Steve Winwood Carlos Santana - Why Can't We Live Together ( Montreux15 Jul 2004)

 

Stephen Lawrence Winwood (born 12 May 1948) is an English musician, singer, and songwriter whose genres include blue-eyed soul, rhythm and blues, blues rock, and pop rock. Though primarily a keyboard player and vocalist prominent for his distinctive, soulful high tenor voice, Winwood plays other instruments proficiently, including drums, mandolin, guitar, bass, and saxophone.

Winwood was an integral member of three seminal musical ensembles of the 1960s and 1970s: the Spencer Davis Group, Traffic, and Blind Faith. 

 

Carlos Humberto Santana Barragán^[1] (Spanish: [.karlos sanˈtana] (listen); born July 20, 1947) is an American guitarist who rose to fame in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band Santana, which pioneered a fusion of Rock and roll and Latin American jazz. Its sound featured his melodic, blues-based lines set against Latin American and African rhythms played on percussion instruments not generally heard in rock, such as timbales and congas. He experienced a resurgence of popularity and critical acclaim in the late 1990s. In 2015, Rolling Stone magazine listed him at No. 20 on their list of the 100 greatest guitarists.^[3] He has won 10 Grammy Awards and three Latin Grammy Awards,^[4] and was inducted along with his namesake band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998.^[5]

 The song was first written by Timmy Thomas

 

Timothy Earle Thomas (November 13, 1944 – March 11, 2022) was an American R&B singer, keyboardist, songwriter, and record producer, best known for the hit song, "Why Can't We Live Together".^[1]

 Thomas was born in Evansville, Indiana, on November 13, 1944,^[2] one of twelve siblings.^[3] He first attracted interest in his work as an accompanist with Donald Byrd and Cannonball Adderley, before working as a session musician^[1] in Memphis, Tennessee, and releasing singles on the Goldwax Records label. He had little solo success until he moved to Glades Records in Miami, Florida, and in late 1972 he released "Why Can't We Live Together".^[1] The record topped the U.S. Billboard R&B chart, made the top three on the Billboard Hot 100, and top 20 in other countries including the United Kingdom^[2] where it peaked at number 12 on the UK Singles Chart.^[4] This disc sold over two million copies.^[2]

 

Thomas wrote the song after recently moving to Miami, Florida, and hearing Walter Cronkite on the radio reporting on the number of deaths in the Vietnam war. In a later interview, he commented:

I said “WHAT?! You mean that many mothers’ children died today? In a war that we can’t come to the table and sit down and talk about this, without so many families losing their loved ones?” I said, “Why can’t we live together?” Bing! That light went off. And I started writing it then. “No more wars, we want peace in this world, and no matter what color, you’re still my brother.” And then after that, put it on this little tape, and went to WEBF, which was a local radio station. And they played local artists then… they played it, and the phones lit up. They said “Man, who is that?” And I did it as a one-man band! That was my foot playing bass, that was my left-hand playing guitar… Could never believe that as a one-man band, something like that would’ve been played that much. But I do believe that the world was ready to start changing a little bit. And that song made the change.^[1]