Lyrics to
Ode To Big Blue

Released by Gordon Lightfoot in 1972
From the Album: Don Quixote |

This version of Ode To Big Blue was released by Gordon Lightfoot in 1972.

Our Gordon Lightfoot Songs profile has Ode To Big Blue lyrics from 1972 and most if not all of the lyrics by Gordon Lightfoot that we have here at Decade Lyrics.

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The oceans of the world were the home of Big Blue
He was the greatest monster that the world ever knew
And the place that he loved best
Was the waters to the west
Around the blue Pacific he did roam

Big Blue moved alone for a mighty blue was he
And the battles of the whales was an awesome sight to see
And he took them one by one and he drove them all away
In the mating of the day he was the king

Big Blue had fifty wives and he sired forty sons
Though most of them feel victim to the cruel harpoon guns
Ah but he was too much wise to get caught by the gunners’ eyes
And so he lived at sea a hundred years

His mouth was as large as a tunnel so they say
His hide was thick as leather and his eyes quick and small
And his back was all scarred by the times he got away
And he knew the smell of whalers did Big Blue

Big Blue passed away to his natural decay
Beside the Arctic Circle as he travelled up that way
And there never was a man who was born with a gunner’s hand
Who ever took a pan to Big Blue

Now the gray whale has run and the sperm is almost done
The finbacks and the Greenland rights have all passed and gone
They’ve been taken by the men for the money they could spend
And the killing never ends, it just goes on

The oceans of the earth were the home of Big Blue
He was the greatest monster that the world ever knew
And the place that he loved best was the waters to the west
Around the blue Pacific he did roam


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Gordon Lightfoot has released many songs over the years besides Ode To Big Blue. Gordon Lightfoot released songs from 1966 to 2004 spanning across albums like Lightfoot!, The Way I Feel, Back Here On Earth, Did She Mention My Name, Sunday Concert, Sit Down Young Stranger / If You Could Read My Mind, Summer Side Of Life, Don Quixote, Old Dan's Records, Sundown, Cold On The Shoulder, Summertime Dream, Endless Wire, Dream Street Rose, Shadows, Salute, East Of Midnight, Waiting For You, A Painter Passing Through, and Harmony. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Gordon Lightfoot.

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If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1972 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and Ode To Big Blue by Gordon Lightfoot

The lyrics to Ode To Big Blue are just the words, phrases, verses and chorus that Gordon Lightfoot used when the song was created in 1972. The lyrics to Ode To Big Blue have both easy-to-spot meanings and hidden metaphors that have been discussed by the music press and fans, but only Gordon Lightfoot and any collaborators know all of the inspirations for the song.

If you like etymology or breaking apart phrases and words, it is easy to understand the lyrics to Ode To Big Blue by Gordon Lightfoot. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to Ode To Big Blue" means the words set to the music of Ode To Big Blue, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Gordon Lightfoot. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to Ode To Big Blue and the lyrics to Ode To Big Blue are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Gordon Lightfoot who came here looking just for the lyrics to Ode To Big Blue, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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