that I am very happy to announce has come true.  I was 4 years into pretty debilitating "long Covid" at the time.....I still had some lung fibrosis, my vocal cords were scuffed up from chronic coughing over a period of years, I still suffered from significant fatigue, and I just simply couldn't take the deep breaths I had always been able to prior to contracting the first strain of COVID in 2020, and it was affecting my singing voice in ways that I didn't like at all.  But I knew that I had to keep singing and playing in spite of the challenges because it was still my passion and my profession, and frankly....I don't know what else to do with my life.

I'm proud of this cover because I had to adapt to a difficult situation.  I was really frustrated when I was trying to record it because for 2 hours, I kept running out of breath in terrible places due to my diminished lung capacity, and didn't know what to do about it.  However, eventually I came up with an alternative phrasing that was different than how I had sung it for 30 years, but was still artful and allowed me to be sincere and expressive, and most importantly, allowed me to take more frequent breaths.  I ultimately felt very good about the performance and feel like it's an important capture for posterity for that particular season in my life and what I was dealing with.

I'm happy to say that I have rebounded and no longer feel any restrictions to my breathing, and have returned to the phrasing I've always used in the past for this song.  But I'll always be proud of myself for finding a way to keep sailing my vessel down that river, even when my capacities were compromised and diminished.  Because this song reinforces the wisdom of all my greatest mentors....continuing to sail is far more important than how fast the ship travels or where you end up....on the day you take your last breath, what will matter most is that you kept sailing. 

Enjoy my cover of this song from February 13, 2024, and then check out a great performance of it by Garth himself from a broadcast of the Grand Ole Opry in 1992, as well as that performance by James Taylor at the 2021 Kennedy Center Honors that I mentioned earlier. 

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