Johnny Mercer!  Oh my goodness, what a lyricist! He was also a popular singer who recorded his own songs as well as those written by others.  From the mid-1930s through the mid-1950s, many of the songs Mercer wrote and performed were among the most popular hits of the time.  He wrote the lyrics to more than a thousand songs, including compositions for movies and Broadway shows.  He received nineteen Academy Award nominations and won four.  Mercer was also a co-founder of Capitol Records.

Among his thousands of songs were the following classic standards: Come Rain Or Come Shine, Ac-cent-tchu-ate the Positive, Autumn Leaves, Fools Rush In, I’m Old Fashioned with Jerome Kern, I Remember You, Moon River with Henry Mancini, Skylark with a great melody by Hoagy Charmichael, That Old Black Magic, One For My Baby (And One More For The Road) with Harold Arlen, Satin Doll with Duke Ellington, and On The Atchison Topeka And The Santa Fe.

This one’s drop-dead gorgeous.

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
Oh skylark
Won’t you lead me there?

For this next song, Johnny Mercer also wrote the music.

When an irresistible force such as you
Meets an old immovable object like me
You can bet just as sure as you live
Somethin’s gotta give
Somethin’s gotta give
Somethin’s gotta give

When an irrepressible smile such as yours
Warms an old implacable heart such as mine
Don’t say no, because I insist
Somewhere, somehow, someone’s gotta be kissed

So, en garde, who knows what the fates might have in store?
From their vast mysterious sky?
I’ll try hard ignorin’ those lips that I adore
But how long can anyone try?

Fight, fight, fight, fight, fight it with all of our might
Chances are some heavenly star-spangled night
We’ll find out just as sure as we live
Somethin’s gotta give
Somethin’s gotta give
Somethin’s gotta give

Fight fight fight it with all of your might
Chances are that some heavenly star-spangled night
We’ll find out just as sure as we live
Somethin’s gotta give

I could spend a couple of nights on Johnny Mercer alone, so it seems almost silly to bundle him tonight with another of the great genius lyricists, but here goes.

Cole Porter was born in Indiana, to a wealthy Baptist family.  His mother started Porter in musical training at an early age; he learned the violin at age six, the piano at eight, and he wrote his first operetta (with help from his mother) at 10. Beginning in 1909, Cole went to Yale where he sang both in the Yale Glee Club, of which he was elected president his senior year, and in the original line-up of the Whiffenpoofs.

Porter was working as a songwriter when the U.S. entered World War I in 1917.  Porter actually enlisted in the French Foreign Legion and served in North Africa.  He was transferred in 1917 to the French Officers School at Fontainebleau and was assigned to teach gunnery to American soldiers.  He set up a luxury apartment in Paris and alternated between his officer duties and leading a playboy lifestyle.  His songs reflect his lifestyle.

What a character!  Such a talent!  He was one of the few lyricists of his time who also always wrote the music to his songs.

My story is much too sad to be told,
But practically everything
Leaves me totally cold.
The only exception I know is the case,
When I’m out on a quiet spree,
Fighting vainly the old enui
And I suddenly turn and see,
Your fabulous face.

I get no kick from champagne
Mere alcohol doesn’t thrill me at all
So tell me why should it be true
That I get a kick out of you

Some get a kick from cocaine
I’m sure that if I took even one sniff
That would bore me terrifically too
Yet I get a kick out of you

I get a kick every time I see you standing there before me
I get a kick though its clear to me you obviously don’t adore me

I get no kick in a plane
Flying too high
With some guy in the sky is my idea of nothing to do

Yet I get a kick
Out of you

Cole Porter: Clever, clever, clever.  This genius wordsmith opitomized urban music and the New York City glamor in the 1940s.

Times have changed,
And we’ve often rewound the clock,
Since the Puritans got a shock,
When they landed on Plymouth Rock.
If today,
Any shock they should try to stem,
‘Stead of landing on Plymouth Rock,
Plymouth Rock would land on them.

In olden days a glimpse of stocking
Was looked on as something shocking,
But now, God knows,
Anything Goes.

Good authors too who once knew better words,
Now only use four letter words
Writing prose, Anything Goes.

The world has gone mad today
And good’s bad today,
And black’s white today,
And day’s night today,
When most guys today
That women prize today
Are just silly gigolos

And though I’m not a great romancer
I know that I’m bound to answer
When you propose,
Anything goes

When grandmama whose age is eighty
In night clubs is getting matey with gigolo’s,
Anything Goes.

When mothers pack and leave poor father
Because they decide they’d rather be tennis pros,
Anything Goes.

If driving fast cars you like,
If low bars you like,
If old hymns you like,
If bare limbs you like,
If Mae West you like
Or me undressed you like,
Why, nobody will oppose!
When every night,
The set that’s smart
Is intruding in nudist parties in studios,
Anything Goes.

The world has gone mad today
And good’s bad today,
And black’s white today,
And day’s night today,
When most guys today
That women prize today
Are just silly gigolos
And though I’m not a great romancer
I know that I’m bound to answer
When you propose,
Anything goes

If saying your prayers you like,
If green pears you like
If old chairs you like,
If back stairs you like,
If love affairs you like
With young bears you like, Why nobody will oppose!

And though I’m not a great romancer
I know that I’m bound to answer
When you propose,
Anything goes…
Anything goes!

Whew!  The man is a word machine churning out clever twists and turns by the gallon.  Cole Porter was also the master of the list song.  Here’s my favorite.

At words poetic, I’m so pathetic
That I always have found it best,
Instead of getting ‘em off my chest,
To let ‘em rest unexpressed,
I hate parading my serenading
As I’ll probably miss a bar,
But if this ditty is not so pretty
At least it’ll tell you
How great you are.

You’re the top!
You’re the Coliseum.
You’re the top!
You’re the Louver Museum.
You’re a melody from a symphony by Strauss
You’re a Bendel bonnet,
A Shakespeare’s sonnet,
You’re Mickey Mouse.
You’re the Nile,
You’re the Tower of Pisa,
You’re the smile on the Mona Lisa
I’m a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop,
But if, baby, I’m the bottom you’re the top!

Your words poetic are not pathetic.
On the other hand, babe, you shine,
And I can feel after every line
A thrill divine
Down my spine.
Now gifted humans like Vincent Youmans
Might think that your song is bad,
But I got a notion
I’ll second the motion
And this is what I’m going to add;

You’re the top!

You’re Mahatma Gandhi.

You’re the top!
You’re Napoleon Brandy.
You’re the purple light
Of a summer night in Spain,
You’re the National Gallery
You’re Garbo’s salary,
You’re cellophane.
You’re sublime,
You’re turkey dinner,
You’re the time, the time of a Derby winner
I’m a toy balloon that’s fated soon to pop
But if, baby, I’m the bottom,
You’re the top!

You’re the top!
You’re an arrow collar
You’re the top!
You’re a Coolidge dollar,
You’re the nimble tread
Of the feet of Fred Astaire,
You’re an O’Neill drama,

You’re Whistler’s mama!

You’re camembert.

You’re a rose,

You’re Inferno’s Dante,

You’re the nose
On the great Durante.
I’m just in a way,
As the French would say, “de trop”.
But if, baby, I’m the bottom,
You’re the top!

You’re the top!
You’re a dance in Bali.
You’re the top!
You’re a hot tamale.
You’re an angel, you,
Simply too, too, too diveen,
You’re a Boticcelli,
You’re Keats,
You’re Shelly!

You’re Ovaltine!
You’re a boom,
You’re the dam at Boulder,
You’re the moon,
Over Mae West’s shoulder,
I’m the nominee of the G.O.P.

Or GOP!

But if, baby, I’m the bottom,
You’re the top!

You’re the top!
You’re a Waldorf salad.
You’re the top!
You’re a Berlin ballad.
You’re the boats that glide
On the sleepy Zuider Zee,
You’re an old Dutch master,

You’re Lady Astor,
You’re broccoli!
You’re romance,
You’re the steppes of Russia,
You’re the pants, on a Roxy usher,
I’m a broken doll, a fol-de-rol, a blop,

But if, baby, I’m the bottom,
You’re the top!

Cole Porter: He was the top!

(If you missed the beginning of this series, please start with The IRA Awards Part 1)

For more inspirational music, thoughts and ideas from Peter Link,
please visit Watchfire Music.

Even More Inspiration

• The Ira Awards Part 3
• The Ira Awards Part 2
• The Ira Awards Part 1
• The Changing Scene
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I
• Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn

James Taylor

If you were to ask me, “Who has been your favorite pop star throughout your life?” I’d have to answer that it is a tie between The Beatles and James Taylor.  Perhaps that dates me; perhaps, on the other hand, it doesn’t.  Both have had such musically triumphant careers and both are sure to be long lasting.

Also both churned out mountains of great music and for me that’s the bottom line.  The Beatles were perhaps more eclectic, but Sweet Baby James was, well, just so sweeeet!

As a lyricist, James can be somewhat impressionistic like Paul and Joni, but also could just nail it down with the best of them.  He wrote this song for a musical, “Working”, and as a story-telling song, it’s one of the best.  It wins my Ira Award for Best Song for a Musical Written by a Pop Star.

Now my grandfather was a sailor

He blew in off the water

My father was a farmer

And I, his only daughter

Took up with a no good mill working man

From Massachusetts

Who dies from too much whiskey

And leaves me these three faces to feed

Millwork ain’t easy

Millwork ain’t hard

Millwork it ain’t nothing

But an awful boring job

I’m waiting for a daydream

To take me through the morning

And put me in my coffee break

Where I can have a sandwich

And remember

Then it’s me and my machine

For the rest of the morning

For the rest of the afternoon

And the rest of my life

Now my mind begins to wander

To the days back on the farm

I can see my father smiling at me

Swinging on his arm

I can hear my granddad’s stories

Of the storms out on Lake Eerie

Where vessels and cargos and fortunes

And sailors’ lives were lost

Yes, but it’s my life has been wasted

And I have been the fool

To let this manufacturer

Use my body for a tool

I can ride home in the evening

Staring at my hands

Swearing by my sorrow that a young girl

Ought to stand a better chance

So may I work the mills just as long as I am able

And never meet the man whose name is on the label

It be me and my machine

For the rest of the morning

And the rest of the afternoon

Gone for the rest of my life

Then James can turn around and write with great depth sharing his own spiritual corner on life with us in this wonderful insight into his style of life.  This song expresses the nature of James the best for me, capturing the essence of the man better than any of his others.  I like to think of him sitting out on his back porch in the Berkshires, pen in one hand, guitar in the other.

The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time

Any fool can do it

There ain’t nothing to it

Nobody knows how we got to

The top of the hill

But since we’re on our way down

We might as well enjoy the ride

The secret of love is in opening up your heart

It’s okay to feel afraid

But don’t let that stand in your way

‘Cause anyone knows that love is the only road

And since we’re only here for a while

Might as well show some style

Give us a smile

Isn’t it a lovely ride

Sliding down

Gliding down

Try not to try too hard

It’s just a lovely ride

Now the thing about time is that time

Isn’t really real

It’s just your point of view

How does it feel for you

Einstein said he could never understand it all

Planets spinning through space

The smile upon your face

Welcome to the human race

Some kind of lovely ride

I’ll be sliding down

I’ll be gliding down

Try not to try too hard

It’s just a lovely ride

Isn’t it a lovely ride

Sliding down

Gliding down

Try not to try too hard

It’s just a lovely ride

Now the secret of life is enjoying the passage of time

James has had a great effect on me in my life and in my music.  His mastery of chord progressions and guitar meanderings always blows my mind and stimulates my imagination.  Musically, he is probably my biggest influence.  When his new CDs come out, I’m always first in line, knowing that in a short time I’ll be lying on the couch back home with my headphones on, a big smile upon my face and wonder in my heart.

I don’t know that his lyrics have had a similar impact, but I do know that one of my favorite songs I’ve ever written came from the wish to some day be able to write a song like the one above, “Isn’t It A Lovely Ride.”

This next song, as beautifully sung by Jenny Burton, is definitely a reaction to my hero, Sweet Baby James, and my own shot at putting my stamp on my own soul.

When I consider the heavens

The works of Thy fingers

The moon and the stars

You ordained

When I consider a child

The steps that he’s taking

His light and his joy

So ingrained

When I think of the way

That each breath comes unnoticed

Sustaining this delicate life

I am swept off my feet

In breathless wonder

At the mystery of life

When I consider the music

Of all the great masters

And know it was You

They all heard

And the works of our Shakespeares

King Davids and Keats

You gave them each

Every word

When I contemplate

The pure fabric of nature

Bewildered by all we have learned

I am swept off my feet

In breathless wonder

At the miracle of life

And I think on these things

And the wonder life brings

From the greatest of things to the small

And though I spend my life

Searching life’s solemn secrets

I know I’ll never know all

As I ponder the atom

The boundless vast ether

The billions of lives

On this stone

I consider the gift

Of God’s imagination

And begin to explore

The unknown

But this whimsical world

It just slips through my fingers

As I try to hold on to the air

And I’m swept off my feet

In breathless wonder

At the miracle of life

And I think on these things

Yes I think on these things

And the wonder life brings

Even More Inspiration

• The Ira Awards Part 2
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I
• WFM Listening Room – Series II Finale
• WFM Listening Room Series II – 3
• Progress Afoot
• Life At Its Best

Joni Mitchell-Self Portrait

If you’ve already read Part 1, then welcome back!  Tonight let’s start with Joni.  In Part 1 I opened with the expression “A poem doth not a lyric make”.  Joni Mitchell, in my book, comes the closest to writing poetry that works as lyrics.  It is her genius to do so.  Even though she can make it work sometimes, I still wouldn’t try it if I were you.  Joni Mitchells only come along once in a lifetime.

Joni writes a lot like Paul Simon – she paints an impressionistic picture.  She is a poet at work on a lyrical canvas.  She sometimes tells a story, but that story often just has splotches of through line and she leaves it up to the listener to fill in the blanks.  She is also, you may already know, an accomplished painter whose work often graces her album covers.

Here’s one of my favorite Joni’s.

Just before our love got lost you said

I am as constant as a northern star

And I said, constantly in the darkness

Where’s that at?

If you want me I’ll be in the bar

On the back of a carton coaster

In the blue TV screen light

I drew a map of Canada

Oh Canada

With your face sketched on it twice

Oh you’re in my blood like holy wine

You taste so bitter and so sweet

Oh I could drink a case of you darling

And I would still be on my feet

Oh I would still be on my feet

Oh I am a lonely painter

I live in a box of paints

I’m frightened by the devil

And I’m drawn to those ones that ain’t afraid

I remember that time that you told me, you said

Love is touching souls

Surely you touched mine

Cause part of you pours out of me

In these lines from time to time

Oh you’re in my blood like holy wine

You taste so bitter and so sweet

Oh I could drink a case of you darling

Still I’d be on my feet

I would still be on my feet

I met a woman

She had a mouth like yours

She knew your life

She knew your devils and your deeds

And she said

Go to him, stay with him if you can

But be prepared to bleed

Oh but you are in my blood you’re my holy wine

You’re so bitter, bitter and so sweet

Oh I could drink a case of you darling

Still I’d be on my feet

I would still be on my feet

When you get done reading or hearing this lyric, you’ve only gotten sketches, but you really have an insight into their relationship and the analogy used is just terrific.

I grew up writing theater lyrics.  They have to be more straightforward, less obtuse, because, especially in today’s musicals, the lyrics must advance the plot.  That’s a lot to require in a medium where most people pay little attention to the lyrics being absorbed by the music, but the surroundings of the theater, the stage, the costumes, the characters, the plot itself make the audience focus more on the lyrics.

Oscar Hammerstein pretty much invented this tradition with the advent of the ground breaking “Oklahoma” (No one who has ever seen this musical will ever have trouble spelling this word).  After “Oklahoma” the songs pretty much always had to forward the plot.  Previous to that, songs turned up most often as nightclub routines that had nothing to do with anything except pure entertainment.

Pop music is a whole different story.  In the 50’s when rock was born, lyrics went from great sophistication to great simplicity.  “Da doo run run” and “Purple People Eater” tickled the sensibilities of millions, but I couldn’t say that the 50s or the 60s were exactly a high watermark in the craft and art of lyric writing.

Then the Beatles came along and smashed all the traditions and turned the musical world, and the rest of the world for that matter, upside down.

Lennon and McCartney not only could write with beautiful, cogent and intelligent simplicity (think “Yesterday”), but they could also take you far beyond Joni and Paul in the art of impressionism.

In terms of simplicity, here’s a beauty from John:

Imagine there’s no Heaven

It’s easy if you try

No hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people

Living for today

Imagine there’s no countries

It isn’t hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion too

Imagine all the people

Living life in peace

You may say that I’m a dreamer

But I’m not the only one

I hope someday you’ll join us

And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions

I wonder if you can

No need for greed or hunger

A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people

Sharing all the world

You may say that I’m a dreamer

But I’m not the only one

I hope someday you’ll join us

And the world will live as one

Lennon and McCartney could also write with a kind of off the wall sense of humor.  It was Stephen Sondheim who said that one of the hardest things to do in the theater was to write a song that got laughs.  Then he went out and proved himself wrong with “Gee, Officer Krupke” and “Comedy Tonight”.

Lennon and McCartney tickled our funny bones with songs like “Octopus’s Garden”, “When I’m Sixty-four”, and even the following great straight rocker that gives a tongue in cheek nod in the middle to the great Brian Wilson’s “I Wish They All Could Be California Girls” and also squeezes in a tip o’ the hat to Ray Charles.  I may not have a boffo laugh from this song, but I can’t hear it without breaking out into a big grin.

Flew in from Miami Beach BOAC

Didn’t get to bed last night

On the way the paper bag was on my knee

Man I had a dreadful flight

I’m back in the U.S.S.R.

You don’t know how lucky you are boy

Back in the U.S.S.R.

Been away so long I hardly knew the place

Gee it’s good to be back home

Leave it till tomorrow to unpack my case

Honey disconnect the phone

I’m back in the U.S.S.R.

You don’t know how lucky you are boy

Back in the U.S.S.R.

Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out

They leave the West behind

And Moscow girls make me sing and shout

That Georgia’s always on my mind.

I’m back in the U.S.S.R.

You don’t know how lucky you are boys

Back in the U.S.S.R.

Show me round your snow peaked mountains way down south

Take me to your daddy’s farm

Let me hear your balalaika’s ringing out

Come and keep your comrade warm.

I’m back in the U.S.S.R.

You don’t know how lucky you are boys

Back in the U.S.S.R.

And then, of course, in the impressionistic tradition of Joni and Paul, there’s Lucy.  For two decades my generation argued about what this song was about, but when you were on what they were on, you didn’t care.  The song is an icon of its time.

Picture yourself in a boat on a river,

With tangerine trees and marmalade skies

Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly,

A girl with kaleidoscope eyes.

Cellophane flowers of yellow and green,

Towering over your head.

Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes,

And she’s gone.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds.

Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain

Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies,

Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers,

That grow so incredibly high.

Newspaper taxis appear on the shore,

Waiting to take you away.

Climb in the back with your head in the clouds,

And you’re gone.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds.

Picture yourself on a train in a station,

With plasticine porters with looking glass ties,

Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile,

The girl with the kaleidoscope eyes.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds.

Stay tuned.  Coming soon: Cole Porter, James Taylor, Lieber and Stoller, Johnny Mercer, Irving Berlin, and the great Oscar Hammerstein.

Even More Inspiration

• The Ira Awards Part 3
• Gabriel, Come Blow Your Horn
• My Body
• Light At The End Of The Tunnel
• Even Now
• Hitting The Wall

Ira Gershwin

In the music industry, when the royalty split is determined for songwriters, the industry standard for royalties is that the composer gets 50% and the lyricist gets the other 50%.  Each contributor to the song shares equally.  But when it comes to publicity, notoriety, and public appreciation, that’s where the equality stops.  The composer always gets the lion’s share of the attention.

And so to right this inequality, to re-balance the appreciation for these underappreciated wordsmiths, I’ve decided to create just what this world needs most – another awards show – The Ira Awards, presented by Watchfire Music.  Also I’ve decided to name it after the most underappreciated lyricist of them all – Ira Gershwin.

Over the next couple of nights I’ll be giving out Iras to many of the world’s greatest lyricists and discussing why we’ve voted for them.  Our panel of judges (consisting of me, myself and I) have been collecting and reviewing examples of the world’s greatest lyrics for the past 30 years now and the ballots are now tabulated, the voting is in and it’s time to give out them golden statues.

To right our first wrong, let’s first establish the derivation of our title.  Ira Gershwin wrote lyrics for his much more famous brother, George for many years.  When people say, “Ah, that’s a Gershwin song” let’s face it, they’re not thinking “Gershwin Brothers”, they’re thinking “George”.  How did Ira get left out?  I have no idea.  It’s an injustice that I hope to resolve.

The man who only lives for making money

Lives a life that isn’t necessarily sunny;

Likewise the man who works for fame –

There’s no guarantee that time won’t erase his name

The fact is

The only work that really brings enjoyment

Is the kind that is for girl and boy meant.

Fall in love — you won’t regret it.

That’s the best work of all — if you can get it.

Holding hands at midnight

‘Neath a starry sky…

Oh that is nice work if you can get it.

And you can get it — if you try.

Strolling with the one girl

Sighing sigh after sigh…

Oh nice work if you can get it.

And you can get it — if you try.

Just imagine someone

Waiting at the cottage door.

Where two hearts become one…

Who could ask for anything more?

Loving one who loves you,

And then taking that vow…

Nice work if you can get it,

And if you get it –

Won’t you tell me how?

Lyrics: Ira Gershwin

In my classes on lyric writing I always lead off with this: “A poem doth not a lyric make.”  I always get the same reaction,  “Wha?”

What it means is this.  The major difference between poems and lyrics is that with a poem, the reader can stop in time and investigate a turn of phrase or a deeper thought.  With lyrics, there ain’t no stoppin’.  The music prohibits that.  So lyrics have to be simpler, more straightforward.  There can be poetry in a lyric, but it can’t be so dense that the listener cannot follow.

In the above lyric, Ira gets my award for best simple story telling done economically.  Here’s another of his gems.

Embrace me, my sweet embraceable you

Embrace me, you irreplaceable you

Just one look at you my heart grew tipsy in me

You and you alone bring out the gypsy in me

I love all the many charms about you

Above all I want my arms about

Don’t be a naughty baby…

Come to papa come to papa do

My sweet embraceable you…

Again, Lyrics: Ira Gershwin.  Google just about any George Gershwin song and often it gives George the lyric credit and leaves poor Ira out, but the fact is that Ira wrote the lyrics and George, the music.

Paul Simon, another great lyricist from another age tells a good story as well.  He certainly is poetic and his lyrics more obtuse, but in the following lyric Paul gets my vote for painting a picture that sets a mood and tells a story that has so many blanks that we, the listeners, get to fill in the blanks with our own imaginations.  Call it, the award for gorgeous impressionism.

Let us be lovers, we’ll marry our fortunes together

I’ve got some real estate here in my bag

So we bought a pack of cigarettes, and Mrs. Wagner pies

And we walked off to look for America

Cathy, I said, as we boarded a Greyhound in Pittsburg

Michigan seems like a dream to me now

It took me four days to hitchhike from Saginaw

And I’ve come to look for America

Laughin’ on the bus, playing games with the faces

She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy

I said be careful, his bowtie is really a camera

Toss me a cigarette, I think there’s one in my raincoat

We smoked the last one an hour ago

So I looked at the scenery, she read her magazine

And the moon rose over an open field

Cathy, I’m lost, I said, though I knew she was sleeping

I’m empty and I’m aching and I don’t know why

Countin’ the cars on the New Jersey turnpike

They’ve all come to look for America, all come to look for America

Now here’s another guy who is among my top 5 favorite lyricists.  Alan Lerner was one of the few lyricists who were probably better known than his composer, Fritz Lowe.  Alan wrote Brigadoon, My Fair Lady, Camelot and a few others of similar magnitude.  Here’s one of my favorite Lerner lyrics.  From Brigadoon.

This is hard to say, but as I wandered through the lea,

I felt for just a fleeting moment that I suddenly was free of being lonely.

Then I closed my eyes and saw the very reason why.

I saw a man with his head bowed low.

His heart had no place to go.

I looked and I thought to myself with a sigh:

There but for you go I.

I saw a man walking by the sea,

Alone with the tide was he.

I looked and I thought as I watched him go by:

There but for you go I.

Lonely men around me, trying not to cry,

Till the day you found me, there among them was I.

I saw a man who had never known a love that was all his own.

I thought as I thanked all the stars in the sky:

There, but for you, go I.

Beautifully crafted, intelligently written, simple, and yet deep.  Kudos goes to Fritz Lowe also for a gorgeous melody.

But for me the all-time love song lyric, the winner of this lifetime’s Ira award, has to go to Alan Lerner for our next winner.

If ever I would leave you

It wouldn’t be in summer.

Seeing you in summer I never would go.

Your hair streaked with sunlight,

Your lips red as flame,

Your face with a luster

That puts gold to shame!

But if I’d ever leave you,

It couldn’t be in autumn.

How I’d leave in autumn I never will know.

I’ve seen how you sparkle

When fall nips the air.

I know you in autumn

And I must be there.

And could I leave you

Running merrily through the snow?

Or on a wintry evening

When you catch the fire’s glow?

If ever I would leave you,

How could it be in springtime?

Knowing how in spring I’m bewitched by you so?

Oh, no! Not in spring-time!

Summer, winter or fall!

No, never could I leave you at all!

Stay tuned for the next couple of nights as we romp through the great lyrics of the American songbook.  If you’re a bit of a lyricist, you won’t want to miss this.  If you’re just a person who loves a great song, you’re in for a treat.

Even More Inspiration

• Even Now
• Grieving In Silence
• Kickstarter.com Campaign – I
• Gettin’ It Done
• The Road To Inspiration — Peter Link and Julia Wade
• The Ira Awards Part 5