"Each day is Valentine's Day"
Okay, not really, not for most of us. But today is Valentine's Day! So here's "My Funny Valentine," by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, sung by Judy Blazer:
Video posted by New World Records
You'll note that I chose to use a version sung by a woman, even though the Frank Sinatra and Chet Baker covers are probably the most well-known. That's because the song was written for the Broadway musical Babes in Arms, in which it was sung by a young woman about her new boyfriend, a young man named--wait for it--Valentine. The lyrics, it seems to me, make a lot more sense when you consider that they are describing a boy, and one whom the singer considers hopelessly naive and idealistic--a dope, to her way of thinking. Not that it's not a lovely, romantic song on its own because it is, ruefully expressing the impossibility of explaining even to yourself why people love who they love.
***
As suggested above, Babes in Arms was written by the songwriting and Broadway musical team of Rodgers and Hart, one of a staggering array of stage and film musicals (and over 500 songs) they worked on together. You definitely will recognize any number of their famously witty, sophisticated songs: "Manhattan", "Isn't it Romantic" (if you want to skip to the part you'll recognize, start at about 0:43), "Blue Moon", "The Lady is a Tramp" (also from Babes in Arms, and sung by a girl who was a Depression-era hobo--a literal "tramp," which is what the lyric actually is talking about!), "Falling in Love with Love" (a Rodgers waltz), "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered".... A YouTube dive after Rodgers and Hart songs will keep you occupied for more than a few hours! And both these men were Jewish.
Richard Rodgers (whose father, a physician, changed his last name to Rodgers from Abrahams) was not just "a composer". Partnering first with Lorenz Hart and later with Oscar Hammerstein II--and not forgetting the solo work he did--he was one of the people most instrumental for bringing the Broadway musical from musical comedy revue to musical play.
With Hart, he not only produced the many standards referenced above but the team also started moving shows toward integrating plot and music, basing musicals on Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (A Connecticut Yankee) and Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors (The Boys from Syracuse). They also brought in dance in a more serious way than was common at the time--Balanchine choreographed several of their shows--and with Pal Joey they brought to Broadway a show which was strikingly dark in tone and theme and which starred an unlikeable anti-hero. Of course, Rodgers' first show with Hammerstein, Oklahoma!, is famously groundbreaking in bringing all those strands--coherent plot, dance used to progress the plot, darker plot elements--together in what is called the first fully integrated musical.* The plays they wrote together as well as those they produced solidified the revolution in the form.
Rodgers is also one of only two people so far to be a PEGOT winner, having collected two Pulitzers (for Oklahoma! and South Pacific), an Emmy (for the score to "Winston Churchill - The Valiant Years"), two Grammys (Best Cast Album for both The Sound of Music and No Strings), an Oscar (Best Original Song for "It Might as Well be Spring"), and seven Tonys for four Broadway shows (South Pacific, The King and I, The Sound of Music, and No Strings) plus two more special Tonys, just to round things out.
Lorenz or Larry Hart was likewise Jewish. He and Rodgers met at Columbia University, and that's when their more than 20-year partnership began. His lyrics were and are famed for their emotional and technical sophistication, full of timely references and timeless emotions as well as verbal gymnastics and internal rhymes. But Hart suffered from depression and alcoholism, and
Rodgers found it difficult to keep working with Hart due to Hart's increasingly erratic behavior--for the last few shows they worked on together, Rodgers had to more or less kidnap his partner and force him to stay in a hotel room until he produced the lyrics needed for their current project. Despite that, Rodgers didn't start working with Hammerstein until Hart declined to work on the show that eventually became Oklahoma!, and he and Hart worked together on a revival of A Connecticut Yankee after Oklahoma! came out. Tragically, Hart disappeared after the opening of that last show, and was found unconscious in a hotel room a couple of days later; rushed to a hospital, he died a few days later.
But the songs remain, and they remain as fresh and relevant as ever.
_____
* Yes, there was Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's Show Boat. So far as I can tell the main difference between the groundbreaking-ness of Show Boat and Oklahoma! is that Show Boat was admired, but no one else changed the kind of show they were putting on, and Oklahoma! was admired and everyone else started writing what they then called book musicals.
Another thing both shows notably had in common was the lyricist and book writer--but today we aren't talking about Hammerstein, so that is a discussion for another day.
You'll note that I chose to use a version sung by a woman, even though the Frank Sinatra and Chet Baker covers are probably the most well-known. That's because the song was written for the Broadway musical Babes in Arms, in which it was sung by a young woman about her new boyfriend, a young man named--wait for it--Valentine. The lyrics, it seems to me, make a lot more sense when you consider that they are describing a boy, and one whom the singer considers hopelessly naive and idealistic--a dope, to her way of thinking. Not that it's not a lovely, romantic song on its own because it is, ruefully expressing the impossibility of explaining even to yourself why people love who they love.
As suggested above, Babes in Arms was written by the songwriting and Broadway musical team of Rodgers and Hart, one of a staggering array of stage and film musicals (and over 500 songs) they worked on together. You definitely will recognize any number of their famously witty, sophisticated songs: "Manhattan", "Isn't it Romantic" (if you want to skip to the part you'll recognize, start at about 0:43), "Blue Moon", "The Lady is a Tramp" (also from Babes in Arms, and sung by a girl who was a Depression-era hobo--a literal "tramp," which is what the lyric actually is talking about!), "Falling in Love with Love" (a Rodgers waltz), "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered".... A YouTube dive after Rodgers and Hart songs will keep you occupied for more than a few hours! And both these men were Jewish.
Richard Rodgers (whose father, a physician, changed his last name to Rodgers from Abrahams) was not just "a composer". Partnering first with Lorenz Hart and later with Oscar Hammerstein II--and not forgetting the solo work he did--he was one of the people most instrumental for bringing the Broadway musical from musical comedy revue to musical play.
With Hart, he not only produced the many standards referenced above but the team also started moving shows toward integrating plot and music, basing musicals on Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (A Connecticut Yankee) and Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors (The Boys from Syracuse). They also brought in dance in a more serious way than was common at the time--Balanchine choreographed several of their shows--and with Pal Joey they brought to Broadway a show which was strikingly dark in tone and theme and which starred an unlikeable anti-hero. Of course, Rodgers' first show with Hammerstein, Oklahoma!, is famously groundbreaking in bringing all those strands--coherent plot, dance used to progress the plot, darker plot elements--together in what is called the first fully integrated musical.* The plays they wrote together as well as those they produced solidified the revolution in the form.
Rodgers is also one of only two people so far to be a PEGOT winner, having collected two Pulitzers (for Oklahoma! and South Pacific), an Emmy (for the score to "Winston Churchill - The Valiant Years"), two Grammys (Best Cast Album for both The Sound of Music and No Strings), an Oscar (Best Original Song for "It Might as Well be Spring"), and seven Tonys for four Broadway shows (South Pacific, The King and I, The Sound of Music, and No Strings) plus two more special Tonys, just to round things out.
Lorenz or Larry Hart was likewise Jewish. He and Rodgers met at Columbia University, and that's when their more than 20-year partnership began. His lyrics were and are famed for their emotional and technical sophistication, full of timely references and timeless emotions as well as verbal gymnastics and internal rhymes. But Hart suffered from depression and alcoholism, and
Many of his lyrics were the confessional outpourings of a hopeless romantic who loathed his own body. By all accounts, Hart, who stood just under five feet tall and wreathed himself in cigar smoke, saw himself as an undesirable freak. Homosexual in the era of the closet, he pursued a secretive and tormented erotic life of which only hints appear in his songs. (NYT, 1995)
Rodgers found it difficult to keep working with Hart due to Hart's increasingly erratic behavior--for the last few shows they worked on together, Rodgers had to more or less kidnap his partner and force him to stay in a hotel room until he produced the lyrics needed for their current project. Despite that, Rodgers didn't start working with Hammerstein until Hart declined to work on the show that eventually became Oklahoma!, and he and Hart worked together on a revival of A Connecticut Yankee after Oklahoma! came out. Tragically, Hart disappeared after the opening of that last show, and was found unconscious in a hotel room a couple of days later; rushed to a hospital, he died a few days later.
But the songs remain, and they remain as fresh and relevant as ever.
_____
* Yes, there was Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's Show Boat. So far as I can tell the main difference between the groundbreaking-ness of Show Boat and Oklahoma! is that Show Boat was admired, but no one else changed the kind of show they were putting on, and Oklahoma! was admired and everyone else started writing what they then called book musicals.
Another thing both shows notably had in common was the lyricist and book writer--but today we aren't talking about Hammerstein, so that is a discussion for another day.
Good to have the explanation.
ReplyDeleteSongs written for shows are often even cleverer in context, I think.
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