OK, the performance itself isn’t that much of a Throwback, but the song is: Yes guitarist Steve Howe wrote this charming solo guitar instrumental nearly half a century ago, and he has performed it here and there for many years (it even appears in the 1975 film Yessongs, from a 1972 performance).
Howe said this about the tune’s origins: “It’s the first song I ever wrote, and I think it’s really a good piece. I wrote it on the 4th of August in 1969, when my oldest son, Dylan, was born. The very night that he was born, I finished the song. Originally, it was a dedication to Chet Atkins, but then it became a dedication to Dylan. It combined a lot of things I’d learned or imagined. I always wanted to write music, and when I decided to write solo guitar music, it was earth-shattering inside, because suddenly I was an independent person. I could stand up on stage and play ‘Clap.’ That meant as much to me as it did to be in Yes.”
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The guy definitely has chops, and its fun to hear him outside the usual prog-rock bag. —Blair Jackson