Too Marvellous for Words (2)
Posted in Jazz, Popular Song on Jul 13th, 2009 No Comments »
I posted earlier Frank Sinatra’s recording of this great popular song, by Johnny Mercer and Richard Whiting. Sinatra’s version was recorded in 1956 for his classic ‘Songs for Swinging Lovers’. As I have said elsewhere, the song fits him like a glove. He presents the song with a suave mastery in a voice of cool velvet. Cool too in the deft, offhand manner he throws off the lyrics. But I have my reservations about Sinatra’s rendition, not for any lack of musicality on his part, but because he fails to do justice to the sentiments behind the words. The words are subservient to his masterly vocalisation. The words express love, but love doesn’t inhabit Sinatra’s calm command.
Here is another version, by Billie Holiday, recorded two years earlier. She cannot match Sinatra’s vocal command. Her voice is shot, its range restricted, her breath control poor, a voice, a rasp almost, at the end of its tether. She never had a shred of Sinatra’s discipline. But she sings it as if she means it, as if speaking directly to her lover, telling him what she feels about him, offering her feelings, how much he means to her. There are no false accents, as there are in Sinatra’s, done solely for musical effect. She pays the words respect and attention. She sings the words as she might speak them - and it works. It is a human confession of love.
Words matter.
