Mocking Bird

Lees wrote it in 1968. The fan site says it was when he first met his future wife, Olwen; Songfacts, quoting the biographer Keith Domone, says he was living with her parents and based it on a musical phrase from "Pools of Blue", recording a demo on a tape recorder borrowed from Olwen. It was a live favorite before it was recorded. Lees gave no direct statement on what it is about. Wolstenholme sings the lead vocal and, by one account, the band was unhappy with the song until Godfrey slowed the tempo and added the orchestral element.

The studio take dates from the October and November 1970 sessions with Norman Smith. An earlier May 1970 version and a non-orchestral version were added to the 2011 and 2023 reissues; Background Magazine says the May version does not sound very different from the album's. The single (Harvest HAR 5034) came out on March 19, 1971 with "Vanessa Simmons" on the B-side, with Songfacts giving March 3, and was reissued on March 7, 1975. It did not chart in the UK. The album credit and the arranging credit with Godfrey were the subject of a later legal dispute, which is not summarized here.

It was a staple at their shows: setlist.fm counts it in 68 setlists for the original band, the most of any song, in 95 for John Lees' Barclay James Harvest and in 43 for the Holroyd band. A BBC Radio 1 In Concert from the Paris Theatre in 1972, with Martyn Ford's orchestra, opens with it and was issued as BBC in Concert 1972. The Live album (1974) and Berlin (1982) both carry a live version, titled "Mockingbird" on those releases. Which version our upload is has not been established. No covers or samples were found.