Fabulous Friday: "Body and Soul"
- ladiesvoices
- 4 hours ago
- 1 min read
Today I'm doing one of my song-in-review features only instead of different recordings of the same song I'm giving you a progression of the same song.
The song is one of the great jazz standards, "Body and Soul," music by Johnny Green and lyrics by Edward Heyman, Robert Sour and Frank Eyton. I was shocked to go to Wikipedia and see that it was written for English actress Gertrude Lawrence, favorite of Noel Coward and creator of Anna in The King and I. Not who I expected to be the first person to sing this bluesy number.
The first person I heard sing it was Ella Fitzgerald, on a tape I bought when I went to college. Here she is singing it on some TV special, introduced by her biggest fan, Frank Sinatra:
Pretty soon I heard it in the Manhattan Transfer recording but I'll save that for last. The Manhattan Transfer recording has its origins in this sublime recording by saxophone player Coleman Hawkins:
Jazz singer Eddie Jefferson took the Hawkins recording and put words to it. Sometimes the words are a little goofy - - a melodic melody, is that little twee? But I do love the lyric, "The doors have not been always open." Indeed.
And Manhattan Transfer took the Eddie Jefferson version, had someone make a delicious four-part arrangement, and changed the words to add bits about Jefferson. I really love how elaborate the vocal arrangement is - - most often in four parts, but sometimes in unison or in two parts, thrillingly breaking into four parts. And I really love the soprano's high notes at the end.
Comments