Chicago Smooth

Goodbye, March

"Out like a lamb" is the end of the saying about the month of March. So, I asked Rick O'Dell if he knew any jazz songs that had lambs in them.  He replied no and asked me if I really thought March was going to go out gently.  Not realizing what a weather prophet he is, I went on a search for a jazzy lamb, hoping that IF I found one, the snow and cold would go away. 

Finding a lamb in jazz is like finding a needle in a haystack, but I did it.  There is a composer in Britain named Bob Chilcott, who used five of William Blake’s poems to create a suite called Jazz Songs of Innocence.  "The Lamb" is a ballad of two stanzas.  The first one asks the creature who created it and the second answers by telling the lamb that his creator calls himself a lamb.

I could find it performed only by high school or college choirs, which makes it hard to appreciate. Most of the recordings are done by proud parents sitting in balconies, surrounded by coughing strangers and fidgeting children. The best one on YouTube is a recorded rehearsal at Ohio State University. You have to ignore the professor’s admonishments, the boring camera angle and two false starts before they get down to the business of the song. Trust me, it’s not worth the trouble.

Fast forward to the shock of the first day of spring when we had a full on Chicago style snowstorm! Spending the day huddled in a warm woolen sweater, I began to wonder if that was what they meant when it was said March goes out like a lamb!

~Lydia Barnes ([email protected])

Our Smooth Video of the Day:  A familiar voice brings us a breath of spring.

 

$7.3 Million History Lesson

You've got to know your history! 

A grandfatherly man told me that when I was young.  He was emphatic, and as I have moved through life, I’ve learned what he meant.

It is my biggest beef with the singers who try out for American Idol.  Many of the contestants show they have very little musical background by the song choices they make.  In the auditions, I know hundreds of singers fail to make the cut, because how many times can you hear a song done badly and not call it torture?  I tip my hat to the people who are the initial screeners. I’m sure they earn every penny for every bad note they hear.  

Speaking of pennies, look at how much money Williams, Thicke and TI would have saved if they had first gotten permission from the family of Marvin Gaye.  Let me say I really love Pharrell Williams and I like Robin Thicke and rapper TI.  But they prove the point that I try to address with my some of my blog entries:  history matters. 

They have been ordered by the court to pay nearly half the proceeds that their song has made or a dollar for each copy of song that was sold.  And let’s not even speculate as to what the lawyers have cost them.  

Myself, I would have done like Sam Smith and Tom Petty and settled out of court.  When you listen to "Got to Give It Up," you hear a ten minute cut consisting of a fifty-one second repeating melody done with soft singing in the background.  The repeating bass lick is rounded out by piano, drum and cowbell, recorded as if at a party.  Ditto for "Blurred Lines."  Even the subject matter is the same, getting rid of shyness and getting down to the business of sex.  Written decades apart and from a different point of view, when you boil it down lyrically,  Marvin is trying to convince himself to be bold, whereas Robin and Company are trying to convince a girl she should be.

So, when I reach back a few decades and get inspired for a blog post, bear with me.  I didn’t know that I was a frustrated jazz historian until they started handing out all this money for copying songs from their previous owners.   Budding artists take note, I’m available for hire.

~Lydia Barnes ([email protected])

Our Smooth Video of the Day:  Listen for yourself in this "Blurred Lines"/"Got to Give It Up" mashup.

 

Fever - Spring and Otherwise

Bright skies and warmer weather bring something called Spring Fever.  It’s a condition of the mind which causes you to crave moonlight walks, warm embraces, soft songs and a deep gaze into someone’s eyes.  This malady can be traced way back, but I want to take you back to a jazzy origin.

When the first Grammy awards were held in 1959, one of the first songs to be nominated was Peggy Lee’s cover of Little Willie John’s song "Fever."  It was placed in the categories of Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Female Vocal Performance.

Miss Peggy was the female version of cool.  Blonde, with a beauty mark near her mouth, her elegant wardrobe and flawless makeup exuded sophistication.  At the beginning of "Fever," her fingers snap, setting the tempo that leads into one of the best introductory bass licks ever.  The trumpet solo adds heat to her sexy low growl.  In the middle of the song, there are history stanzas about two famous couples, Romeo and Juliet done in Elizabethan rhyme, Captain Smith and Pocahontas, complete with a double entendre of “Daddy-O, don’t you dare” and a scientific nod to temperature.  It’s all Miss Peggy. She wrote those stanzas to replace ones that she didn’t think fit her style and image from the original song. Her version has been covered by Elvis, Ella Fitzgerald, Buddy Guy, Michael Buble, Madonna and Beyonce. 

Born in North Dakota in 1920, Norma Delores Engstrom was half Norwegian and half Swedish. She was renamed by the announcer when she sang live for a Fargo radio broadcast during her high school years. At 17, she left home, headed for California.  While singing in a Palm Beach Hotel, she was offered a job at the Buttery Room in the Ambassador East Hotel, here in Chicago.  That’s where she was seen by Benny Goodman and became his band singer for two year, until she married band guitarist Dave Bourbon. Since band rules said no married couples, they both quit.   

But she didn’t stop performing because of marriage.  Her solo career soared. She even worked to make Disney sexy.  She was the motivating force behind the movie Lady and the Tramp.  She voiced Darling, the wife, Peg, the dog and the two Siamese cats, Si and Am.  She co-wrote lyrics for the five of the six songs in the movie. She performed "La La Lu," "He’s a Tramp" and "The Siamese Cat Song," where she recorded two tracks to perform both cat voices. 

Through her sixty year career and four husbands, she kept the heat turned up. Working on writing, acting and performing through the late 1990s, she even inspired the Muppets' brassy, bossy Miss Piggy. Champagne and chocolate anyone?

~Lydia Barnes ([email protected])

Welcome March

The old saying about the weather is that March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.  I’ve spent a few days thinking, in jazz, who is the lion and who is the lamb? 

I went to Google to find out.  I put in Jazz Lion.  I got back Gregory Porter’s song "Be Good (Lion's Song)." That was not what I was expecting.  I thought I would get something by Sun Ra, the Last Poets, Osibisa, Earth, Wind and Fire or the group War.  I was positive that Bob Marley had done something about the Lion of Judah, Haile Selassie.  But nothing like that came up. 

And just as well.  I dug a little deeper, perusing Sun Ra. His record label was called Black Lion, and on it he had a song called "When There is No Sun."  Since that has been what we have been living through most of January and February, I gave it a listen.  It’s a wonderful jazz piece, but after what we have lived through, it only prolonged the agony.

So I went to Gregory Porter’s video. His butterscotch voice sings about being a lion in a cage who watches a lady named Be Good dance around him. It’s enchanting.  The jazzy waltz has nonsense lyrics, but it has everything to make your day better.  Thanks Gregory, for making the lion of March a gentle creature that I could get used to dancing around. 

~Lydia Barnes ([email protected])

Our Smooth Video of the Day--by Gregory Porter: