But Redding was more than 10 miles away, at Waldo Point Harbor in Sausalito. Meanwhile, the city of San Francisco recently put the lyrics on display on a pier in Brannan Street Wharf. Marc Myers, in his book Anatomy of a Song: The Oral History of 45 Iconic Hits that Changed Rock, R&B and Pop, mistakenly noted that Redding went to the houseboat to catch his breath right after playing Monterey. It’s here where Redding began writing the song – and where the first of the myths and misconceptions about it began. When rock impresario Bill Graham made him an offer to get out of downtown, Redding, a country boy at heart, was happy to spend those days on Graham’s houseboat. Still, Redding was committed to the road for the rest of that summer, including a six-night gig at Basin Street West in San Francisco in August. “One of the main things Otis told me in the car one day was, ‘I’m coming to Memphis and I’m going to get a place and you and I are going to produce and write songs.’ He really enjoyed being in the studio.” “Absolutely his style was changing,” Cropper tells Rolling Stone. Redding had produced (and co-written) Arthur Conley’s hit “Sweet Soul Music” earlier that year and Cropper says he started talking about getting off the road and spending more time producing in the studio. He had always relied on the emotion and energy in his vocals to carry his songs, but now he started paying more mind to the words themselves he’d also recorded most of his songs live in the studio, but the complex layering achieved by the Beatles and George Martin clued him in to other ways of building tracks. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band over and over. Redding had begun listening to Bob Dylan, whom he’d met at the Whisky in ’66 but beginning in June, the singer – like the rest of the world – was playing Sgt. It was the only time I told Otis what to do.” I suggested he write something folk-like, saying we could call it Soul Folk. “He saw a huge crowd of white kids going nuts over him, and he began to believe he could follow in the footsteps of Sam Cooke and Ray Charles.”Īl Bell, then a Stax executive, says that he told Redding he was getting pegged as a genre musician and “would have to come up with something different. I think it’s really an inspiration to all kids.“Monterey had a powerful effect on Otis,” recalls Stanley Booth, who interviewed Redding for the Saturday Evening Post during those final sessions. “I think they’ll read these lyrics and kind of place themselves inside the story, so that it becomes a diverse story for anyone. I think this little girl and this little cat in this book, they could have been any color,” said Redding-Andrews. “Kids today are just over figuring out color so much, and people are people. The song really informed the story so much.” So, I wanted this story to have that bit of an arc where there was sort of a struggle. “Everyone kind of has warm-fuzzy, happy feelings with, but when I really listened to it, there’s a bit of melancholy to it. “In order to make that relatable, I came up with this story about this little cat who is trying to catch his dinner and just can’t catch a break - but finally has a friend to show some kindness at the very end of the book,” she continued. I wanted to really sit down and listen to the lyrics and try and understand the feeling and the meaning and relate that for kids,” O’ Connor said. … I wanted to obviously try and honor this song it’s such a classic. “I had wonderful inspiration, which was the song itself. The song was ranked number four on Billboard’s year-end Hot 100 chart, going on to win two Grammy awards in 1968. “ (Sittin’ on) The Dock of The Bay” was one of the last songs Redding wrote before his tragic death in 1967. She continued, “He traveled two-thousand miles from home just to make the dock his home.”
It’s amazing the excitement it brings to the eyes of kids when they see his journey traveling through ‘(Sitting on) The Dock of The Bay,'” Redding-Andrews said. He’s sitting in the morning sun, and he will be sitting there until the evening comes.
“The illustrations with the little cat just really reflect that he will be sitting until the evening come, waiting to catch his dinner of fish.
Now, there’s a new children’s book in the series called “ (Sittin’ on) The Dock of The Bay.” Redding-Andrews joined Reitzes again, along with Kaitlyn Shea O’Connor, the illustrator of the book. The book is based on the lyrics to Otis Redding’s famous song. “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes and Redding-Andrews last spoke in the fall of 2020, when the release of the children’s book “ Respect” came out. Karla Redding-Andrews is the executive director and vice president of the Otis Redding Foundation.