After I published my story My Angel Catharina online for the www audience, Hendrix researcher Niko Bauer, known for his excellent website www.earlyhendrix.com, made me aware of information which changes the story to some extent.
Jimi finished a version of the lyrics for the song ‘Angel’ on 14 January 1968, naming it ‘My Angel Catherina (Return of Little Wing)’, referring to the girl who kept him company while he was confined to his hotel room in Gothenburg, awaiting the upcoming trial on 16 January. This dedication suggests he wrote the song for her there and then, but, as Bauer correctly pointed out, Jimi had already recorded a demo of the song in November of the previous year, including singing a version of the lyrics.
How ‘Angel’ came about is an interesting story. Some people consider ‘Angel’ and ‘Little Wing’ as sister songs. They both originate from concepts Jimi was working on in 1967, both songs have a common ‘root idea,’ originating from the Monterey Pop Festival event.
Jimi Hendrix, about ‘Little Wing’: “I got the idea like, when we were in Monterey and I was just looking at everything around. So I figured that I take everything I see around and put it maybe in the form of a girl maybe, somethin' like that, you know, and call it 'Little Wing', and then it will just fly away. Everybody's really flyin' and they're really in a nice mood, like the police and everybody was really, really great out there. So I just took all these things an’ put them in one very, very small little matchbox, you know, into a girl and then do it. It was very simple, but I like it though.”
To put things in perspective... Jimi met Catharina for the first time on 13 September 1967 in Gothenburg.
Two weeks later recording sessions for Axis: Bold As Love started on 1 October at the Olympic Sound Studios in London. On 14 October Jimi and Mitch record a demo called ‘Little Wing,’ a try-out for later development. Although marked as ‘Little Wing,’ the song is obviously the earliest known version of ‘Angel’ (with bits of ‘Like A Rolling Stone’), and elements of ‘Little Wing.’ At this point Jimi is still searching for what to do with this ballad.
Two weeks later, on 25 and 28 October, Hendrix records the version that ends up on the Axis album as the ‘Little Wing’ we now know.
On 13 November, two weeks after the final mixes for Axis: Bold As Love, Jimi returns to Olympic Studios to record ‘Sweet Angel,’ and again on 28 December. Both recordings are already similar to the version that ends up on the 1971 Cry Of Love album.
By January 1968, the song had been recorded at some stage of development, complete with lyrics. So how does the lyric sheet of ‘Angel’ end up at the Esso Motor Hotel in Gothenburg? Possibly Jimi carried his lyric notebook around for development while on the road. Another explanation could be that he re-wrote the song (Jimi noted: “Finished January 14, 1968”) at the hotel to refine the words for later use. As he was confined to his hotel room for a week, he may have chosen to spend the time wisely, by concentrating on his lyric writing.
Whatever the case, Jimi wrote “Catharina (Return of little wing)” on top of the sheet, next to the song title ‘My Angel,’ as a dedication to the girl who kept him company during his stay in Gothenburg.
In addition to including her name in ‘1983... (A Merman I Should Turn to Be),’ Jimi also recorded a version of this song on 13 March 1968 in New York with a group of musicians. It was logged under the title ‘Angel Catarina.’
More about the events in 1968 here.
