The Windmills of Your Mind
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Featured:  Illustration: Portrait fantaisiste du marquis de Sade (1866) by H. Biberstein |
"The Windmills of Your Mind" (Les moulins de mon cœur) is a song with words and music by Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman and Michel Legrand from the 1968 film The Thomas Crown Affair. Noel Harrison performed the song for the film score. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1968. (Harrison's father, the British actor Rex Harrison, had performed the previous year's Oscar-winning "Talk to the Animals").
Dusty Springfield's version of the song is also well known, although it has been remade by singers such as Alison Moyet, Swing Out Sister, Edward Woodward and Sting, whose version was used in the 1999 remake of the same film. Dusty Springfield's version appears on the soundtrack to Breakfast on Pluto (2006).
The song illustrates a person's mental state after a romantic break-up, relating the way emotionally charged thoughts and memories can run in tortured circles. With its succession of similes ("Like a circle in a spiral/Like a wheel within a wheel"), hypnotic rhythms and complex imagery, it is a song that can "stick in your head." The lyrics even refer to this phenomenon: in among a collection of disjointed memories is "a fragment of a song," in the 1968 recording, and "a fragment of this song," in the 1999 recording.
The line "That the autumn leaves were turning to the color of her hair" is generally altered to the opposite gender when the song has been sung by a woman.
In popular culture
- The song was featured in a skit in an episode of The Muppet Show, being sung faster and faster until catastrophe ensued.
- In the Morecambe & Wise Christmas Show in 1973, it was sung by Hannah Gordon whilst Eric and Ernie were blown around in the background.
- In "The Songbird Sings Legrand" live at Araneta Coliseum, Regine Velasquez performed the song with Legrand accompanied by Manila philharmonic orchestra
- The final episode of I'm Alan Partridge ends on the King's Singers version of the song, as Alan goes to see his autobiography being pulped.
Recordings
- The Iranian artist Farhad Mehrad covered the song in his 1996 album Khab dar Bidari.
- American band Vanilla Fudge recorded a cover of this song on their album Rock & Roll in 1969.
- Swiss singer Sonja Salvis performed the French version of the song on her 1970 album "Send for me" recorded with the Czechoslovak Gustav Brom Orchestra.
- In concert, Dany Brillant has performed it in French as a duet with a woman singing in English, Viktor Lazlo.
- Tina Arena covered the song for her 2007 album Songs of Love & Loss and jazz singer Dianne Reeves did it for her 2008 album When You Know.
- Jose Feliciano also made a popular cover of the song.
- The Ken Ardley Playboys recorded a not terribly popular cover of the song on their 1996 album We've Got Ken.
- Indie rock band Parenthetical Girls did a cover of the song on their 2008 album, Entanglements.
- The classical quartet All Angels covered the song for their self-titled debut album.
- Australian hip hop artist Phrase released a single "Clockwork" featuring a remixed version of the song's chorus in 2008.
- Popular Christian/Gospel/Jazz acappella sextet Take 6 did a cover of the song on their 2008 album, The Standard.
- British singer Terry Hall of The Specials covered the song on his 1994 album "The Collection".
- British singer Sally Ann Marsh recorded a promo single in 1995, with various dance versions of the song.
- Michel Legrand regularly performs the song in concert (in its version with French lyrics, translated by Eddy Marnay). It usually includes a fast-paced improvisation on the theme.
- Québec singer Marie-Denise Pelletier performs it on her album "Les mots de Marnay".
- Peter Grant features the song on his album 'New Vintage'.
- Portuguese singer Fernando Tordo recorded a version in the same language as the original in 1969.
