The Lonesome Whip-poor-will

Elton John’s 1975 single, “Philadelphia Freedom,” is neither about Philadelphia nor Whip-poor-wills. It’s not even really about what the song title itself references: the tennis star Billy Jean King’s professional tennis team, the Philadelphia Freedoms. (The Wikipedia page for the song provides background on this.)

And so perhaps it’s fitting that the song, written with Elton John’s long-time collaborator, Bernie Taupin, references a symbolic, rather than real, Whip-poor-will.

If you choose to you can live your life alone
Some people choose the city
Some others choose the good old family home
I like living easy without family ties
Till the Whip-poor-will of freedom
Zapped me
Right between the eyes

The Metaphoric Whip-poor-will

Elton John’s Whip-poor-will may be one of the first metaphoric Whip-poor-wills to appear in popular music. More often, when someone is singing about a Whip-poor-will, they mean the bird. The song is too iconic and its association with country life to pure to have it any other way.

Elton John clearly mean something else. But what? What’s a Whip-poor-will of freedom? And how does it zap?

I struggle to make sense of this verse, except to say this — in invoking city and family (presumably semi-rural) life, the verse covers familiar terrain for the Whip-poor-will. Perhaps because the song seems to side with city life, the figurative nature of the Whip-poor-will makes a bit of sense? After all, the real bird itself is rather rare in urban centers, including Philadelphia.

That much of the rest of the song is itself cryptic, using phrases that don’t quite mean what they mean (“Philadelphia freedom” being tops on that list) doesn’t help things along.

Even so, I find the reference to the Whip-poor-will notable. It’s suggestive of a transformation of the bird in popular music — from a literal bird singing to a symbol that carries the meanings of other references to the bird. That the phrase “Whip-poor-will of freedom” is written and sung by two English song-writers — the European Nightjar’s song is quite different from the Whip-poor-will’s — about city life, where the bird would find no home adds further intrigue.

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Featured Photo by Charl Folscher on Unsplash