On Legacy: The Creedence Clearwater Revival Years, John Fogerty revisits some of the seminal classic rock hits the legendary musician wrote and recorded more than 50 years ago.

Just as the original songs were a family affair — Fogerty’s late brother Tom was also in CCR — Fogerty has recreated 20 iconic tunes including “Proud Mary,” “Fortunate Son” and “Bad Moon Rising,” but this time with his sons Shane and Tyler. His wife/manager Julie serves as executive producer.

Over Zoom, Fogerty can’t hide his pride when he talks about recording with his sons, who have been in his touring band for several years now, and about how his wife’s business acumen and vision led him to remake the renowned tunes.

The impetus for Legacy, which came out Aug. 22 on Concord, was Fogerty regaining control over his songs after a half-century fight, as well as turning 80. In 2023, the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer gained majority control of his CCR publishing rights after one of the most bitter, longest battles in rock & roll. It made him view the songs with a new sense of ownership and pride.

The Legacy songs are tagged “John’s Version” in a fun nod to Taylor Swift and the superstar dubbing her album re-recordings as “Taylor’s Version.” Fogerty jokes, “I wanted them to call [the re-recordings] Taylor’s Version. I lobbied for that: ‘You want this to sell? Call it “Taylor’s.”‘”

Though they are decades apart, Swift and Fogerty’s ultimately successful fights to own their material —for Swift, her masters, and for Fogerty, his publishing — are not dissimilar, and he declares, “I was so happy to see her solution to her predicament… I was applauding her doing [the re-recordings]. I’m convinced that her re-recording those in many ways reset the condition, so that she was able to purchase the originals. She was strong enough and powerful enough a force that she rearranged the playing field.”

By intent, the new versions on Legacy so closely mirror the originals that even Fogerty can’t always tell the difference. “I was driving with Julie, and we were listening to a national radio station and they were playing ‘Up Around the Bend.’ Of course, our goal is to have them play the new versions, and I’m looking at her and going, ‘Oh, man, they’re playing the old original.’ The [song’s] going along and [I realized] ‘Hey! They are playing the new one!’ I mean, it actually fooled me. That made me feel so cool. I can’t even tell you how great that was, because that’s Shane playing [the lead].”

In an expansive interview, a gregarious Fogerty talks about what it meant to revisit some of America’s most beloved rock songs, spending time in the studio with his family, his friendship with Bruce Springsteen and — though he doesn’t mention him by name — his dismay at some of the activities of the current occupant of the White House.

How did this album come about?

Julie years ago murmured about maybe me re-recording some of the songs from back in the day. I wasn’t jumping up and down. One of the things she said — I’m paraphrasing her intent — she had had a vision that was full of joy, and part of that vision was re-recording my songs. I was in a different mindset. Then we got the publishing back, which is such a wonderful thing. I can’t even describe all the different dimensions — one of which is relief, just something that you felt should have been and had finally coming to pass. And that’s sort of put me at ease about a lot of things.

I’m sure turning 80 is another facet of that. It started to look more like something I could be engaged to do, especially if I was doing it with Shane and Tyler and Julie and the rest of my family. And so, I sort of tenuously agreed to start.

What was it like being in the studio? These tracks sound so vital and joyous.

Thank you for noticing. That’s actually how we are. I don’t think you can manufacture or plan that that’s going to be there. I had no idea about what sort of commitment and artistic involvement [it would take]. This process has reacquainted me with that person that’s in my soul that is relentless. I just can’t consider it finished until it’s really, really good.

When did you feel it clicked in the studio?

When it got to the part where I’m interacting with Shane and Tyler and Julie as the people who are actually performing the musical parts, I think that’s where the engagement really got strong. I was interacting with my kids. We’re making something together. It wasn’t easy. It’d be like you’re in a football game. It’s getting late and you’re down a couple of touchdowns, but you know you should be winning. And I think that’s kind of what happened.

Then you hear it back and realize that it’s succeeding. There is great joy and excitement in that, because what I got to do is watch this new band feel what I felt 50-something years ago with the guys in Creedence. The old days had ups and downs, and the tail end of it didn’t end so well. I have lingering memories of all of that. And so, delving into that and watching a new set of people become close and committed, I think that’s what you’re hearing.

These are so faithful to the originals. Do you pull out any of the original recordings to make sure you were getting it right?

One of the songs was “Born on the Bayou.” I was playing it pretty much how I have done it live for about 30 years. It didn’t have the same character [as the recording]. It’s like traveling on a road in your car, and there’s landmarks: over there, there’s a group of rocks, there’s a stop sign, and down the road, there’s a clump of cactus and over there, there’s an ice cream store. I kind of wasn’t doing that, and I had to listen to the original.

Julie had gotten my old Acme Rickenbacker guitar back some eight years ago or so. I had given it away and after 44 years, she had gotten it back. Of course, we were determined to use that. I also have the custom amp that I had actually played that song on back in the day. I had the same cabinet, but it didn’t have the same speaker, but I had some new ones that were pretty close. But yet my articulation, even though it’s such a simple thing, was not exactly the same — so we spent a lot of time getting the amplifier settings and all that geeky stuff pretty close.

Did you find yourself at any point saying things to your sons that you remember saying to the original Creedence 50 years ago?

I would say “yes,” but the first person I gave those instructions to was me. I passed through some kind of veil where I gave myself permission that it’s okay [to recreate the songs like the originals] — because it’s me, right? I mean, it was an amazing sort of spiritual or mystical journey. Not many people actually get to do that in the world. I got to understand the reason for the [original] choices, and you get why that’s there in that place. That was just a wonderful existential journey I got to go through.

But this time you got to have your sons with you.

I particularly wanted Shane to play some of the guitar licks that I had performed. I can’t remember actually making a decision; I just know I felt in my heart that I’m the dad and he’s my son. Here’s my metaphor: So, 55 years ago, I opened a little shoemaker shop and it said Fogerty: Shoemaker. And now I get to put “Fogerty and Sons: Shoemaker,” you know? Meaning that I was passing on the craft. It really turned out that way.

Shane’s been playing the lead lick for “Up Around the Bend” in my band for years. He was 12 years old and we were at Royal Albert Hall and I had him play that lick. That’s pretty cool.

But that’s not the same as recreating the original from the record.

When we listened back [to the recording] even though he had my Acme guitar, it didn’t sound the same. He’s a great guitar player, and I didn’t want him to get offended. It was a Friday. I could sense what was wrong. I said, “Shane, I want you to take the guitar home and practice this over the weekend. Listen to the record and get yourself to where you’re wiggling on that top string.” He comes back on Monday. I know he worked on it a lot, and he goes in and nails it. It was great. I know he worked many hours at home. But there’s also a third thing going on here: It’s DNA. I mean, it’s in him to be able to do that.

You wrote “Fortunate Son” when you were in your mid-20s and its story of railing against inequity and entitled privilege for the rich still rings true now. Do you look back in awe that you were so wise at such a young age?

Every once in a while I’ll be lying in bed half asleep or something and then suddenly you go, “Well, yeah, that sure said it, didn’t it?” I was a kid when I did that, but at the time I didn’t think I was a kid. At the time, I was an artist looking at how I’d been educated and how I’d been brought up. My mom was a wonderfully liberal person. She loved Pete Seeger.

He was a role model for you both musically and ethically.

Yes, absolutely. I suppose it could go either way, but because of the way the political spectrum has set itself, if you’re a person that has empathy for the less fortunate or the people that are shut out completely, or you don’t like cheating, lying [or] stealing. I think you tend to kind of go left-of-center rather than right-of-center. I don’t want to condemn all conservatives — and we sure don’t want to go there — but, wow! I’m just amazed… It ain’t me, I ain’t putting up with it, but those guys are. How could you put up with that idiot? Look at what he’s doing right in front of you. He’s using his position of office to make billions of dollars. I mean, the corruption is just rampant. Oh god, there I go. [Laughs.]

Pete Seeger is also a role model for Bruce Springsteen. How do you feel that ever since 2009, he’s ended his tours by playing your song, “Rockin’ All Over the World”?

Yeah. I mean, what a mensch, that guy. It made me feel just really happy inside. I love Bruce. I’m pretty sure he loves me. He’s admired my music. I’ve admired his. But still, sometimes a guy does something that takes your breath away. That one did because it was just so uplifting. It was like, “Wow, it’s just a happy thing.”

If you can only put one song from Legacy in a time capsule, which one is it and why?

I thought I was going to choose “Proud Mary,” but I think I’m going to choose “Have You Ever Seen the Rain?” because it’s a beautiful song. Most of my songs were kind of more blues-based, and even though it was based on an unhappy situation [as CCR was breaking up], the song became more of a pop melody. To me, that’s a good thing.

Yes, “Proud Mary” I thought was a classic, and a few more of them I think are a classic, but “Have You Ever Seen the Rain” was the fact that I was able to write that and yet be mysterious enough with the words that the song now is actually a very happy song to me. The reason is — and what I tell my audience — is because it reminds me of you. Thank you for singing my songs and keeping them in your heart all these years. You have been a rainbow in my life, and this song has a rainbow in it. I think it’s a song full of hope.

Is there a joy that you get from being on stage now that you didn’t get 50 years ago?

When I started as a little kid, I just loved music, and never thinking anything would ever change that. But the tail end of Creedence was unhappy. It didn’t end well. And over the years, there’s been so much animosity and lawsuits, just negative stuff. Obviously, some part of my life was affected by that when I would think about some parts of Creedence. [Julie] would say, “Well, you weren’t happy then, but now you’re making music with people that love you and that you love them.”

And [these re-recordings are] such an antidote to [those days]. It’s such an opposite of that way it ended. It’s a very real thing — because for one thing, it’s all one life. Now I don’t have to be this guy at home and then that guy when I go out the door. It’s all one life.

You don’t sound like someone who wants to stop playing live anytime soon.

I’ll never stop.

The Library of Congress has acquired rare music and lyric sketches from composer Harold Arlen and lyricist E.Y. “Yip” Harburg, who collaborated on the song score to the iconic 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.

The acquisition includes 35 manuscript items, including the first handwritten drafts of music and lyrics from some of the most beloved songs from the film classic, which starred Judy Garland. The collection also includes draft song lists and correspondence from the film’s director, Mervyn Leroy.

The crown jewel of the collection: the only lyric sketch for “Over the Rainbow” known to exist. “Someday I’ll wish upon a star + wake + find the darkness far behind me,” Harburg scrawled in pencil on a piece of yellow legal paper. This is believed to be the start of his creative process for a song that has proved timeless and universal, recorded by such varied artists as Garland, Ray Charles, Willie Nelson, Patti LaBelle, Barbra Streisand and Placido Domingo.

“Over the Rainbow” won an Oscar for best original song, while Herbert Stothart’s score won best original score – making The Wizard of Oz the first double song/score winner in Oscar history. Garland’s recording of “Over the Rainbow” was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1981 and the National Recording Registry in 2016. The full soundtrack album was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2006.

The film was inducted into the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry in 1989.

“Over the Rainbow” topped the American Film Institute’s “100 Years…100 Songs,” a 2004 list of the top songs in American film from the 20th century. The Wizard of Oz ranked third (behind Singin’ in the Rain and the original West Side Story) on AFI’s 2006 Greatest Movie Musicals list.

Additional collection highlights include:

“Harold Arlen’s contributions to The Wizard of Oz have profoundly shaped American culture,” Nicholas A. Brown-Cáceres, acting chief of the Library’s Music Division, said in a statement. “The donation of these manuscripts and papers represents a treasured addition in conjunction with our various Oz-themed holdings. This gift not only honors Arlen and Harburg’s imaginative genius but also preserves the legacy of the music that has captured the hearts of generations. The Library is grateful to the late Mrs. Arlen and the Arlen family for sharing these artifacts with the American people.”

A small display will be featured in the Great Hall of the Thomas Jefferson Building beginning in October that features original music and lyric manuscripts from the creation of The Wizard of Oz and Wicked. These treasures from the Music Division’s Harold Arlen Collection and ASCAP Foundation Collection document the creation of the soundtracks to the iconic films inspired by Frank L. Baum’s classic novel The Wizard of Oz. This display will be on view from Oct. 23 through Jan. 7, 2026.

The recently acquired Wizard of Oz material joins the Harold Arlen Collection, which was donated by Arlen’s sister-in-law, Rita Arlen, beginning in 2022. That collection includes a musical sketchbook, a large notebook of music and lyric sketches for the musical House of Flowers (1954), hundreds of photographs and Arlen’s original typescript screenplay for The Wizard of Oz.

Additionally, the existing Arlen Collection contains correspondence from Arlen’s friends, family and colleagues including Harburg, Mercer, Streisand, Louis Armstrong, Fred Astaire, Irving Berlin, Truman Capote, Bing Crosby, Ira Gershwin, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers and Frank Sinatra.

It also includes several artworks such as three portraits by George Gershwin, including a rare self-portrait dated 1929 that Gershwin sent to Arlen. The Library also acquired Arlen’s original sketch for his searing torch song, “Stormy Weather,” and his manuscript for “The Man That Got Away” from Garland’s A Star is Born (1954).

Arlen’s other classic songs included in the 2022 collection include three other Oscar-nominated songs: “Blues in the Night,”  “Ac-Cent-Chu-Ate the Positive” and “The Man That Got Away,” as well as “Come Rain or Come Shine,” “Get Happy,” “It’s Only a Paper Moon,” “One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)” and “A Sleepin’ Bee.”

Arlen wrote the liner notes for Streisand’s Grammy-winning 1963 debut album. His notes brought him his only Grammy nomination – in the category of best album notes. (Most of his best work preceded the arrival of the Grammys in 1959). Streisand returned the favor in 1966, when she sang two songs on Arlen’s debut album, Harold Sings Arlen (With Friend). She was the friend, of course, and sang “Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead” (from Oz) and “House of Flowers.”

Harburg and Arlen were the first two recipients of the Songwriters Hall of Fame’s Johnny Mercer Award, that organization’s highest honor. They received the award in 1981 and 1982, respectively. Arlen received a trustees award from the Recording Academy posthumously in 1987.

The Harold Arlen Collection joins dozens of other songwriter collections in the Library’s Music Division. These include the manuscripts and papers of Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, George & Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers & Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Jay Lerner & Frederick Loewe, Billy Strayhorn, Leonard Bernstein, Jeanine Tesori, Leslie Bricusse, Burt Bacharach, Harry Chapin and Judy Collins.

The Library of Congress is the world’s largest library, offering access to the creative record of the United States — and extensive materials from around the world — both on-site and online.

Relationship experts have endlessly parsed the body language and non-verbal cues between Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce during the singer’s album release appearance on the Kansas City Chief’s tight end’s New Heights podcast two weeks ago.

Kelce’s broad smile and longing looks at his girlfriend of two years said it all. But if you really want to know how the three-time Super Bowl champ feels about Swift, just ask his dad. At Sunday night’s (Aug. 24) premiere of the new six-part ESPN series The Kingdom about the Chiefs’ pursuit of a Super Bowl three-peat, People magazine caught up with Travis’ dad, Ed Kelce, to ask him about how his youngest son’s joy steams from his relationship with the pop superstar.

“Taylor,” Ed Kelce said when asked to pinpoint the source of Travis’ happiness. “There’s no question about it.” Ed could see it when he tuned in to the two-hour New Heights pod, dubbing the appearance “so good… I think it was awesome. It was great to see them go back-and-forth. They’re two people obviously very much in love.”

People also caught up with family matriarch Donna Kelce at Sunday’s premiere, where she had high praise for the New Heights appearance as well. Donna said she also tuned in and she dubbed the record-breaking Aug. 13 appearance “really, really eventuful… It was authentic. It was just something I think everybody was thrilled to see, and it was a very loving podcast.”

Swift and Kelce went official with their romance in Oct. 2023 and have since made a habit of showing up for each other at important events, with Travis flying out for a number of Eras Tour shows and Taylor posting up in the family box at more than a dozen Chiefs games. Swift broke the internet when she went on New Heights to reveal the details of her upcoming 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl.

Saturday Night Live boss Lorne Michaels famously runs a tight ship. He doesn’t like it when the cast cracks up during sketches and he expects the show’s musical acts to stick to the script and play the songs they’ve rehearsed for that week’s show.

So, when Sinead O’Connor veered way off during her moving a cappella October 3, 1992 performance of Bob Marley’s “War” on SNL — which she ended by ripping up a picture of then Pope John Paul II and saying “Fight the real enemy” — the singer was reportedly blanket-banned from the NBC network and would never again appear on SNL; O’Connor died of natural causes in July 2023 at age 56.

In a rare interview, Michaels was asked by Puck if he had to think twice about bringing attention to one of the show’s most controversial moments by having Miley Cyrus and Brittany Howard cover O’Connor’s most famous hit: her take on the Prince-penned “Nothing Compares 2 U.” The pair took on the ballad in February during the SNL50: The Anniversary Special celebration and Michaels said it was a no-brainer.

“No,” he said when asked about whether he had any worries about revisiting that controversial moment. “If [O’Connor] were still alive, I would have asked her to sing that song. But it was represented by Miley singing it with so much power.”

The famously stoic Michaels said he “teared up a couple times” during the emotional half-century celebrations earlier this years, saying he wasn’t weeping, per se, but that “a lot of other people were,” especially when Paul McCartney closed the show with the Beatles’ “Carry That Weight.”

Flashing back to the show opener with Paul Simon and Sabrina Carpenter dueting on “Homeward Bound,” Michaels said that even after 50 years of SNL, he was nervous about whether the first gen-now gen collaboration would work. “Earlier anniversary shows, we just did the one show, but I thought a year ago that we could do that [concert the Friday night before at Radio City Music Hall],” he said. “I spoke to Paul Simon about it, and then he got a call from Sabrina Carpenter, who wanted him to do a song with her on her special. And he said, ‘I don’t think I want to do that. Would you take that to Radio City?’ So [the opening] started back then, it was in my head. And then it migrated.”

He knew for sure, however, that he wanted to close with McCartney. “For lots of reasons. The emotion,” Michaels said. “Once he was there, I toyed with him opening, but there was something to closing with ‘Golden Slumbers’ that felt powerful to me. And Paul [Simon] and Sabrina were gonna do ‘Homeward Bound,’ which worked perfectly. It resonated with the audience that was there because for a lot of them, [SNL] was a home for five to 10 years. [The pairing] let the audience know what the show is. It’s now and it’s then.”

As for whether he was holding out for Taylor Swift — who has been on the show six times, including a cameo on the 40th anniversary special — to participate if she’d wanted to, Michaels said that was never in the cards. “She and Travis [Kelce] came to Pete Davidson’s show, the first show of the season before, and I talked to her about it then,” he said. “But I knew that her [Eras] tour was mammoth. And I thought, ‘If she can come, she’ll come, and if she can’t, she can’t.’”

SNL will return to the air for its 51st season on Oct. 4.