Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)
"Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)" is a song written and recorded by American country music singer Alan Jackson. It was the lead single from his tenth studio album, Drive (2002), released on Arista Nashville. The song's lyrics center on reactions to the September 11 attacks in the United States, written in the form of questions. Jackson desired to write a song capturing the emotions surrounding the attacks, but found it difficult to do so.
"Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)"
He debuted the song publicly at the Country Music Association's annual awards show on November 7, 2001. It was released that month as a single and topped the Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart for five weeks; in addition, it reached number 28 on Billboard's all-genre Hot 100 chart. The song received largely positive reviews from critics, who appreciated its simple, largely apolitical stance. The song won multiple awards at the Academy of Country Music and Country Music Association Awards, including Song of the Year, and also earned Jackson his first Grammy Award for Best Country Song.
Composition[edit]
The verses focus on others' reactions in the form of questions. One verse asks, "Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow?/Go out and buy you a gun?/Did you turn off that violent old movie you're watchin'/And turn on I Love Lucy reruns?" In between, he asks about the locations of people when the tragedy played out, "Were you in the yard with your wife and children?/Or workin' on some stage in LA?" In the chorus, Jackson tries to sum up his own feelings, first by calling himself merely "a singer of simple songs", and "not a real political man", and finally by paraphrasing the Biblical New Testament's first letter of Paul to the Corinthians, chapter 13, verse 13: "Faith, hope and love are some good things He gave us/And the greatest is love."
The song is in the key of C major with a vocal range of A2-C4 and a primary chord pattern of C-G.[8]
Promotion[edit]
Jackson was scheduled to perform at the Country Music Association's annual awards ceremony on November 7, 2001, to be aired on CBS. Originally, he planned to perform "Where I Come From",[9] which, at the time, was the No. 1 hit on the Billboard country charts.[10] But mere days before the awards show, Jackson's manager, Nancy Russell, played a recording of "Where Were You" for four of the CMA's top executives. All four were overcome with emotion by the time the song ended.[9]
The day before the show, CMT had a brief note on its web site that Jackson would be introducing the new song during the awards telecast.[11] The next night, after an introduction from the show's host, Vince Gill, Jackson performed "Where Were You" seated on a stool, with an orchestra and backing singers behind him. At the conclusion of the five-minute-long song, the audience gave him an immediate standing ovation. This performance, along with Gill's introduction, is used as the song's music video.