GREAT MELODY, GREAT LYRIC, GREAT RENDITION

[Mark Blackburn]

ANN HAMPTON CALLAWAY – This Time The Dream's On Me

If I didn't know better I'd say, 'What a coincidence!' I'd just been thinking of my favorite Harold Arlen Johnny Mercer song THIS TIME THE DREAM'S ON ME – the fact that it's been 'envisioned' in so many beautiful ways -- by musical heroes, ranging from Ella, to Tony Bennett, to Harry Connick Jr, to Alison Krauss – the latter my favorite slow rendition for the movie “Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil” (1997).

It's playing right now on Siriusly Sinatra – my new favorite version by Ann Hampton Callaway. A song composed exactly 80 years ago this summer. Did Frank Sinatra ever perform it – even on radio? Wiser Men than I would know. A one-line Wiki entry with a list of important versions that does not yet include the latest from Ann H-C.

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA - My Heart Stood Still (live)

Siriusly Sinatra is playing the most beautiful 'concert' version ("'87 Dallas, TX") of My Heart Stood Still -- still my favorite track from my all-time favorite Sinatra album, "The Concert Sinatra" (1963). A lapse in memory ("my feet could walk . . . and walk") only brings an already adoring audience closer to him. Recalling Frank's NYC dressing room advice to a young Tony Bennett: Don't worry about 'nerves' [it only makes] the audience "even more on your side." And it's that endearing vulnerability of late-in-life Sinatra on stage that makes a recording like this one so special. Yes, it's at YouTube. [Alas "comments turned off - learn more"]

[Mark Blackburn]

Thee I Love

I remember my father enjoying (on TV not in theater) the Gary Cooper film “Friendly Persuasion” – his favorite (mine too) especially for the horse and buggy race – forbidden in Quaker culture, circa the Civil War. The movie's theme song, reflected Quaker-isms -- unlike any other song before or since! (1956).

Well, if it's not too late to say it, THEE I LOVE is still my favorite Pat Boone song – for the endearing lyric, yes, but especially for its unforgettable tune by an Oscar-winning film composer: the kind of melody you could hear but once, and be able to hum it for a lifetime. 

[p.s. I'd forgotten that in 2019 my namesake posted an informed appreciation for this video:]

Mark Blackburn
2 years ago
Listening on Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio to Debby Boone's Dad singing 'Thee I Love':  I'll have to catch Debbie Boone's "Playing Favorites" show in its entirety: Based on just the tail end of her program earlier this hour, I'm thinking: "No, THIS is my favorite "Playing Favorites" on Siriusly Sinatra. Driving home from church this morning I was thinking of my favorite song of 1956: "Thee I Love." I shared my musical parents' song-sensibilties; I can remember my Dad enjoyed this then-already-old-fashioned tune -- popularly known as "Friendly Persuasion" -- from the Gary Cooper movie of the same name. No, Debbie didn't play her Dad's hit version of this. So let's listen once more, with feeling!

An informed note at Youtube reminds us that others jumped at the chance to record a cover version, Pat Boone had the hit (I believe it reached No. 2 that year in Canada): " . . . Charted at #5 on Billboard Hot 100 in September 1956 and #3 on the UK Singles chart. Theme song of the movie of the same name which starred Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire and Anthony Perkins. Billboard reported there were almost a dozen competing versions of this song in 1956. The Four Aces charted at #45 on the Hot 100 with their version and #29 on the UK Singles chart.

Written by Dimitri Tiomkin & Paul Francis Webster." --- A personal note: I love Dimitri Tiomkin's movie music. Wiki reminds us that the Russian-born composer (who moved to Hollywood the year of the great stock market crash, 1929) was a multiple Oscar winner: "Tiomkin received twenty-two Academy Award nominations and won four Oscars, three for Best Original Score for High Noon, The High and the Mighty, and The Old Man and the Sea, and one for Best Original Song for "The Ballad of High Noon" (Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling) from the former film. But this melody was his personal favorite -- mine too!

 

Edited October 11, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

CLEO LAINE - Friendly Persuasion (Thee I Love)

I've always meant to sing the praises of Cleo Laine – England's greatest gift to jazz singing: I've been a life-long fan, though Cleo's YouTube videos seldom come my way. Coincidentally or not, I'd just celebrated "my favorite Pat Boone song" in the  'Other Celebrities' folder at Sinatra Family Forum -- where a new member "AIDA - a student in Russia” had revived Pat's dormant thread.

And as if reading my mind, the intuitive genius that is YouTube has just sent me a link to Cleo's version of THEE I LOVE, which she transforms into something akin to olde English poetry, set to a modern melody – and not what it actually was: a Quaker-speech influenced, Oscar-nominated, song from the 1956 Gary Cooper Civil War movie, Friendly Persuasion (its alternate title).

While enjoying this, my “new favorite version” at YouTube, I Googled her name and was reminded that, God willing, 'when October goes' this year Cleo will be 94. Having outlived by 11 years her husband -- England's best-known jazz sax great, John (“Sir John”) Dankworth. They always appeared together, as here on this wonderful video. Wiki reminds us that John Dankworth died on 6 February 2010, aged 82, on the afternoon before a(nother) show with Cleo.

[Mark Blackburn]

KATHARINE MCPHEE – Blame it on My Youth

We've been celebrating Katharine McPhee (see previous page) and right now Siriusly Sinatra is playing her inspired medley of Blame It On My Youth and You Make Me Feel So Young. Beautiful, 'at every level,' you may agree.

The song was composed by Edward (Body & Soul) Heyman -- and my Dad's favorite movie pianist (and mordant wit) Oscar Levant. Favorite stanza

If I forgot to eat, and sleep, and pray, blame it on my youth
And if I cried a little bit, when first I learned the truth
don't blame it on my heart -- blame it on my youth

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA - When I'm Not Near The Girl I Love . . .

. . . I love the girl I'm near!

At this moment Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio is playing my favorite song from Finian's Rainbow (1947 - a very good year).

From a Sinatra album I don't own ("65") featuring a beautiful, large sound stage orchestration, that could only be Nelson Riddle at the peak of his arranging powers; recorded perhaps the same year as my favorite album 'The Concert Sinatra' ('63). Wiser men would know. Every stanza's a favorite but this one made me laugh just now:

Every femme that flutters by me, is a flame that must be fanned!

When I can't fondle, the hand, I'm fond-of . . . I fondle the hand 'at hand.'

[Those lines and these from the coda:]

For Sharon, I'm carin'
But Susan I'm choosin'
I'm faithful to those who are HERE . . .

First version offered at YouTube this day and most viewed (nearing 28K).

Edited May 28, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

ROD STEWART w. STEVIE WONDER – What a Wonderful World

I see friends shakin' hands, sayin' "How do you do!"
They're really saying "I love you."
I hear babies cryin', I watch them grow
They'll learn much more than I'll ever know
And I think to myself . . .

My country Canada has one tenth the population of the United States – which provides Canadians with a handy “divide by ten” rule-of-thumb: Hence when an album goes 'platinum' in the U.S, with sales of one million, in Canada 100K sales gets you platinum status. Thought of it just now as Siriusly Sinatra is playing CRAZY SHE CALLS ME by Rod Stewart, from his “Great American Songbook” series of CDs; the first of which sold "3 million in America, 300K in Canada."

It was the first in Rod's five-volume 'GAS' series that began almost two decades ago in 2002. That year his world-wide sales had reached 100 million. Largely because of his Great American Songbook tribute albums “Sir Roderick David Stewart CBE” has sold over 250 million records worldwide.  Not bad for someone who entered show business in 1962 “busking with a harmonica” (on the streets of London). For this series of CDs, on one of his tracks the greatest living harmonica virtuoso, Stevie Wonder plays a tasty solo. Track four on “STARDUST – The Great American Songbook Vol. III” (listed as “platinum - sales of 1,000,000”)

“What a Wonderful World – featuring Stevie Wonder. Songwriters George Weiss & Bob Thiele's one big hit – WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD -- Louis Armstrong's signature best-seller which got another million copies in royalties thanks to Rod.

Edited May 29, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

NATALIE COLE - If You Could See Me Now

"You'll happen my way on some mem'rable day
And the month will be May for a while.
I'll try to smile but can I play the part
Without my heart behind the smile?"

Satellite radio is playing my all-time favorite version of IF YOU COULD SEE ME NOW – Natalie Cole with a superbly arranged big band and the best collaboration by songwriters Carl Sigman and Tadd Dameron. The thought, most every one of us may have experienced about 'the one that got away' expressed so perfectly in song.

“I think you'd be mine again . . . if you could see me now.”

----

I miss Natalie Cole, and waiting with anticipation for her 'next great album' of standards. This recording was track 16 on her “Stardust” album of 1996 – “recorded and mixed by Al Schmitt” (they both won a Grammy for for this one). An album with nine arrangers – this track the only one arranged by “James Hughart and Charles Floyd.”

The informed liner notes by the Coles family friend Dick La Palm note that it's a jazz singer's song that “might have dropped into obscurity if Sarah Vaughan had not recorded it in the 50s and Carmen McRae in the 60s” and that it is “a demanding song with unorthodox intervals and Natalie's respectful inventions ennoble this wedding of Tadd Dameron's music and Carl Sigman's lyrics.”

[Mark Blackburn]

HARRY CONNICK JR. -  All of You

After some other songwriters scored with the song “All of Me” (Why not take?) the great Cole Porter whimsically went to work on the title ALL OF YOU – for which every line but the penultimate (“so love at least a small percent of me, do!”) ends with the words “of you” – and all rhymes had to be 'internal.' Harry brings a new sexiness to words like these:

“The arms, the eyes, the mouth of you
the east, west, north and the south of you . . . ”

----

His online bio tells us “Harry Connick Jr, has sold 30 million albums world-wide” and has enjoyed “13, No. 1 jazz albums in the United States.” (This latest triumph actually was released two years ago – late 2019.)

“TRUE LOVE” highlights all of Harry's talents – as “pianist, singer, arranger, orchestrator and conductor.”

After selecting the songs, and writing and orchestrating the arrangements, Connick “assembled and conducted the orchestra” – which features his longtime touring band “with additional horns and a full string section.”

“This was the first time,” he wrote, “that I’d taken a deep dive into another artist’s repertoire, and Cole Porter was my #1 choice for the project. His lyrics are witty and nuanced and he takes risks as a composer that I find appealing.”

 

 

Edited May 31, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

PEGGY LEE - My Personal Property (NYC)

Google for “My Personal Property – Peggy Lee” and find there is no Wikipedia entry for a really witty song with that title, playing an hour ago on Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio. But then, Google thoughtfully includes an entry about "2 SHOWS NIGHTLY – a 1968 live album by Peggy Lee" [which] "at Lee's request [was] abruptly withdrawn from circulation almost immediately after its release,” [and that] the album had included “My Personal Property" by Cy Coleman & Dorothy Fields.” The same Dorothy Fields who, with Jerome Kern, picked up the 1936 'Best Original Song' Oscar for "The Way You Look Tonight."

Peggy Lee concludes her version with a teasing, spoken extro -- that she might be willing to share her favorite spots in NYC "fifty/fifty! [pause] Sixty/forty? Seventy/thirty! Eighty-twenty? Ninety? -- ah, we can make a deal!”

Thanks to Jersey Lou Simon for including this one in today's playlist. Please be at YouTube. Yes! – complete with a spoken intro, that this song was “introduced in the movie version of the Broadway smash hit, Sweet Charity.”

Edited June 3, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

BOB DYLAN - (still) Knockin' on Heaven's Door

My oldest grandchild Thomas (now 24) has, from an early age, been our family's technical wizard (currently a computer team leader with Western Canada's SHAW cable company) and he is also an increasingly accomplished musician (a much better guitarist than his 74-year-old Grampa). Anyway, Thomas just sent me an email, that he and his girlfriend, who work and live in scenic Banff Alberta ....

“ .... went out with some friends to a local 'beach' (Lake Johnson - they call it a beach on a lake, but to us Manitobans it seems more like the bank of a river!) and met some kindred spirits. We brought three acoustic guitars with us and had a crowd of 12-15 singing some well-known songs (Beatles tunes, acoustic versions of modern pop, but it was Bob Dylan’s "Knocking on Heaven’s Door” that had the most voices behind it.) One broken string later, we had more fun than we’ve had in quite a while. ”

[A song I first heard when I was Thomas' age!  Wikipedia reminds us:]

"Knockin' on Heaven's Door" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, written for the soundtrack of the 1973 film Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. Released as a single two months after the film's premiere, it became a worldwide hit, reaching the Top 10 in several countries. The song became one of Dylan's most popular and most covered post-1960s compositions, spawning covers from Guns N' Roses, Eric Clapton, Randy Crawford and more. Described by Dylan biographer Clinton Heylin as "an exercise in splendid simplicity",[1] the song features two short verses, the lyrics of which comment directly on the scene in the film for which it was written: the death of a frontier lawman (Slim Pickens) who refers to his wife (Katy Jurado) as "Mama".[2]

Edited October 12, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

JAMES TAYLOR - Sweet Baby James

Below the latest JAMES TAYLOR video shared at YouTube today -- for Sweet Baby James -- a fan "Critical Path" posted the note:

17 hours ago (edited)
With ten miles behind me, and ten thousand more to go." Gets me every time. I've been loving this song for over 50 years now. Where'd the time go? Thank you, James.

Recalling for some of us, the night that Jay Leno welcomed James Taylor to 'The Tonight Show' with a moving personal anecdote, about why this song meant so much to Jay – a memory of the exact moment when he climbed into his old car (a Ford family sedan I think) and began his solo, cross-country drive to L.A.

He was feeling lonely and sad, “.... when I turned on the radio and – there you were – singing those words meant for me: 'With ten miles behind me, and ten thousand more to go'.” Big smile from James Taylor who knew such moments himself -- including his earliest in L.A. (see below).

Like any great songwriter, Mr. Taylor will tell you it's the highlight of your day (or year) -- when a stranger says with conviction: 'That song meant so much to me – and to my future wife; because of you we met and married!' (etc).

[Someday, maybe even 20 minutes from now, we'll be able to Google: “James Taylor with Jay Leno on The Tonight Show” -- and there it'll be. No doubt contradicting my own memory of the event, right?]

"Track 1, Side One" of the SWEET BABY JAMES album (1970) – the one that really introduced the world at large to Mr. Taylor's greatness. This was one of three songs that were released as singles, and the only one that “didn't chart.”

This rendition shared by James Taylor with Facebook friends today – “restored footage from the BBC series “One in Ten – A Singer and his Songs,” -- is my new favorite 'live' performance. Love the subtitle at the start as James begins to play that old Gibson J-50: “Bright acoustic guitar music” (the simple truth, isn't it?)
 

 

The album's Wiki entry has been updated to include an endearing note about James' first days in L.A.:

The album, produced by Peter Asher, was recorded at Sunset Sound, Los Angeles, California, between December 8 and 17, 1969, at a cost of only $7,600 (US$53,634 in 2020 dollars[3]) out of a budget of $20,000.[4] Taylor was "essentially homeless" at the time the album was recorded, either staying in Asher's home or sleeping on a couch at the house of guitarist Danny Kortchmar or anyone else who would have him.

Sweet Baby James was Taylor's second studio album [and] first release on Warner Brothers Records. [and included] one of Taylor's earliest successful singles: "Fire and Rain", which reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album itself reached #3 on the Billboard Album Charts. Sweet Baby James made Taylor one of the main forces of the ascendant singer-songwriter movement. The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for Album of the Year, in 1971. The album was listed at #104 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

Edited June 5, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

JAMES DARREN - Dream a Little Dream of Me

Three or four times a year, Jersey Lou Simon includes in the playlist his favorite version of DREAM A LITTLE DREAM OF ME. Mine too. It's playing as I type this. I always have the same thought: What a great arrangement, with opening notes as memorable as a 'hook' by Nelson Riddle – I can spot it the moment it begins to play (saying aloud) “That's James Darren's version – my favorite.”

Perhaps I dreamed it, but I seem to recall asking once before: “Who wrote this arrangement?” and didn't Nancy say she'd check with her good friend, and James Darren couldn't remember immediately and “had to go and look.” Do you think I can find what his answer was. Wondering (again) if it was perhaps the late Pat Williams?

“Comments are turned off” [so, no,we can't] “learn more"

[Mark Blackburn]

WALTER RODRIGUES JR. - Raindrops as virtuoso guitar solo

The artist who made “Raindrops” famous, Billy Joe Thomas left us last month, just shy of his 79th birthday. Best known for turning this song (one of the best from Burt Bacharach and Hal David) into the 'first No. 1 hit of the 1970s'. B.J's original version topped the charts for months, sold 2 million copies, and was the 'Song of the Year' Grammy winner (1971).

I imagine B.J. looking down (listening in) to my favorite living fingerstyle guitar virtuoso, and saying with a chuckle: “I had to wait to get to heaven before I finally heard THIS – best ever guitar version!”

For me, this is the finest imaginable 'arrangement for six strings' – so fresh in its approach, so 'orchestral' in its delivery. And chock full of chord substitutions that could only be conceived and played by Walter. Those long supple fingers actually make it look easy. 'Artless, they used to say of such genius: You watch and think, 'With practice maybe I could play that.” Oh no you can't!

Walter Rodrigues Jr. is an 'original.' He doesn't have any apparent influences. My life-long guitar hero Chet Atkins was that way. (As a singer, so was Ray Charles – nobody 'influenced' him). The approach you see here is pure Walter Rodrigues Jr.

The simplest harmonic that any guitarist plays for the first time is – on the high E-string. Love it that Walter chooses to end this deceptively simple masterpiece in that very way. The final note. Simply perfect!

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA 'live' - Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars (Corcovado)

The pleasure of sipping a first coffee of the day, while hearing Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio play my favorite singer's 'alone with solo guitar' performance of my favorite song by Canadian-born lyricist  Gene Lees: Frank and Tony Mottola on stage (in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic). By way of introduction Frank says,

“Most of the songs we've been doing for you this evening are, basically, from the United States. But this is a 'Concert of All The Americas' and I'd like to do a song from Latin America, from Brazil to be more blunt. It was written by my dear friend Antonio Carlos Jobim and arranged by Tony (Mottola) himself.”

----

Was this Sinatra's very last 'out-of-country' concert, I wonder? It remains to my ears the best-recorded 'live' show (outside the capitol of the Dominican Republic, right?) For guitarists, this one is an object lesson in how to play (perfectly) with a plastic pick.

[I needn't have transcribed the intro] Uploaded to YouTube a decade ago – complete intro and EXTRO: Frank complaining the drink he's been handed is plain water (“That's for your garden!”)

Tony Mottola's on-line bio reminds us he was 86 when he left us “August 9,2004” [and that] Mottola “worked often on television, appearing as a regular on shows hosted by vocalist Perry Como and comedian Sid Caesar and as music director for the 1950s series Danger.

From 1958 to 1972, he was a member of The Tonight Show Orchestra led by Skitch Henderson,then by Doc Severinson.

He composed music for the TV documentary Two Childhoods, which was about Vice President Hubert Humphrey and writer James Baldwin, and won an Emmy Award for his work.

In 1980, Mottola began performing with Frank Sinatra, often in duets, appearing at Carnegie Hall and the White House. He retired from the music business in 1988 but kept playing at home almost every day.”

 

Edited June 11, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

Ain't misbehavin' (coincidentally)

I awoke today thinking of my father's favorite Fats Waller tune – one that Dad could replicate in Waller's signature 'stride' piano style – AIN'T MISBEHAVIN'. I remember my father enjoying Chet Atkins' solo rendition – in stride style but on his signature Gretsch 'Country Gentleman' electric guitar. From a 'mono' version of an album that Chet recorded in his basement studio in long ago 1957. Wonder if it's at YouTube? (what isn't? See below).

Hit the back one hour button at Siriusly Sinatra streaming on computer and it's Willie Nelson with my new favorite version of same. With an unforgettable instrumental introduction by a jazz piano trio. Which reminds us that . . .

Great arrangements (think Nelson Riddle) always have an unforgettable opening 'hook' – a clever 'counter-melody' that stays with you forever. Your ears perk up the moment you hear it again. Willie Nelson's jazz piano trio has that required catchy refrain, you may agree. Despite his advanced age, Willie Nelson lends an endearing credibility to the words of love:

I know for certain, 'The One I Love' ….
I'm through with flirtin' – it's YOU I'm dreamin' -of !
Ain't misbehavin',
I'm savin' my love for YOU!

Isn't this a classic photo? “Comments turned off” so . . . no one to talk with, I'm by myself . . .

Not just for finger-style guitarists? Chet was 33 or 34 when he created this gem which my piano-playing Dad enjoyed. You too? Mono black vinyl (you can hear a click when the stylus hits the record).

[Mark Blackburn]

ELLA – What is There to Say

“My heart's in a deadlock – I'd even face wedlock with you!”

Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio is playing Ella with latter-day London Symphony Orchestra accompaniment – dubbed in decades after her original recordings. The sound quality is wonderful – with Ella in perfect voice.

Just one version at YouTube, with “comments turned off” – so, what is there to say, and what is there to do, with folks like that!

What is there to say about the song itself? Not a word at Wikipedia. But I know this one as the 'other great song' composed by Vernon Duke and 'Yip' Harburg – the very same year (1934) as their big hit, “Autumn in New York.” Frank did the definitive version of that song, and recorded this one too. But maybe Ella does the best version of this overlooked gem.

It's track 10 on Ella's SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME album (2017). At the time of its release, an online reviewer in England noted that this album "pairs Ella's exquisite recordings (from 1950 to 1961) with brand new arrangements for the London Symphony Orchestra from Oscar and Grammy -winning arranger Jorge Calandrelli" who also "served as conductor for the symphony sessions that were recorded at Abbey Road Studios."

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA & VIOLA – Try a Little Tenderness

For only the second time on Siriusly Sinatra I'm hearing our favorite singer and another of his great guitarists, Al Viola – 'alone together' performing one of my Mom's favorites, TRY A LITTLE TENDERNESS. When I was still in a crib, Mom would sing me to sleep with this one: I can still imagine her coming from the kitchen in our apartment – wiping her hands on her apron, and singing it softly as a final lullaby to send me off to sleep. Mom would have loved hearing this version by Frank, playing at this moment on channel 71.

Search for this as a 'live' performance at YouTube and sure enough, here it is: “Live, from the Pyramids, Egypt 1979” (one more Sinatra CD that isn't among the 70+ I own: When was it released? I wasn't aware of its existence until Siriusly Sinatra played it a year or two ago -- and the senior wise man at Sinatra Family forum 'Bob in Boston' tracked it down. Thanks, to Bob and to Siriusly Sinatra's programmer, 'Jersey Lou' Simon.

Edited June 13, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA – Blues in the Night

“World-class music, on Sirius/XM, 'Siriusly Sinatra'” says 'The Voice' of Channel 71, just after we heard Frank's definitive version of a “song that should have won the Oscar” – according to the winner that year, Oscar Hammerstein II. Oscar, together with Jerome Kern, won the “Best Original Song” Academy Award that year with 'The Last Time I Saw Paris' – defeating Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer's BLUES IN THE NIGHT. “You were robbed” Hammerstein wrote in a three-word telegram to his friend Mercer.

From my favorite Sinatra album of 'torch' songs (“Sings for Only the Lonely”) one of the two tracks co-written by Johnny Mercer. Bet this was his favorite version too.

The first version at YouTube with “comments” including a favorite reflection from a kindred spirit.

tuxguys
2 years ago (edited)
(5/19/19) I can't believe that I heard this for the first time this morning, on WMVY... As much as I admire Arlen's and Mercer's work, together and separately, I always dismissed this tune as a "pseudo-Blues," usually sung by someone who had no idea of what the Blues was. When the perfect interpretation of a tune hits your ears, it can give you the experience of having heard a tune a thousand times before, and yet, when THAT performance hits you, you finally understand what the tune is all about. This happened to me this morning, and not just because of Francis Albert's prodigious vocal musicianship, but also because of Nelson Riddle's Impressionistic arrangement. This is more than a standard... This is more than Jazz singing... This is Art Song.

[Mark Blackburn]

Frank & Nelson's WEE SMALL HOURS (Take 2, years later)

There would have been a day in 1963 when Frank said to Nelson, "Let's record it again" -- 8 years after the original title track for his classic album, IN THE WEE SMALL HOURS. That later version is playing right now on Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio. Reminded of what Richard Carpenter said, on his Playing Favorites show: "I prefer this later version." Me too. For reasons I can't put into words. But then, the first upload at YouTube this day has a most recent comment that says it well.

John Ryan
1 year ago
I like the older [Frank] versions, like this one... more seasoned, more depth.

[Mark Blackburn]

Charlie Watts - If I Should Lose You

Google for “Charlie Watts Quintet – If I Should Lose You” (the song playing right this minute on Siriusly Sinatra satellite radio) -- the very first note, answers my perennial No. 1 question: Who wrote that song?

"Original versions of If I Should Lose You by Charlie Watts:
secondhandsongs.com › performance
If I Should Lose You by Charlie Watts was written by Leo Robin and Ralph Rainger. [and] Charlie Watts released it on the album Warm & Tender in 1993."

There's often a 'sweet' sound to an English orchestral arrangement – instantly identifiable to my ears -- which extends to the solos by individual musicians – in this case an alto sax virtuoso who performs a tasty musical bridge. I never was able to learn his name. Tracking down the vocalist was a chore I did just once, long ago; I believe he was an American (never identified in the Channel 71 'scroll').

We may surmise that this track is one of 'Jersey Lou' Simon's favorites from this (nearly 30 year old) labor of love from the ageless Rolling Stones' drummer (world's oldest active rock star, right?)

A pensive, poignant opening orchestral flourish by a fine arranger (still wondering who?)

“If I should lose you, the stars would fall from the sky
If I should lose you, the leaves would wither and die.
The birds in May time, would sing a mournful refrain,
and I would wander around, hating the sound of rain . . . ”

[Mark Blackburn]

ELLA - Call Me Darling

Ella is singing a song I can't recall ever hearing before right this minute, on Channel 71. Love the way in the opening stanza of this lyric, she turns the word “for” into a four-syllable phrase! As in . . .

Call me Darlin' – call me Sweetheart -- call me Dear . . .
Thrill me, Darlin' with the words I want to hear . . .

In your dark eyes – a-smilin' – a promise I see
but your two lips won't say, you care FOR me

Someday I may learn who wrote this song. In the meantime, is it at YouTube? Ah yes, the album with Ella and an RCA ribbon mic (they used two dozen of them for The Concert Sinatra). To this day, better bass than any other mic. But you knew that. Oh yes, and I thought I spotted the arranger, did you? Nelson Riddle's orchestra had a different sound with other great singers. His charts 'customized' to fit the artist.

[An official version with “comments turned off” so we won't actually "learn more" will we?]

[Mark Blackburn]

SINATRA - Night

“I've been in every kind of darkness, but for some reason, the night makes me nervous . . . ”

“NIGHT – Frank Sinatra” says the Siriusly Sinatra announcement streaming on my computer screen right now – with a graphic of the album cover, "SINATRA THE COMPLETE REPRISE STUDIO RECORDINGS."

Would love a quick link from Andrew T as to the 'personnel' for this recording (how big an orchestra, the where & when etc.) A gorgeous arrangement that could only be Don Costa with what sounds like an 18 or 20 piece string section. The melody is so beautiful and deserved a matching lyric from one of our heroes – The Bergmans, maybe! And not just the voice-over, spoken words of free verse poetry. Whose words these are I think I know, his house is in the village though …. and his name is just outside the reach of my failing memory.

Google the words “Sinatra, NIGHT, YouTube” and …. I get plenty of nuthin' …. How about you? It seems to me I've heard this song before. (I live my life in song titles, can you tell?)

Andrew T -- the youngest of the Wise Men at Sinatra Family Forum responded immediately with a link to this.

 

[Mark Blackburn]

'Deed they did (Sammy, Lester & Chester)

About 15 years ago, a guitarist friend of mine here in Canada suggest that we "really ought to drive down to NYC and see Les Paul" – at the 'Iridium' -- a mid-town club which Wiki recalls “opened in January 1994 at its original location, at 63rd Street and Central Park West, with a minimal cover charge.”

As I recall Les Paul played there Monday or Tuesday nights, each week for almost 15 years, right up until his death in August of 2009 at age 94.

Back when they were in their 60s, Les recorded an album of duets with his life-long friend Chet Atkins. My favorite track of theirs was DEED I DO – a song I never heard sung (never knew the lyric). As if to say, "Well, 'deed you should!" Siriusly Sinatra is playing Sammy Davis Jr.'s terrific vocal version (wonder where & when – and what's this from?).

Chester & Lester's instrumental version (below) but first, here's Sammy at the peak of his vocal powers, and a great old song you may never have heard-of.

From their Grammy-winning album of 1976. Les Paul, stage right, playing his signature Gibson solid-body electric, and in your left ear, 'Mr. Guitar' playing his (warmer-sounding) Gretsch Chet Atkins Country Gentleman. In this photo Chet is playing his latter day signature model Gibson acoutic-electric steel-string.  But you knew that. 

 

 

Edited June 17, 2021 by Mark Blackburn

[Mark Blackburn]

I see the next offering was their version of AVALON. If you can spare the six minutes it takes (two versions back to back).

After the first one ends (3:31) Chet asks Les to “Come over here” and says, “You know I've known you a long time and admired you very much, but you're playin' the damn thing wrong; you gotta play it a little faster.” [And so they do!] Les at the close: "Why don't we play something pretty .... do you know Ave Maria?"