No doubt if Oscar Wilde had still been swinging in The Swinging Sixties, he’d have adored the songs of Donovan Phillips Leitch, better known simply as Donovan. Take the Scotsman’s diction—as formidable as a poet’s—or the precision of his pronunciation, whether spoken or sung and adorned with Glaswegian inflection and rolling r’s. Check out “Wear Your Love Like Heaven” for the former, “Atlantis” or “Season of the Witch” for the latter.

Wilde would’ve also certainly enjoyed Donovan’s sartorial sense.

At a deeper level, Wilde would have felt an artistic kinship borne of geography and culture. Oscar was profoundly Irish, Donovan deeply Scottish but also a fellow Hibernian by dint of his grandmothers, both of whom hailed from Ireland—so, Celtic myth and folklore, landscape and weather, and the mutual misery of centuries of English oppression….

Histories of ages past,

Unenlightened shadows cast

Down through all eternity

The crying of humanity —

’Tis then that the Hurdy Gurdy Man comes
singing songs of love.

The Hurdy Gurdy Man, Donovan’s sixth studio album, was released in October 1968. Eclectic, ambitious, whimsical,
mystical, powerful, intriguing, and altogether entertaining, the album is like strolling through a bazaar at a continental crossroads, merchants haggling in a dozen dialects, and everywhere the eye arrested by the rich textures and intricate patterns of exotic fabrics—from paisleys to tartans, Banarasi brocades to mulberry Charmeuse.

The eclectic mix of songs and their often startling juxtapositions builds on an innovation recently pioneered by Donovan’s four close friends from Liverpool. The massively “heavy” title track opens the record; after it trails off, a distinctly medieval drone starts up—our friend the hurdy gurdy—to kick off “Peregrine,”
a variation of an ancient Scottish Folk song addressed in mystical friendship to a falcon. The transition rivals The Beatles’ brilliant move from “Within You Without You” to “When I’m Sixty-Four” on Side 2 of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Musicologists had already coined the term “World Music,” but artists, record store managers, and listeners wouldn’t start using it until the 1980s. Donovan was way ahead. Much the way Roger McGuinn intended Sweetheart of the Rodeo as a survey of American musics, The Hurdy Gurdy Man is a conspectus of global traditions—Jazz (“As I Recall It”), Folk (“The Entertaining of a Shy Girl”), Raga (“Peregrine” and “Tangier”), Calypso (“West Indian Lady”), Burlesque (“Get Thy Bearings”), even children’s music (“The Sun is a Very Magic Fellow”), and a pinch of psychedelic.

The array of instruments used on the record comprises a veritable World Music orchestra: alongside conventional drums, piano, and acoustic and electric guitars and bass, you’ll hear bongos, cello, congas, Cor anglais (AKA English horn), flute, harmonium, harp, harpsichord, saxophone, sitar, tabla, tambura, and, of course, the hurdy gurdy.

So, what exactly is a hurdy gurdy? Imagine a lute, but instead of plucking or strumming the strings, a hand crank turns a rosined wheel spinning perpendicularly to and in constant contact with the strings. A precise date or place eludes historians, but the hurdy gurdy shows up on the scene in Europe in the 11th or possibly 10th century, perhaps an ancillary invention of the medieval industrial revolution already in full swing by that point. Early in the film The Song Remains the Same, Jimmy Page can be seen playing one while reclining on a Persian rug by a pond in the English countryside.

In meaningful ways, Led Zeppelin and The Beatles cross paths on The Hurdy Gurdy Man. As mentioned, Donovan was great pals with the Fab Four and joined them at Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s ashram in the Himalayan foothills of Rishikesh for a transcendental meditation retreat. It’s there that Donovan taught John Lennon the Travis picking technique on guitar which Lennon used to lovely effect on “Dear Prudence,” “Julia,” and “Happiness is a Warm Gun.” It’s there that Donovan wrote the song “Hurdy Gurdy Man.” At Rishikesh, George Harrison gave Donovan a tambura, as well as another stanza for his newly written song (Donovan has routinely sung the additional verse when playing live but omitted it in the studio version for time considerations.) And it’s at Rishikesh that Donovan co-wrote “The Sun is a Very Magic Fellow” with Beatles friend and roadie Mal Evans.

Back in England in the recording studio, sought-after session man John Paul Jones played a large part in crafting The Hurdy Gurdy Man. The soon-to-be Led Zeppelin bassist served as musical director and arranger, booking the other session musicians, shaping the sound of the songs, and playing bass on the title track. Contrary to compelling legend, Jimmy Page and John Bonham did not play on the song “Hurdy Gurdy Man.” But five years after The Hurdy Gurdy Man, the lads in Led Zeppelin deployed the eerily mystical drone of “Peregrine” on “In the Light” to start off Side 3 of Physical Graffiti. Naturally, Jimmy took it to 11 by doubling the instruments with a slight delay, a brilliant touch that never fails to dazzle.

The Hurdy Gurdy Man meets my Perfect Album criteria in many ways. Melodic hooks, sonic textures, unexpected phrases—every song pleasures the ear while engaging the mind. Perhaps it’s contradictory, but Donovan will get you dancing even while he always makes “smart” music. Maybe it’s not contradictory at all. And such versatility: it’s superb music for Monday night’s dinner at home or Friday evening’s cocktail party, a soundtrack guaranteed to transform room and board. And it’s a nourishing album for very young minds: kids love it!

Wilde might have enjoyed“Jennifer Juniper” most, given its art -for-arts-sake sensibilities, its lovely chamber music
orchestration, and its sonorous shift to French lyrics in the last verse. As for the exquisite shaman behind the album, when he wrote his life story he chose to call it: The Autobiography of Donovan: The Hurdy Gurdy Man.

Here is the original album playlist:

Side 1:

Hurdy Gurdy Man

Peregrine

The Entertaining of a Shy Girl

As I Recall It

Get Thy Bearings

Hi It’s Been a Long Time

West Indian Lady

Side 2:

Jennifer Juniper

The River Song

Tangier

A Sunny Day

The Sun is a Very Magic Fellow

Teas