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Dear friends, I'm so grateful to all of you who wrote to Dan through The Living Legacy website
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Posted on 12/16/2007 7:23:00 PM PST by ABN 505
Singer-songwriter Dan Fogelberg, famed for the soaring vocals and elegant instrumentation of tunes such as "Longer" and "A Love Like This," died on Sunday, three years after being diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. He was 56.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Broccoli and tomatoes prevent prostate cancer better than leading prescription drugs
Tomatoes: The Prostate Cancer-Fighter
Tomato Sauces, Rich in Lycopene, May Reduce Risk of Prostate Cancer
I saw Dan my final time in Atlanta, the Full Circle Tour, 2003!
He was looking and sounding very fine at that show!
The following year I was thrilled to hear of another tour in the works-and would have gone to see him again if he came within my reach!...Then - the sad news was announced of his illness!
June K.
Agree with ya on the Knopfler reference, Dan has a nice fingerpicking style which is musically lyrical in nature.
Funny thing about The Raven, for years I would hear it on the radio and automatically assumed it was Crosby, Stills, and Nash ... never knowing until recently that it was Dan !!
Raven is a great rocker, and is one of my all time fave Crosby, Stills, and Nash Dan Fogelberg tunes :)
Oh no...
Dan Fogelberg indeed a great loss to music.
Glad to see there are others appreciative of not only his writing but his musicianship, which is typically overlooked. He was the whole package and was especially good in a live setting (my Experience). Never saw him at Red Rocks, but when I lived in Boulder saw many concerts and really liked the venue.
Dan will be missed.
I suppose he was influenced by their music... as they do have a similar style and sound. I have read that The Beatles was an early influence, too!
:) Not surprising, eh?
All I know for sure is that Dan had his own unique way of delivering a song that touched my heart as no other ever could!
I will miss him so very much- all the new music he could/would have given us.
But will be forever grateful for what he was able to give us over the years!
Junie
Good advice. Also Selenium and Vitamin E are good to reduce the risk. There are also some "innovative" to reduce the risk of prostate cancer.
Just damn! One of my all-time favorites. I saw him in concert in Orlando about 20 years ago. He did an acoustic set by himself that was awesome. His album “Twin Sons Of Different Mothers” with Tim Weisberg is a classic.
Jean Fogelberg
P.O. Box 747
Deer Isle, ME 04627
Also donations to cancer research can be made in Dan's name at:
Phil Luciano
NEWS COLUMNIST
Saturday, December 22, 2007
At Woodruff High School, Jill Anderson had a typical teen romance: on-again/off-again with the same boy over several years.
He'd write a lot of poetry and share his insights with Jill. But as they went to separate colleges, things cooled off. They tried to stay in touch, but he moved out West and she headed to Chicago.
And that might've been the sum of a sweet memory, if not for a chance reunion one Christmas Eve at a Peoria convenience story - one music fans know well.
Jill's old boyfriend was Dan Fogelberg, who memorialized their convenience-store encounter in "Same Old Lang Syne." Since the song's release in 1980, Peoria - as well as the rest of his fans worldwide - has wondered about the "old lover" referenced in the song. Fogelberg never would say, and only a handful of people knew the ex-girlfriend's identify.
Jill, now Jill Greulich of Missouri, feels she can finally share the story.
"It's a memory that I cherish," she says.
She says she had kept publicly mum because Fogelberg was such a private person.
"It wasn't about me. It was about Dan. It was Dan's song," Jill says.
Further, though she and Fogelberg only rarely had communicated over the past quarter-century, she feared that her talking about the song somehow might cause trouble in his marriage. But in the aftermath of his death - he passed away of prostate cancer Sunday at age 56 - she has been sharing her secret with old friends in Peoria.
"I don't want this to overshadow Dan," Jill says. "When I heard the news that he died, I was very sad."
She and Fogelberg were part of the Woodruff Class of '69. They would date for long stretches, break up, then get back together.
Often, they would head to Grandview Drive, take in the vistas and listen to the likes of Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills & Nash. Fogelberg often would pen poetry, some of which he gave to Jill.
"I still have some of those in a drawer at home," she says.
After high school, Fogelberg went to the University of Illinois in Urbana to study theater, while Jill attended Western Illinois University to major in elementary education. They stayed in touch, even continuing to date for a while. But the romance ended for good when he left the U of I early to head to Colorado and pursue his music career.
After graduating college, Jill relocated to the Chicago area, where she worked as an elementary teacher and flight attendant. Not long after college, she married a man from that area, and her connection to Fogelberg faded to memories.
But on Christmas Eve 1975, Jill and her husband visited her parents, who still lived in the Woodruff district. Also at the home were some friends of the family.
During the gathering, Jill's mother asked her to run out for egg nog. Jill drove off in search of an open store.
Meanwhile, a few blocks away, a similar scenario was playing out at the Fogelberg home, where Dan Fogelberg was visiting family for the holiday. They needed whipping cream to make Irish coffees, so Fogelberg volunteered to go search for some.
By happenstance and because almost every other business on the East Bluff was closed, Jill and Fogelberg both ended up at the Convenient store at the top of Abington Hill, at Frye Avenue and Prospect Road. She got there first, and Fogelberg noticed her shortly after arriving.
They bought a six pack, sipped beer in her car and gabbed away. "We had some laughs," Jill recalls.
As two hours flew by, Jill's family and friends grew worried.
"We were like, 'Where is she?'" says a laughing Eileen Couri of Peoria, one of the friends at the gathering that night.
When Jill returned, she simply explained that she had run into Fogelberg, and the two had caught up with each other. No big deal.
Five years later, Jill was driving to work in Chicago. She had on the radio, and a new song popped on. First, she thought, "That sounds like Dan."
Then she listened to the lyrics, about two former lovers who have a chance encounter at a store. "Oh my gosh!" she told herself. "That really happened!"
They would not discuss "Same Old Lang Syne" until years later, during a conversation backstage at a Fogelberg concert. Two parts of the song are inaccurate. Blame Fogelberg's poetic license.
Jill does not have blue eyes, but green. In fact, when they dated, Fogelberg called her "Sweet Jilleen Green Eyes" - a combination of her full first name and his twisting of a song title by Crosby, Stills & Nash.
Fogelberg explained that he took the easy way out for "Same Old Lang Syne." As he told Jill, "Blue is easier to rhyme than green."
Also, her then-husband was not an architect but a physical-education teacher. Jill doubts Fogelberg knew what her husband did for a living. She thinks Fogelberg probably just thought "architect" sounded right for the song.
But those are minor details. The heart of the song hangs on its most chilling line: "She would have liked to say she loved the man, but she didn't like to lie."
Still, even decades later, she declines to discuss that line of the tune.
"I think that's probably too personal," she says.
But the song had no impact on her marriage. By the time of its release, she had divorced.
"Somebody said he waited until I was divorced to release the song, but I don't know if that's true," Jill says.
In 1980, the same year of the song's release, Jill married Chicago-area native Jim Greulich. Eventually, they would move to a St. Louis suburb, where she now teaches second grade.
A few of her school associates have known her secret about the song. So has Fogelberg's mother, who still lives in Peoria and exchanges Christmas cards with Jill.
This week, Jill sent e-mails to a few old pals in Peoria, lifting the lid off the "Same Old Lang Syne" mystery. One of the e-mail recipients was Wendy Blickenstaff, a Woodruff classmate of Jill's and Fogelberg's.
"I had a big suspicion" it was Jill, says Blickenstaff, now the head counselor at the school. "I'm happy for her. It's really cool. ... That's a memory that she treasures."
Jill agrees. Yet her memories of Dan Fogelberg stretch far beyond "Same Old Lang Syne."
"I'll always have a place in my heart for Dan," she says. " ... Dan would be a very special person to me, even without the song."
PHIL LUCIANO is a columnist with the Journal Star. He can be reached at pluciano@pjstar.com, 686-3155 or (800) 225-5757, Ext. 3155.
Oh!
Thank you so much for posting this! I like having these details. What sweet memories for this lady to have and cherish!
Still, I hope this doesn’t make Dan’s wife Jean feel sad or more hurt than she already is!
The last time I saw Dan in concert, in 2003, he seemed extremely happy and upbeat! This was due, in part I believed, to being in a happy relationship with his new wife.
It was as much a pleasure to see his happy smile as it was to hear his beautiful music!
Oh! How I will miss him!
June K.
Don’t anyone fall for pc crap about prostate cancer. Take 4000 IU of vitamin D3 per day and donate blood as frequently as possible. These two steps will prevent about 97% of prostate cases.
Roger that. I saw Dan in concert in college, and I always think of the girls I knew in Waco when I hear that song.
Pretty regularly, his Souvenirs album on on my iPOD. Right after James Taylor and right before Phil Collins.
EVERY DAY for me - for the past 30 something years!
There have been very few days that I have not played Dan’s music since I first discovered him!
This is a tremendous loss to me! As silly as it may sound to some people- it’s a personal loss for me - because his music has always been so special to me and a big part of my daily life! ( Yes- I guess I am a Dan Fanatic! )
June K.
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Dear friends, I'm so grateful to all of you who wrote to Dan through The Living Legacy website
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I have a friend who was diagnosed similarly: positive DRE, negative PSA. Biopsy made the diagnosis. He had what he described as 'robo-surgery.'
Just want to repeat your point: you need both tests.
Thanks for posting this. I had not had a chance to visit the Fogelberg sites, ( due to limited time during this holiday)so had not read this.
I’m happy I read that from Jean Fogelberg and it’s comforting to know our messages reached Dan and touched him during his long struggle. I am one of those fans who sent several messages to tell him of my devotion and my love of his music-and to send my good wishes and prayers.
I feel sure he appreciated knowing how much he was loved and valued.
That’s a wonderful picture too. I wonder if it was recent...I hope he was able to enjoy some days, sailing...
June
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