Melodic Mastery of Richard Rodgers " He Was Too Good to Me." There is general agreement that America's masters of the " pure melodic line" are Jerome Kern and Richard Rodgers. Both came from a middle class Germanic family background which may account for their more educated training and formal melodic creations. Others like George Gershwin,Irving Berlin and Harold Arlen came from poor Eastern European immigrant families which may account for their more vigorous syncopation and jazz influenced writing. Rodgers was particularly adept at step-wise writing where he would start with just a few notes, relatively close together and then create a wider melodic arc generating additional drama and tension . A perfect example is " He Was Too Good To Me" with lyrics by Lorenz Hart for a 1930's show " Simple Simon"
A rather rueful verse introduces the singer's lament of how she ended up losing her one great love even though she acknowledges, throughout the main section, how wonderfully he treated her.
The final line ends sadly with " He Was Too Good -------To Be True."
Carly Simon provides a very respectful and heartfelt rendition made even more personal because her family and the Rodgers Family were quite good friends in NY Café Society. Her father founded the publishing firm of Simon & Shuster
LINK: .
http://youtu.be/EKD0Xk6aBuc
No comments:
Post a Comment