(Weekend Music—hat tip to Robert W)
Yeah, yeah, I know. Just like me to post a sad song about spring. But it’s great.
Read the absolutely fascinating story of the song here. Did it make you think of “The Waste Land”? Not an accident.
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Mac, I wrote about the Betty Carter performance of this song about a year ago. You *must* listen and tell me what you think.
http://pentiment.blogspot.com/2009/03/spring-can-really-hang-you-up-most.html
Posted by: Pentimento | 03/28/2010 at 07:23 AM
That's really impressive, though on the basis of one hearing I like Ella's better. Carter really takes the song apart and makes her own thing of it. It's a really good thing but I have more sense of the song in Ella's version.
Posted by: Mac | 03/28/2010 at 11:56 AM
And p.s.: the post itself is great. Oddly enough, given my temperament, I don't generally react to spring in a melancholy way.
Posted by: Mac | 03/28/2010 at 01:49 PM
Thanks, Mac. Spring has come to Appalachia with a vengeance and already I'm feeling like a horse that never left the post.
I really love the Betty Carter version. It is very abstract, almost dry, but for that very reason I think it's incredibly moving -- the kind of emotional restraint she uses (like Mozart) makes the emotions, for me, more poignant.
Posted by: Pentimento | 04/03/2010 at 06:04 PM
I just realized that the link on my site is to a later live version of the song, not the more restrained 1964 performance. I'll send you an mp3.
Posted by: Pentimento | 04/03/2010 at 06:18 PM