HAPPY TIMES

BOB CROSBY AND THE BOBCATS

SONGWRITER: SYLVIA FINE

COUNTRY: U.S.A.

ALBUM: BOB CROSBY AND THE BOBCATS

LABEL: CAPITOL RECORDS

GENRE: BALLAD JAZZ

YEAR: 1956

George Robert Crosby (August 23, 1913 – March 9, 1993) was an American jazz singer and bandleader, known for his group the Bob-Cats.

"Happy Times" is a jazz ballad written by American lyricist Sylvia Fine. The song was originally created for and made in a appearance in the 1949 film The Inspector General, which was originally titled Happy Times. Bob Crosby performed the song with his group, the Bob-cats.

"Happy Times" was created as a ballad with small notes of jazz. The song was an original production by Sylvia Fine (along with two theatrical numbers, “Soliloquy for Three Heads” and “Medicine Show Number”) for the 1949 musical comedy The Inspector General. The song was performed by jazz musician Bob Crosby and his group the Bob-cats.

In 2008 Crosby's rendition of the song appeared as part of the soundtrack of Fallout 3. The song made a repeat appearance in Fallout 4 in 2015.

Wish on the moon

And look for the gold in a rainbow

And you'll find a happy time

You'll hear a tune

That lives in the heart of a bluebird

And you'll find a happy time

Though things may look very dark

Your dream is not in vein

For when do you find the rainbow?

Only after rain

So wish on the moon

And someday it may be tomorrow

You will suddenly hear chimes

And you'll have your happy, happy time

So wish on the moon

And someday it may be tomorrow

You will suddenly hear chimes

And you'll have your happy, happy time.

STRANGE FRUIT

BILLIE HOLIDAY

SONGWRITER: LEWIS ALLAN

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: STRANGE FRUIT

LABEL: ATLANTIC RECORDS

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1972

Eleanora Fagan (April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959), better known as Billie Holiday, was an American jazz musician and singer-songwriter with a career spanning nearly thirty years. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner Lester Young, Holiday had a seminal influence on jazz music and pop singing. Her vocal style, strongly inspired by jazz instrumentalists, pioneered a new way of manipulating phrasing and tempo. She was known for her vocal delivery and improvisational skills, which made up for her limited range and lack of formal music education.

After a turbulent childhood, Holiday began singing in nightclubs in Harlem, where she was heard by the producer John Hammond, who commended her voice. She signed a recording contract with Brunswick Records in 1935. Collaborations with Teddy Wilson yielded the hit "What a Little Moonlight Can Do", which became a jazz standard. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Holiday had mainstream success on labels such as Columbia Records and Decca Records. By the late 1940s, however, she was beset with legal troubles and drug abuse. After a short prison sentence, she performed at a sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall, but her reputation deteriorated because of her drug and alcohol problems.

Strange Fruit" is a song performed most famously by Billie Holiday, who first sang and recorded it in 1939. Written by teacher Abel Meeropol as a poem and published in 1937, it protested American racism, particularly the lynching of African Americans. Such lynchings had reached a peak in the South at the turn of the century, but continued there and in other regions of the United States. According to the Tuskegee Institute, 1,953 Americans were murdered by lynching, about three quarters of them black. The lyrics are an extended metaphor linking a tree’s fruit with lynching victims. Meeropol set it to music and, with his wife and the singer Laura Duncan, performed it as a protest song in New York City venues in the late 1930s, including Madison Square Garden.

The song continues to be covered by numerous artists, including Nina Simone, UB40, Jeff Buckley, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Dee Dee Bridgewater and has inspired novels, other poems, and other creative works. In 1978, Holiday's version of the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. It was also included in the list of Songs of the Century, by the Recording Industry of America and the National Endowment for the Arts. Lyricist E. Y. Harburg referred to the song as a "historical document". It was also dubbed, "a declaration of war... the beginning of the civil rights movement" by record producer Ahmet Ertegun.

Southern trees bear strange fruit,

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,

Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,

Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,

The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,

Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,

Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,

For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,

For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,

Here is a strange and bitter crop.

LONG AGO AND FAR AWAY

DICK HAYMES & HELEN FORREST

SONGWRITERS: JEROME KERN & IRA GERSHWIN

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: LONG AGO AND FAR AWAY

LABEL: MCA RECORDS

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1983

"Long Ago (and Far Away)" is a popular song from the 1944 Technicolor film musical Cover Girl starring Rita Hayworth and Gene Kelly and released by Columbia Pictures. The music was written by Jerome Kern, and the lyrics were written by Ira Gershwin. The song was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1944 but lost out to “Swinging on a Star”. The song was published in 1944 and sold over 600,000 copies in sheet music in a year. In 2004 it finished #92 in AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.

In the film it is sung by Rita Hayworth (dubbed by Martha Mears) to Gene Kelly, and later briefly reprised by Jinx Falkenburg. Charting versions were recorded almost simultaneously by Dick Haymes and Helen Forrest, Bing Crosby, Jo Stafford, and Perry Como.

The Dick Haymes-Helen Forrest recording was released by Decca Records as catalog number 23317. The record first reached the Billboard magazine charts on April 27, 1944 and lasted 11 weeks on the chart, peaking at #2.

[Her]

Long ago and far away

I dreamed a dream one day

And now that dream is here beside me

Long the skies were overcast

But now the clouds have passed

You're here at last

Chills run up and down my spine

Aladdin's lamp is mine

The dream I dreamed was not denied me

Just one look and then I knew

That all I longed for long ago was you

[Him]

Long ago and far away

I dreamed a dream one day

And now that dream is here beside me

Long the skies were overcast

But now the clouds have passed

You're here at last

Chills run up and down my spine

Aladdin's lamp is mine

The dream I dreamed was not denied me

Just one look and then I knew

That all I longed for long ago was you

[Her]

Just one look and then I knew

[Him, with her humming along]

That all I longed for long ago

[Both)]

Was you..

CHATTANOOGA CHOO CHOO

GLENN MILLER

SONGWRITERS: Harry Warren & Mack Gordon

MOVIE: SUN VALLEY SERENADE ,1941

COUNTRY: U. S. A.

ALBUM: CHATTANOOGA CHOO CHOO

LABEL: RCAVICTOR

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1941

"Chattanooga Choo Choo" is a 1941 song written by Mack Gordon and composed by Harry Warren. It was originally  recorded as a big-band/swing tune by Glenn Miller and His Orchestra and featured in  the 1941 movie Sun Valley Serenade. It is the first ever song to receive a a gold record, presented by RCA Victor in 1942 for sales of 1.2 million copies.

Hi there, Tex, what you say?

Step aside partner, it´s my day

Bend an ear and listen to my version

Of a really solid Tenesse excursion

Pardon me, boy

Is that the Chattanooga choo choo?

Track twenty-nine

Boy, you can gimme a shine

Can you afford

To board a Chattanooga choo choo

I've got my fare

And just a trifle to spare

You leave the Pennsylvania Station 'bout a quarter to four

Read a magazine and then you're in Baltimore

Dinner in the diner

Nothing could be finer

Than to have your ham an' eggs in Carolina

When you hear the whistle blowin' eight to the bar

Then you know that Tennessee is not very far

Shovel all the coal in

Gotta keep it rollin'

Woo, woo, Chattanooga there you are

There's gonna be

A certain party at the station

Satin and lace

I used to call "funny face"

She's gonna cry

Until I tell her that I'll never roam

So Chattanooga choo choo

Won't you choo-choo me home?

Chattanooga choo choo

Won't you choo-choo me home?