Who Was Elton John's 'Tiny Dancer'?
Who Was Elton John's 'Tiny Dancer'?
'200 Greatest 70s Rock Songs Vol. 2' Book Excerpt
“Tiny Dancer” was first released on Elton John’s 1971 album Madman Across the Water. When an edited single version was released in 1972, it only reached №41. As more album cuts were played on FM radio in the 1970s, “Tiny Dancer” in its original form became a listener favorite.
“Tiny Dancer” was written by John and Bernie Taupin, who was inspired to write the lyrics after his first visit to the US.
“We came to California in the fall of 1970 and it seemed like sunshine just radiated from the populace,” Taupin told Rolling Stone. “I guess I was trying to capture the spirit of that time, encapsulated by the women we met, especially at the clothes stores and restaurants and bars all up and down the Sunset Strip. They were these free spirits, sexy, all hip-huggers and lacy blouses, very ethereal the way they moved.
“They were just so different from what I’d been used to in England. They had this thing about embroidering your clothes. They wanted to sew patches on your jeans. They mothered you and slept with you. It was the perfect Oedipal complex.”
Taupin admitted that the song was also based on his then-wife Maxine. “I knew it was about me,” she revealed in the New York Post. “I had been into ballet as a little girl and sewed patches on Elton’s jackets and jeans,” which are both referenced in the tune.
As for the title, Taupin would only say, “Why ‘Tiny Dancer’? Well, I guess that’s just poetic license. It just sounds better than ‘small dancer’ or ‘little dancer.’”
Frank Mastropolo is the author of the 200 Greatest Rock Songs series and Fillmore East: The Venue That Changed Rock Music Forever.