John Hartford wrote “I Wish We Had Our Time Again” and recorded it for Down on the River, released by Flying Fish in 1989 (FF 514) under the name John Hartford & the Hartford String Band. Every song on the album is his own. It was recorded at the Cowboy Arms Hotel & Recording Spa in Nashville. Hartford and Mark Howard co-produced, and Jack Clement was executive producer. On this track Hartford plays banjo and fiddle, Mark Howard plays guitar, Ruth McGinnis, Holly O’Dell and John Yudkin add more fiddles, Roy Huskey Jr. plays bass and Kenny Malone plays percussion. Hartford was born in New York City in 1937, grew up in St. Louis and died in Nashville in June 2001.
The singer looks back on a friendship or a love that has ended: the roads they ran, the people they knew, the risky things they used to do. Unable to sleep, he gets up in the middle of the night, turns on a light and tries to write it down, but the words won’t come right. He notes how the years fly, and how dear old friends turn away. Each verse comes back to the same refrain, the wish that they could have their time again.
A concert performance by Hartford, recorded at the Cultural Center auditorium in Charleston, West Virginia, with Mike Compton on mandolin, Bob Thompson on piano and Darren Vincent on bass, came out on Live from Mountain Stage (Blue Plate Music, 2000). His son Jamie Hartford included the song on Part of Your History: The Songs of John Hartford (New Sheriff, 2005). Marty Hays named a 2013 album after it. Special Consensus recorded it for Been All Around This World (Compass, 2025), with the verses shared among Greg Blake, Dallas Wayne, Robbie Fulks, Chris Jones, Ashby Frank and Rick Faris. Tony Trischka recorded it for Earl Jam 2 (Down the Road, 2026), with Bruce Molsky singing lead.
