(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna

"(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna", an up-tempo John Lennon composition, is the title track to Ringo Starr's 1974 album Goodnight Vienna. The final song on the album is "Goodnight Vienna (reprise)". Also released as a single, the single version is a medley combination of "(It's All Down to) Goodnight Vienna" and "Goodnight Vienna (reprise)". The single was released in the US on 2 June 1975.

The title song features John Lennon on opening count-in and piano, and Billy Preston on clavinet; and the Reprise song features Lennon's intro, 'OK, with gusto, boys, with gusto!'.

Composition and Lyrics

The composition was the second of five Lennon songs to be offered for inclusion on Starr's solo albums, (the others being "I'm the Greatest" from Ringo, "Cookin' (in the Kitchen of Love)" from Ringo's Rotogravure, and two unreleased songs intended for Stop and Smell the Roses).

The term "Goodnight Vienna" is English slang meaning "it's all over".

References

Vienna

Vienna (ⁱ/viˈɛnə/;German: Wien, pronounced [viːn]) is the capital and largest city of Austria, and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.8 million (2.6 million within the metropolitan area, nearly one third of Austria's population), and its cultural, economic, and political centre. It is the 7th-largest city by population within city limits in the European Union. Until the beginning of the 20th century it was the largest German-speaking city in the world, and before the splitting of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I the city had 2 million inhabitants. Today it has the second largest number of German speakers after Berlin. Vienna is host to many major international organizations, including the United Nations and OPEC. The city lies in the east of Austria and is close to the borders of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary. These regions work together in a European Centrope border region. Along with nearby Bratislava, Vienna forms a metropolitan region with 3 million inhabitants. In 2001, the city centre was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Vienna (Billy Joel song)

"Vienna" is a song from Billy Joel's 1977 album The Stranger, released as the B-side to his "She's Always a Woman" single.

In a July 2008 New York Times article, Joel cited this as one of his two favorite songs, along with "Summer, Highland Falls".

So I go to visit my father in Vienna, I'm walking around this town and I see this old lady. She must have been about 90 years old and she is sweeping the street. I say to my father, "What's this nice old lady doing sweeping the street?" He says, "She's got a job, she feels useful, she's happy, she's making the street clean, she's not put out to pasture." We treat old people in this country pretty badly. We put them in rest homes, we kinda kick them under the rug and make believe they don't exist. They [the people in Vienna] don't feel like that. In a lot of these older places in the world, they value their older people and their older people feel they can still be a part of the community and I thought, "This is a terrific idea - that old people are useful - and that means I don't have to worry so much about getting old because I can still have a use in this world in my old age." I thought, "Vienna waits for you..."

Vienna, Alabama

Vienna is an unincorporated community in Pickens County, Alabama, United States. It was a prosperous river port from the 1830s until the American Civil War, situated along the eastern shore of the Tombigbee River on the southwestern border of the county. It declined rapidly in importance with the building of a railroad through Pickens County following the war. In 1917 the post office closed and this marked the end of Vienna's official status as a town.

Geography

Vienna is located at 33°1′7″N 88°11′31″W / 33.01861°N 88.19194°W / 33.01861; -88.19194 and has an elevation of 141 feet (43 m).

References