No, she wasn’t a smooth jazz artist, but her father was a member of a boy band that was dominant in the '80s and '90s, and her mother was powerful songstress who crossed genres (including Smooth Jazz) with stunning ease. When Whitney Houston sang, we all held our breath and got goose bumps from the high notes.
We’ve watched Bobbi Kristina her entire all-too-short life. I remember Whitney bringing her onstage as a toddler, getting her a chair and singing the rest of the performance to little Bobbi Kristina. Then there was the inside look at the entire family, the reality show called Being Bobbie Brown. To me it ended up being more about Bobbi Kristina and Whitney than about Mr. Brown.
Her mother died a tragic death, very similar to the one she experienced. Almost three years to the date of Whitney’s accidental drowning in her bathtub in the Beverly Hills Hilton on Grammy weekend, Bobbi Kristina’s sad accident is even more tragic.
She never got to show us what she could do with her voice or her life, but I believe that now she is in the arms of her mother. Peace be with them both.
I sure hope Bill Cochran (above) enjoys being the inspiration for this one. His show is a foodie's dream!
Early Sunday morning I found myself wandering around. I saw Boney James and Rick Braun jamming atop a make-shift stage fashioned from wooden crates marked Salt Peanuts while Dizzy Gillespie stood offstage waiting his turn. I wondered why they weren’t all Grazing in the Grass with me. But suddenly I heard Come And Get It, so I headed for the pavilion where Fattburger was Sizzlin with All Natural Ingredients. They were definitely On a Roll. The smell of Green Onions made me turn around. There was Booker T and the MG’s stirring up big pots of Red Beans And Rice.
Before I could get close enough to ask for an autograph, a group of children ran past me waving handfuls of Michael Franks’ Popsicle Toes! Shaking my head, I wondered why their mothers hadn’t given them his Eggplant instead or even a good serving of Ray Charles’ Stringbean.
Passing a gleaming white door, Diana Krall said Peel Me A Grape to Cab Calloway. Always the gentleman, he flashed her his trademark smile and said Everyone Eats At My House. Swinging the door open, I could see Louis Armstrong Struttin with Some Barbeque toward a table covered with a blue and white checkered cloth. Behind that table stood Nat King Cole’s Swingers spreading Frim Fram Sauce on plates of Kelsey Grammer’s Tossed Salad and Scrambled Eggs.
Moving into the living room, I saw Frank Sinatra sitting behind a big, low table on elegant leather couch. He was singing The Coffee Song as he added a heaping dab of Herb Alpert’s Whipped Cream to his cup. Myself, I opted for a mug of Santana’s rich Black Coffee which I spiced up with Herb’s Taste of Honey. Sipping my jazzy concoction, I noticed Gregory Porter pouring some of his Liquid Spirit into a crystal tumbler before disappearing into a music room filled with all white instruments.
After my coffee was gone, I decided to walk through the gleaming all white house that Cab built. That’s when I found that it wasn’t just men in the smooth jazz kitchen. Patti Austin was standing by a stainless steel stove with an apron over a black ball gown crooning I Can Cook, Too. Patti LaBelle came marching through, dressed as Lady Marmalade, preparing to go strutting her stuff on the street. Billie Holiday and John Lennon were talking about some Strange Fruit that she had found growing at the edge of his property, Strawberry Fields Forever. As they debated the meaning of it, the girls of Manhattan Transfer were putting the final splashes of Spice of Life into their Soul Food To Go, being sure to include a few packets of Mindi Abair’s new Haute Sauce with each order.
Standing there watching everything was Herbie Hancock, who, when he saw me said, “I’ve been waiting for you! Come one, let’s go to Cantaloupe Island.”
Mesmerized, I linked arms with him and just as I was about to ask him about Rocket Man, I promptly woke up on my couch!
Note to self: Got to go easy on the bubbly and sardine sandwiches while listening to the Dinner Party!
It’s not something I like remembering. A day when people who hated us so much decided that they would kill a great number of us on our own soil and put a hole in the heart of a great city, New York. Not good. Not nice. I won’t regale you with the details of that event. We all know most of them far too well, even after thirteen years.
Where I will go is into the land of patriotic songs. On the 200th anniversary of the event that produced our National Anthem, I want to liken it to jazz. It’s a hybrid of music, like jazz. The tune of the Star Spangled Banner is an old English drinking song written by a group of amateur musicians in London that was fitted with lyrics that Francis Scott Key wrote as a poem while he was on sequestered on a ship in Baltimore harbor during the bombardment of Fort McHenry, September 13th, 1814. (What is it about September that makes people attack us?)
It’s quintessentially American, like jazz, because it’s been around in our collective consciousness for a long time. The Navy adopted it in 1889 as an official patriotic song and Woodrow Wilson used it in 1916 for official events; however, it was not adopted as the National Anthem until 1931 by an act of Congress.
Like jazz, the song struck a chord in the nation’s heart and persisted although it is notoriously hard to sing because of its octave and a fifth range. After Jose Feliciano did a blues-style rendition of the song for the fifth game of the 1968 World Series, many musicians have made many variations. The most notable ones are the 1983 Marvin Gaye opening for the NBA All-Star Game and Whitney Houston’s 1991 Super Bowl XXV version. Whitney’s was released as a single and charted to 20 that year and was re-released in 2001 when it rose to number 6. With Jose, those are the only times the anthem has hit the Billboard Hot 100.
To this day, the folks in Baltimore live up to the lyric, “And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there." In the National Museum of American History, the original 15 star, 15 stripe banner is still on display. Although we sing only the first stanza, the lyrics from the end of the second stanza are a perfect ending for this piece. Come on, hum them with me. You know the tune!
“'Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave, O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.”
Most love songs are sung to a person who welcomes the attention, who gives back the affection and who wants to be with the singer/artist. But in the real world, this isn’t always the case. Sometimes love is one way, with only the singer being the one aware of the situation.
The first time I heard a song about love that wasn’t returned was in 1964. The Girl From Ipanema" defined unrequited love for me. "When she passes, I smile but she doesn't see, she just doesn't see." Originally called “Menina que Passa” (“The Girl Who Passes By”), it was conceived as a part of a musical comedy about a Martian who lands in the middle of Brazil’s carnival and becomes obsessed by a girl in a bikini. The rest of the music faded into obscurity when the musical didn’t get produced while this beautiful bossa nova became an international sensation, overpowering two Beatles songs in the process. Although it rose just to number five on the charts, it passed the Beatles "I Want To Hold Your Hand" and then went on to become the most recorded song ever, edging out Paul McCartney’s "Yesterday." To me, the thing that makes it so haunting is Astrud Gilberto’s accented English and the gender flip. She is singing lyrics that are clearly for a man. At first I thought that the singer/songwriter was so shy that he had to get someone else to sing it for him. No so. She was chosen because she was the only one in the studio who had enough fluency in English to make it sound right. Otherwise, her husband Joao Gilberto, would have been the singer and it would have been done totally in Portuguese.
Another 1964 hit was "Going Out Of My Head" by Little Anthony and the Imperials. In it, Little Anthony croons that he is being driven mad because "I see you each morning, but you just walk past me, you don't even know that I exist." Although it was written by Bobby Randazzo, a childhood friend of the band, especially for them, it was quickly covered and made jazzy by Wes Montgomery the following year. Since then, it has been embraced by jazz artists from Ella Fitzgerald to Ramsey Lewis to Frank Sinatra to Luther Vandross.
"My Cherie Amour" hit big in 1969 for Stevie Wonder. Originally written for a girlfriend he had in school, the tune's upbeat message speaks to the sweetness of new love. However, he modified the lyrics after their breakup. Keeping the melody but removing her name and generalizing the object of his affection in French, he laments that she isn’t paying him any attention, "I've been near you, but you never noticed me." It’s been covered by Anita Baker, Quincy Jones, Minnie Ripperton and Ramsey Lewis.
"Just My Imagination" done by the Temptations was a sledge hammer in a velvet glove when it was released in 1971. The first line says "Each day through my window I watch her as she passes by," while at the end of the same stanza he admits that "But in reality, she doesn't even know me." Next, the chorus clearly states that he is in deep trouble because "it’s just my imagination running away with me." Then the song goes on to tell of his dreams, "A cozy little home out in the country with two children, maybe three." Poor guy! It was done as a nod to the ballads that the Temps did back in the 1960s. As a departure from the psychedelic sound they were recording at that time, they didn’t have much hope for it, but it hit big. Later it was covered by Larry Carlton, Booker T and the MG’s, Babyface and Gwyneth Paltrow, Euge Groove and Peter White, just to name a few of the smooth jazzers.
Roberta Flack’s 1973 hit "Killing Me Softly’"qualifies as unrequited love because the lyric "He sang as if he knew me in all my dark despair, then he looked right through me as if I wasn't there" sums it up nicely. I find that in all these songs it’s the recurring idea, someone looking right at you but not seeing you. And I appreciate this one because it isn’t done in the gender flip mode. It was written for a woman, sung by a woman owing the feeling she is having.
The ever enigmatic Earth Wind and Fire may have written one for us in 1975 called "Reasons." The line "I'm in the wrong place to be real, I'm longing to love you, just for a night" makes me suspect that it is. But with most of their lyrics, I am never sure.
In 1984 Luther Vandross gender flipped the Carpenters 1971’s hit – "Superstar" (Long ago and oh so far away), which was a song about the relationship between a groupie and a rock star. The performer has moved on, and she is left with only his song on the radio to cling to. Hitting the number two slot on the charts, held out of first place by Rod Stewart’s "Maggie Mae," it was originally recorded in 1970 by Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs and Englishmen Revue on their Live album. It helped propel Rita Coolidge from backup singer to soloist. Yet, it didn’t even hit the charts until Richard Carpenter changed one line of the lyric. Hearing the then up and coming Bette Midler sing it on the Tonight show, Richard decided to reduce the risqué factor by changing one line. "I can hardly wait to sleep with you again" turned into "I can hardly wait to be with you again" with the songwriter's permission, and it got plenty of air time across the country. Luther’s version makes me wonder which female superstar he was referring when he sang "Your guitar, it sounds so sweet and clear, but you're not really here, it's just the radio." Could he be referring to Traci Chapman or Joyce Cooling or Sheryl Crow? Sadly, we’ll never know.
And Lionel Ritchie did a smooth job with his unrequited love song "‘Hello" in 1984. From the first words, we know that this man has it bad and he even admits that it is a one way street by saying "I've been alone with you inside my mind." But he’s hopeful because he asks the musical question "Hello! Is it me you're looking for?" as the chorus. Ten years later Luther Vandross worked his magic on it to make it even smoother on his album, Songs.
Now, after all this musical game of Loves-me,Loves-me-not, the only thing I can think to do is to take the advice of Crosby, Stills and Nash. "Don't be angry, don't be sad, Don't sit crying over good times you've had . . . Sometimes you can't be with the one you love, honey, so love the one you're with!"
TUESDAY REWIND: Today’s sun-fueled temps have put us all in a great mood here at The Sounds of Brazil, so I thought we’d celebrate with a song from this week’s playlist (www.connectbrazil.com), courtesy of bassist Wayman Tisdale. Take a Brazilian break! (Scott Adams)
Isn’t it just amazing how ‘smooth’ stays with us? And while the world of radio is always changing, it remains one of the most intimate ways of making musical connections. That's one of the things I love the most about it.
We’re all learning how important those connections are these days, and the value of the relationships that our smooth format continues to grow – even after 25 years. And while our favorite radio sounds are currently on hiatus, I can’t help but think that there’s still more to come.
So first, thank you so much for all of your messages: the past weeks have been absolutely amazing with your thoughts, questions and words of support. They are a testament to the power of the music we love and the role it plays in our daily lives.
Happily, The Sounds of Brazil hasn’t lost a step: We’ve been streaming the show since 2000 in crystal clear digital and you can enjoy it anytime, anywhere – we have apps for that!
We’re ‘Crossing Borders’ and celebrating birthdays with Bebel Gilberto and Tania Maria this week, and there’s a rare peek into the birth of Bossa Nova when our Brazilian Minute captures the story of Carlos Lyra. Plus Jorge Vercilo and sax great Leo Gandelman with our video of the week when you dive into our webstream 24/7 at www.connectbrazil.com
You’re more than welcome to stop by anytime, and I hope you will. You’ll see me here frequently, too - along with Rick O'Dell, Loni Taylor, Bill Cochran and Alicia - and I’ll be sure to post a ‘Tuesday Rewind’ every week – so we can look forward to sharing a smile – and a song! (Scott Adams)
