Here is the song for this week;
"Speak Low"
The musical comedy "One Touch of Venus", scored by Kurt Weill, opened on Broadway in October, 1943, and ran for 567 performances. S. J. Perelman and Ogden Nash (who also served as lyricist), based their book on the 1885 farcical romance novella, The Tinted Venus, by F. Anstey. In the production Mary Martin played a statue of Venus who came to life when a barber, Rodney Hatch (played by Kenny Baker) slipped the engagement ring which he had bought for his girlfriend on the statue’s finger. The goddess of love tempts Hatch and tries to win him over with the seductive “Speak Low,” the outstanding song from the show sung by Martin. Much to his consternation, she follows him all over the city of New York before resolving not only his romance but the complicated love affairs of others before finally returning to her art gallery pedestal.
“Speak Low” went to number 5 on the charts in 1944, recorded by Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians with vocalist Billy Leach.
The tune is considered as a jazz standard that has been widely recorded, both by vocal artists and instrumentalists until today.
Here are the 6 versions I picked for you;
- Guy Lombardo & His Royal Canadians - "Speak Low"
- Barbra Streisand - "Speak Low"
- Billie Holiday - "Speak Low (Bent Remix)"
- Ava Gardner/Dick Haymes/Eileen Wilson - "Speak Low"
- Tony Bennett & Norah Jones - "Speak Low"
- Marisa Monte - "Speak Low"
Now the floor is yours, go ahead and make your comments (here, Instagram, Facebook wherever you feel like...).
nb. Please note that I intentionally do not include the original versions of the songs as it would be a little unfair to the artists covering the songs, and I am sure that sometimes you will be surprised to see that the songs you thought were the originals are just covers.
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