Willow's Song

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"Willow's Song" is a ballad by American composer Paul Giovanni using lyrics by the poet Robert Burns for the 1973 film The Wicker Man. It is sometimes referred to as "The Wicker Man Song," although the film contains several other songs. The film tells the story of an upright Christian police officer investigating the disappearance of a young girl, the search for whom leads him to a remote Scottish isle inhabited by pagans. While staying at the Green Man pub, Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) is roused from prayer by the landlord's daughter Willow, played by (Britt Ekland), who sings this rather erotic ballad through the adjoining wall of their separate bedrooms. The song is an attempt to seduce Howie by alluding to Willow's sensuality (and promiscuity). It appears on the Wicker Man soundtrack album released in 1998 and re-released in 2002.

It was also the title of a song Shakespeare used in Othello.

[edit] Cover versions

The song has been covered several times, notably as "How Do" on the Sneaker Pimps' 1998 album, Becoming X. This version also appears in the 2006 horror film Hostel. Other covers include a version by the British rock band Doves on their 2003 Lost Sides album, one by Seafood on the 2004 album As the Cry Flows, and one by former Belle & Sebastian singer Isobel Campbell on her 2006 album Milkwhite Sheets. A version with vocals by Rose McDowall appears on the EP A Dozen Summers Against the World and the LP Beauty Reaps the Blood of Solitude by Nature & Organization. Faith And The Muse also covered the song in an appropriately haunting rendition from the album The Burning Season. It is also covered by Anna Oxygen on her 2006 album "This Is an Exercise".