Skylark (1941)

Mercer/Carmichael

And in your lonely flight

haven't you heard the music in the night?

Wonderful music

Faint as a will o' the wisp 

crazy as a loon

sad as a gypsy serenading the moon

A song that has and needs no introductory verse, Skylark is one of Hoagy Carmichael's most beloved and well-known songs, with an unusual pattern of chords - especially in the bridge - that can make challenging to play or sing. Hoagy is thought to have written it as a tribute to his friend, Bix Beiderbecke. Johnny Mercer was inspired, as he mostly is, with the dreamy, nostalgic images that evoke an old Southern evening. (It seems as if Mercer read and re-read Percy Blythe Shelley's Ode to a Skylark poem many times.) The No Sleeping Dogs blog analyzes just what makes the skylark bird so special here. Lastly, I suppose I should mention the discontinued Buick Skylark, which began as a luxury sedan and ended its run as a classic muscle car after 46 years.

CHORUS

Skylark
Have you anything to say to me?

Won't you tell me where my love can be?

Is there a meadow in the mist

Where someone's waiting to be kissed?

Oh skylark
Have you seen a valley green with spring?

Where my heart can go a-journeying

Over the shadows and the rain

To a blossom covered lane

And in your lonely flight

Haven't you heard the music in the night?

Wonderful music

Faint as a will o' the wisp

Crazy as a loon

Sad as a gypsy serenading the moon

Oh skylark
I don't know if you can find these things

But my heart is riding on your wings

So if you see them anywhere

Won't you lead me there?

I'll be home for Christmas (1943)

Ram/Gannon/Kent

"I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams."

This was written at the height of World War II, giving the song a built-in melancholy. After all, in the end, the singer will only be home "in my dreams." And for families whose loved ones were service members, there was a special poignancy, particularly if the loved one would not be returning home, not at Christmas and perhaps enver. Bing Crosby remains the definitive singer on this – as well as on some other classic holiday songs, and he manages to make this original version sound pretty cheerful, or at least pretty hopeful. Other worthy renditions are Elvis' version, and more recently, Kelly Clarkson, who does the song as a nice, slow waltz.

I'll be home for Christmas;
You can count on me.
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents on the tree.
Christmas Eve will find me
Where the love-light gleams.
I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams.

Yellow Bird (Choucounne) 1883

Monton/Durand

The melody and lyrics to this catchy yet poignant tune originated in Haiti in the late 19th century and the name of the poem was Choucounne. A long but interesting discussion of the song's Creole origins is here, including the Creole lyrics. When the record companies were casting around for yet another "island melody" for the impossibly handsome Harry Belafonte aka "King of Calypso" to do, they came up with this one and, at the same time, conveniently made Norman Ludoff the composer, with English words by Marilyn and Alan Bergman. The song remains lilting and lovely, but less so for me once I found it was appropriated. Who was Choucounne? The answer is, a woman, of course. Always a woman.

"You can fly away, in the sky away.

You more lucky than me!"

CHORUS
Yellow bird, up high in banana tree.
Yellow bird, you sit all alone like me.
Did your lady friend leave the nest again?
That is very sad, make me feel so bad.
You can fly away, in the sky away.
You more lucky than me!

VERSE
I also have a pretty gal, She not with me today.
They all the same, the pretty gal, Make them the nest, then they fly away.

CHORUS

SECOND VERSE
Wish that I was a yellow bird, I fly away with you.
But I am not a yellow bird, So here I sit, nothing else to do.
Yellow bird, yellow bird, yellow bird.