Arlen and Mercer-A Marriage Made in Songwriting Heaven: In 1941, Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer first collaborated on " Blues In The Night" from the movie of the same name. Both were professional singers and were equally addicted to the world of jazz and blues. Alec Wilder revealed that it was their " Love of the lonely and sentimental, the witty and the warm and the bittersweet, all parts of the ethos of popular music, that tended to make them work together like a single mind."
In the 1943 movie " The Sys The Limit" Arlen and Mercer wrote two memorable songs for Fred Astaire. The first was " My Shining Hour" , a pure hymn-like melody much like earlier songs written by Jerome Kern ( They Didn't Believe Me" " Till The Clouds Roll By" etc.
In a 2006 Live Concert, Barbra Streisand honours the simple but evocative melody by omitting any vocal histrionics and embraces the tender emotionality of Mercer's lyrics. NOTE: Early in her career, Streisand sang with Arlen and she continues to show her affinity for his music in recordings like " "Come Rain or Come Shine " another Arlen/Mercer collaboration from " St. Louis Woman."
PERFORMANCE LINK: http://youtu.be/V03hG81ESXM
From the same movie" The Sky's The Limit" Arlen and Mercer wrote " One More For My Baby ( And One More For The Road") . Astaire sang it an an angry up-tempo fashion, dancing wildly and ends up smashing the bar room mirror.
But it's Sinatra's definitive interpretation while slightly inebriated that allows him to recount his woes to the lonely bartender.
This is a live television version and more intense than his classic 1958 recording on Capitol's "Only The Lonely". It is Sinatra's ability to feel and re enact the essence of Mercer's lyrics that marks his unique interpretive art.
PERFORMANCE LINK: http://youtu.be/SSWrNfqjDBE
No comments:
Post a Comment