Crosby Stills and Nash

Induction Year: 1997

Induction Category: Performer

"Inductees: David Crosby (vocals, guitar; born August 14, 1941), Graham Nash (vocals, guitar; born February 2, 1942), Stephen Stills (vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass; born January 3, 1945)

Crosby, Stills & Nash have remained America’s longest-running experiment in vocal harmony and social relevance. The trio brought harmony to the forefront of popular music with their unique three-part vocal blend. A low-key supergroup, they emphasized singing and songwriting above all, and their example contributed to the evolution of the singer/songwriter movement in the Seventies. Born out of well-known groups that placed a premium on harmony, Crosby, Stills & Nash boasted impressive individual credentials before they joined forces in 1969. David Crosby sang and played rhythm guitar with . Stephen Stills was a mainstay of . Nash provided the high harmonies that helped make pop sensations of Britain’s Hollies. Even with those estimable prior alliances, Crosby, Stills & Nash would become their pinnacle as musicians.

They met in 1968 on the sociable Los Angeles music scene, with Cass Elliot of making the introductions. Their unmistakable vocal blend was described in Rolling Stone‘s review of their first album as “warm and full, with a built-in kineticism produced by three good voices emerging asynchronously on the same phrase with rich, complementary harmonies.” Particularly on their classic first album, CSN helped steer rock to a more contemplative, song-oriented place, and they made reference to what they did (owing to the frequent use of acoustic instruments) as “wooden music.” In so doing, they helped pave the way for the success of kindred spirits like , and . Their debut album-simply titled Crosby, Stills & Nash-arrived early in the summer of 1969, a few months before Woodstock, which marked their second public appearance.

With their glistening three-part harmonies, Still’s instrumental virtuosity and the trio’s inspired songwriting-which spoke the language of the counterculture both in personal and political terms-Crosby, & and Nash quickly attained the stature of a masterwork, yielding such classics as “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” (written for and about Judy Collins), “Wooden Ships” and “Long Time Gone.” It was followed a year later by Deja Vu, a more eclectic and electric endeavor in which the group expanded with the addition of (late of ) and the rhythm section of Dallas Taylor and Greg Reeves. Shortly after its release, CSNY recorded “Ohio,” a song written by Young in response to the killing of four students at Kent State University by National Guardsmen during an antiwar protest. Of the political content that marked many of their songs, Nash has said: “In speaking for ourselves, [listeners] recognized that we were speaking for them, too.”

Performing acoustic and electric sets highlighted by guitar duels between Stills and Young and the foursome’s affecting harmonies, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young became a major concert attraction. Their malleable live show was documented on 4 Way Street, a double album. However, their internal chemistry proved too volatile to last, and CSNY disbanded in 1971. The quartet regrouped in 1974 to undertake rock’s first stadium tour. CSN, a 1977 album by the trio, yielded a Top Ten hit in Nash’s “Just a Song Before I Go.” Daylight Again (1982) produced another Nash-penned hit, “Wasted On the Way.” Its subject was the band’s combative chemistry. “We have wasted an enormous amount of time on petty issues that should never have kept us from making music,” Nash opined in the liner notes from the box set CSN. And yet the group has been guided by a higher sense of mission that’s ultimately superseded all the squabbling. From the beginning they’ve been politically astute folk troubadours whose songs often address real events. “When we realized that the TV news was lying to us when we were children, we decided that we had to go tell everybody what was really going on,” explained Stills. “What we’ve tried to do is what Thomas Paine did, just issuing broadsides.”

Each member has pursued a solo career, and Crosby and Nash teamed up as a duo for much of the Seventies, but Crosby, Stills & Nash has increasingly become artistic home base for the three of them—and also, from time to time, for Young. CSNY made its second studio album, American Dream, in 1988, and reunited again in the late Nineties to cut Looking Forward. Upon its release in 1999, some 30 years after Crosby, Stills & Nash, Graham Nash could forthrightly say, “We still have it. We still mean it. It’s not for the money. It never was. It’s for the music.”

“They used to say we were speaking for our generation, and I think that it’s still true,” Crosby noted. “You hear a lot of music these days about rage and frustration and anger, but not much about hope and love and forward motion. That’s what we want to continue to stand up for.”

Or, as Stills once succinctly put it, “Changes, that’s what our stuff is about: emotional, intellectual, musical.”

TIMELINE

August 14, 1941: David Crosby was born.

February 2, 1942: Graham Nash was born.

January 3, 1945: Stephen Stills was born.

August 23, 1968: Crosby, Stills & Nash hit #28 with “Marrakesh Express”.

November 29, 1968: Crosby Stills & Nash hit #21 with “suite Judy Blue Eyes”.

December 1, 1968: and Graham Nash move into “Our House” on Laurel Canyon’s Lookout Mountain Road.

May 29, 1969: ‘Crosby, Stills & Nash’ is released. It is popular on both AM and FM radio, and it hangs on the album chart for 107 weeks. It also yields two hit singles: “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” (#21) and “Marrakesh Express” (#28).

August 18, 1969: Crosby, Stills, Nash play at Woodstock with newly added member in what is their second public performance. A half-dozen songs from their set appear on the ‘Woodstock’ (1970) and ‘Woodstock Two’ (1971) concert soundtracks.

March 11, 1970: ‘Deja Vu’, by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young is released. It contains underground favorites like Stills’ “Carry On,” Young’s “Helpless” and Crosby’s “Almost Cut My Hair,” while launching three Top Forty singles: “Woodstock” (#11), “Teach Your Children” (#16) and “Our House” (#30).

April 7, 1971: Crosby, Stills & Nash’s double live album ‘4 Way Street’ is released. Showcasing the group’s range and versatility, it includes group performances and solo spots.

June 17, 1972: Graham Nash and David Crosby release “Immigration Man.”

May 28, 1977: “Just a Song Before I Go,” the first single from ‘CSN’—technically, the second studio album by the trio—enters the ‘Billboard’ chart. Reaching #7, it remains Crosby, Stills & Nash’s highest-charting single.

June 21, 1982: ‘Daylight Again’, which contains the Top Ten hit “Wasted on the Way,” is released.

November 3, 1988: ‘American Dream’, by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, is released. Recorded at ’s California ranch studio, it is the second studio album by the CSNY foursome, appearing 18 years after ‘Deja Vu’.

October 13, 1991: Crosby, Stills and Nash’s ‘CSN’, a four-disc, 78-track box set containing much unreleased material, is released.

August 13, 1994: Crosby, Stills & Nash return to the scene of an early triumph, performing at the Woodstock ‘94 festival. This year is the 25th anniversary of both Crosby, Stills and Nash’s formation and the original Woodstock festival.

May 6, 1997: inducts Crosby, Stills and Nash into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at a ceremony in Cleveland.

May 6, 1997: Crosby, Stills & Nash are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

October 19, 1999: ‘Looking Forward’, by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, is released. A major CSNY tour follows in 2000.

Essential Songs

Suite: Judy Blue Eyes
Teach Your Children
Wooden Ships
Long Time Gone
Woodstock
Ohio
Carry On
Deja Vu
Just a Song Before I Go
Wasted on the Way

LaVern Baker's Blue And White Beaded Dress

Photo by Design Photography
Gift of LaVern Baker