Wild is the Wind (1956)

Tiomkin/Washington

For we're like creatures of the wind

And wild is the wind. . .
Wild is my heart for you

Dimitri Tiomkin, born in Russia, was well-known for composing the music for some of the biggest Western films in the 1940s and 1950s; he was nominated for Best Score over twenty times.  Classically trained in Moscow, his melodies are known for their emotional moodiness, alluding to both the vast emptiness of the West and the inner soul. Ned Washington, best known for composing the lyrics to When You Wish Upon a Star, was a frequent collaborator.  Three very different singers - Johnny Mathis, Nina Simone and David Bowie - all had a hit with this song; were they drawn to the words, the melody, or the idea? Johnny Mathis sang it first as the opening song for the movie of the same name. Of the three great singers who did this, I think Nina Simone owns it. What do you think?

Love me, love me, say you do

Let me fly away with you

For my love is like the wind

And wild is the wind

Wild is the wind

Give me more than one caress

Satisfy this hungriness

Let the wind blow through your heart

For wild is the wind 

Wild is the wind

You . . . touch me
I hear the sound of mandolins

You . . . kiss me    
With your kiss my life begins

You're spring to me    
All things to me

Don't you know - you're life itself!

Like the leaf clings to the tree,

Oh, my darling, cling to me

For we're like creatures of the wind

And wild is the wind    
Wild is the wind
Wild is my heart for you

Lush Life (1938)

Strayhorn

"So I'll live a lush life in some small dive

And there I'll be, while I rot with the rest

Of those whose lives are lonely too"

Billy Strayhorn. His name can't be brought up without mentioning that of Duke Ellington: the two were bound together in work and life. Ellington "kept" Billy, in an apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, blocks from his own. Billy was gay, shy and desperately unhappy; Ellington was his opposite. This is a one of the saddest and most difficult songs to sing or play. Strayhorn wrote the song while still a teenager and it remains elusive to the most seasoned interpreters. Frank Sinatra tried and never came up with something he liked.  Ella Fitzgerald (accompanied by Duke Ellington),  Johnny Hartman, and John Coltrane (without the lyrics) all have versions. Yet the lyrics are especially important in this song: they stand on their own as poetry.  And here is Billy, doing it himself (as well as accompanying himself on piano.) I hope he found peace away from the "wheel of life."

I used to visit all the very gay places

Those come-what-may places

Where one relaxes on the axis of the wheel of life

To get the feel of life

From jazz and cocktails

The girls I knew had sad and sullen gray faces

With distingue traces

That used to be there

You could see where they'd been washed away

By too many through the day

Twelve-o'clock tails

Then you came along with your siren song

To tempt me to madness

I thought for awhile that your poignant smile

Was tinged with the sadness

Of a great love for me

Ah yes, I was wrong

Again, I was wrong

Life is lonely again

And only last year

Everything seemed so sure

Now life is awful again

A trough full of hearts could only be a bore

A week in Paris could ease the bite of it

All I care is to smile in spite of it

I'll forget you, I will
While yet you are still

Burning inside my brain

Romance is mush

Stifling those who strive

So I'll live a lush life in some small dive

And there I'll be, while I rot with the rest

Of those whose lives are lonely too

There Will Never Be Another You (1942)

Gordon/Warren



There will be other songs to sing,
another Fall, another Spring,
But there will never be another you."

This first post is dedicated to the great Max Roach, who was a neighbor in our building and a friend. Attending his memorial service at the Riverside Church, the magnitude of the crowd in and waiting outside the church underlined again how significant Max was to the world, both as musician and human rights activist. Jimmy Heath played an saxophone solo of this song at the service. How true.

LYRICS
There will be many other nights like this
And I'll be standing here with someone new
There will be other songs to sing,
another Fall, another Spring
But there will never be another you

There will be other lips that I may kiss
But they won't thrill me like yours used to do
I may dream a million dreams but
how can they come true
If there will never ever be another you