In 1746 Samuel Johnson was commissioned to create a dictionary
of the English language.
“Before Johnson, no standard dictionary of the English language existed. The lack had troubled speakers of English for some time, both because Italian and French academics had produced major dictionaries of their own tongues and because, in the absence of any authority, English seemed likely to change utterly from one generation to another… A dictionary could help retard such change,…” (The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 1)
also read Samuel Johnson’s Preface to A Dictionary of the English Language
once you record a song, it fixes it–that’s how people will remember it, no matter how many versions you’ve played live or had in your head