From the 1963 album "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" and later re-recorded with Johnny Cash for the back to country/ acoustic/no more hippy "Nashville Skyline" album in 1969. ( Reprising the infamous 'Judas' in the other direction in 1965). We both bought Freewheelin' as teenagers, our first Dylan album, probably because of "Blowin' in the Wind" but in this track the wind is not so much the divine one in Genesis as the heavy hitting one on the Canadian border. We started rehearsing this in the summer but recorded it as the season changed not so slowly into autumn, buffeted by winds and getting rapidly colder and darker. An early love song full of lingering emotion and regret, something of a Dylan genre by the time he'd added Suzi, Joan and Sarah to whoever this tenderly evoked North country woman was. It's a beautiful poem of pathetic fallacy, the oncoming winter and lost summer beautifully evoking a cherished but passed love, as well as being a damn good sound picture of that terrain and climate. We changed the line "many times I've often prayed" slightly to remove the redundancy.
WRITTEN BY: BOB DYLAN
Well, if you’re travelin’ in the north country fair
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine
Well, if you go when the snowflakes storm
When the rivers freeze and summer ends
Please see if she’s wearing a coat so warm
To keep her from the howlin’ winds
Please see for me if her hair hangs long,
If it rolls and flows all down her breast.
Please see for me if her hair hangs long,
That’s the way I remember her best.
I’m a-wonderin’ if she remembers me at all
Many times I’ve watched and prayed
In the darkness of my night
In the brightness of my day
So if you’re travelin’ in the north country fair
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine
Copyright © 1963 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music
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