SUMMERTIME

BILLIE HOLIDAY

SONGWRITERS: DUBOSE HEYWARD; GEORGE GERSHWIN & IRA GERSHWIN

COUNTRY: U.S.A.

ALBUM: THE QUINTESSENTIAL BILLIE HOLIDAY, VOL. 2

LABEL: COLUMBIA RECORDS

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1987

"Summertime" is na aria composed in 1934 by George Gershwin for the 1935 opera Porgy and Bess. The lyrics are by DuBose Heyward, the author of the novel Porgy on which the opera was based, although the song is also co-credited to Ira Gershwin by ASCAP.

The song soon became a popular and much recorded jazz standard, described as "without doubt ... one of the finest songs the composer ever wrote ... Gershwin's highly evocative writing brilliantly mixes elements of jazz and the song styles of blacks in the southeast United States from the early twentieth century". Composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim has characterized Heyward's lyrics for "Summertime" and "My Man's Gone Now" as "the best lyrics in the musical theater". The song is recognized as among the most covered songs in the history of recorded music, with more than 33,000 covers by groups and solo performers.

Summertime and the livin' is easy

Fish are jumpin' and the cotton is fine

Oh your Daddy's rich and your ma is good lookin'

So hush little baby, don't you cry

One of these mornings

You're goin' to rise up singing

Then you'll spread your wings

And you'll take the sky

But till that morning

There's a nothin' can harm you

With daddy and mammy standin' by.

BLACK COFFEE

SARAH VAUGHAN

SONGWRTTER: SONNY BURKE

COUNTRY: U.S.A.

ALBUM: BLACK COFFEE

LABEL: COLUMBIA RECORDS

GENRE: JAZZ

YEAR: 1949

"Black Coffee" is a song. The music was written by Sonny Burke (based on the 1938 piece "What's Your Story Morning Glory" composed by Mary Lou Williams), the lyrics by Paul Francis Webster. The song was published in 1948. Sarah Vaughan charted with this song in 1949 on Columbia.

Peggy Lee recorded the song on May 4, 1953 and it was included on her debut album Black Coffee.

It was included in the soundtrack for the 1960 Columbia Pictures feature Let No Man Write My Epitaph, recorded on Verve by Ella Fitzgerald, also in 1960. The version by Ella Fitzgerald was a favourite song of Polish Nobel Prize laureate Wisława Szymborska who chose it as the song to be performed at her funeral.

I'm feelin' mighty lonesome

Haven't slept a wink

I walk the floor and watch the door

And in between I drink

Black coffee

Love's a hand-me-down brew

I'll never know a Sunday in this weekday room

I'm talkin to the shadows

One o'clock till four

And Lord, how slow the moments go

When all I do is pour

Black coffee

Since the blues caught my eye

I'm hangin' out on Monday my Sunday dreams to dry

Now a man is born to go a-lovin'

And a woman's born to weep and fret

And stay at home and tend her oven

And down her past regrets

In coffee and cigarettes

I'm moanin' all the morning

Moanin' all the night

And in between it's nicotine

And not much heart to fight

Black coffee

Feelin' low as the ground

It's drivin' me crazy

This waitin' for my baby

To maybe come around

(Sarah Humming)

THE STABLE SONG

GREGORY ALAN ISAKOV

SONGWRITER: GREGORY ALAN IZAKOV

COUNTRY: SOUTH AFRICA

ALBUM: THAT SEA, THE GAMBLER

LABEL: GREGORY ALAN ISAKOV

GENRE: FOLK

YEAR: 2007

That Sea, the Gambler is the third studio album by Folk singer Gregory Alan Isakov. It was released in 2007

Gregory Alan Isakov is a singer-songwriter. Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, he emigrated to the United States as a child, and was raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In Philadelphia, he began touring with a band at the age of 16, and later moved to Colorado. His music combines indie and folk, featuring instruments such as the guitar and banjo. Some of his most popular songs include "The Stable Song", "Big Black Car", and "Raising Cain".

Isakov has spent his entire life traveling, and as a result, his travels have impacted his songwriting; his songs tell stories of miles and landscapes and the search for a sense of place. Music has been a constant force in his life, as he says, "I've always had this sense about music and writing, that I sort of have to do it. Like I'll implode without it. I probably wouldn't do it if I felt any other way."

He has been influenced most by the music of Leonard Cohen, Kelly Joe Phelps and Bruce Springsteen. Gregory has played at many music festivals held across the United States, Canada and Europe. Outside of music, he spends his time working in his market garden.

Remember when our songs where just like prayers.

Like gospel hymns that you called in the air.

Come down come down sweet reverence,

Unto my simple house and ring

And ring.

Ring like silver, ring like gold

Ring out those ghosts on the Ohio

Ring like clear day wedding bells

Were we the belly of the beast or the sword that fell

We'll never tell.

Come to me clear and cold on some sea

Watch the world spinning waves like machine

Now I've been crazy couldn't you tell

I threw stones at the stars, but the whole sky fell

Now I'm covered up in straw, belly up on the table

Well I drank and sang, and passed in the stable.

That tall grass grows high and brown,

Well I dragged you straight in the muddy ground

And you sent me back to where I roam

Well I cursed and I cried, but now I know

Now I know

And I ran back to that hollow again

The moon was just a sliver back then

And I ached for my heart like some tin man

When it came oh it beat and it boiled and it rang

Oh it's ringing

Ring like crazy, ring like hell

Turn me back into that wild haired gale

Ring like silver, ring like gold

Turn these diamonds straight back into coal.

Turn these diamonds straight back into coal.

PASSING AFTERNOON

IRON & WINE

SONGWRITER: SAMUEL ERVIN BEAM

WHERE: LIVE AT AQUARIUS RECORDS 2009

COUNTRY: U.S.A.

ALBUM: OUR ENDLESS NUMBERED DAYS ALBUM

LABEL: SUB POP

GENRE: FOLK

YEAR: 2004

Our Endless Numbered Days is the second full-length album from Iron & Wine. Released on March 23, 2004 on Sub Pop, it was the first non-solo effort by Sam Beam under his Iron & Wine moniker. Limited edition copies of the vinyl LP came with a bonus 7" vinyl single. Limited edition copies of the CD came with a bonus CD single.

The album's title comes from the lyrics of the song "Passing Afternoon": "There are things that drift away like our endless, numbered days."

There are times that walk from you like some passing afternoon

Summer warmed the open window of her honeymoon

And she chose a yard to burn but the ground remembers her

Wooden spoons, her children stir her bougainvillea blooms

There are things that drift away like our endless, numbered days

Autumn blew the quilt right off the perfect bed she made

And she's chosen to believe in the hymns her mother sings

Sunday pulls its children from the piles of fallen leaves

There are sailing ships that pass all our bodies in the grass

Springtime calls her children until she let's them go at last

And she's chosen where to be, though she's lost her wedding ring

Somewhere near her misplaced jar of bougainvillea seeds

There are things we can't recall, blind as night that finds us all

Winter tucks her children in, her fragile china dolls

But my hands remember hers, rolling around the shaded ferns

Naked arms, her secrets still like songs I'd never learned

There are names across the sea, only now I do believe

Sometimes, with the window closed, she'll sit and think of me

But she'll mend his tattered clothes and they'll kiss as if they know

A baby sleeps in all our bones, so scared to be alone

Springtime.