Vocal Themes from Movies of the 1940s and 50s

Theme songs from the movies have long had a great effect both within the films themselves, and as commercial recordings. By the time the first entry in our collection was written, 20 years had passed after the song "Charmaine" had emerged in 1926 from What Price Glory?, a silent film with music, and become popular.

Today's set of songs is a companion to a new post on my other blog of Cinema Rhapsodies, an LP of film music themes recorded by Victor Young in 1953, along with a similar collection from the same time, Music for Jennifer, conducted by Paul Weston, which is newly remastered. This set of vocal themes also includes a few songs that can be found on an earlier Young LP called Hollywood Rhapsodies.

In this collection, we first have "Love Letters" from the 1945 film of that name starring Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten. The tune was written by Young, with Eddie Heyman the words. The hit version herein was by Dick Haymes, backed by Young.

Two years later, Young had another success with "Golden Earrings" from the film of the same title, with the words by Livingston and Evans. Peggy Lee had the hit recording of this piece of exotica.

"Portrait of Jennie" is an early example of a song that was "inspired by" a film, the 1948 release with that name starring (again) Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten. Gordon Burdge and J. Russel Robinson wrote the exploitation song; it was a big success in Nat Cole's typically warm performance. Meanwhile the film's score was by Bernard Herrmann, who wrote a remarkable piece called "Jennie's Song" that can be found on the Paul Weston LP.

"The Song from Moulin Rouge (Where Is Your Heart)" is kind of a hybrid, in that it uses music from the film - originally a song called "It's April Again" - only with different lyrics, reflected in the subtitle. Georges Auric wrote the music, William Engvick the lyrics sung by Felicia Sanders on the hit record by Percy Faith.

One of the lesser known songs in this collection is "Autumn in Rome," which is associated with the film Indiscretion of an American Wife with music by Alessandro Cicognini. Actually, the film came out in Italy first as Stazione Termini, but was cut drastically for the American release, with two songs tacked on at the end and sung by Patti Page - "Autumn in Rome" and "Indiscretion," which Paul Weston and Sammy Cahn reworked from Cicognini themes. The former is an exceptional, although little known song that we have in a inspired performance by Herb Jeffries. An LP of Cicognini's score can be found here, in a newly remastered and much improved version.

"Hi-Lili, Hi-Lo" is of course from the film Lili, where it was memorably sung by Leslie Caron. The hit version, however, was by Dinah Shore with backing by Frank De Vol. It's a simple tune, but Dinah and Frank make it pretty noisy, ending with an emphatic "HI-LO." I wonder if that's what Bronislau Kaper and Helen Deutsch had in mind when they wrote the piece. The soundtrack recording with Caron's version is here.

Next we have a personal favorite, the song "Anna" from the 1951 Italian film of the same name. The infectious music by Armando Trovajoli (writing as Roman Vatro) is in the Brazilian baião style. The song is done on screen by lead actor Silvana Magnano, dubbed by Flo Sandon's (who had an affinity for unusual punctuation, apparently). The lyrics are by Francesco Giordano. Oddly, Trovajoli did not write the rest of the score - Nino Rota did. The baião's "boom ba-ba-boom" rhythm would be influential in rock 'n' roll.

"Too Little Time" was perhaps Henry Mancini's first big popular success. The lovely theme is from The Glenn Miller Story, here in an impassioned reading by Steve Lawrence. This is taken from a collection of his King singles, which can be found here. The song's lyrics are by Don Raye.

Next is the Four Aces' version of "Written on the Wind." The film of the same name had music by Victor Young. Sammy Cahn provided the song's lyrics.

"Alone at Last" is another Victor Young melody, from the 1952 film Something to Live For. Bob Hilliard wrote words for it. As far as I can tell, the only recording was a much later (1960) effort by Tony Bennett. Arranger Ralph Sharon counterpointed the melody with another, better known, Victor Young song, "My Foolish Heart," from the 1949 film of that name. Trouble is, "My Foolish Heart" is a stronger melody, so it detracts from "Alone at Last" rather than enhancing it.

"Ruby" from Ruby Gentry was a hit as an instrumental, but there were not many versions using the words that Mitchell Parish added to Heinz Roemheld's melody. Fortunately, Ray Charles did record it several years later, with an arrangement by Marty Paich. Ray does alter Roemheld's melody behind the climactic phrase "Ruby, it's you", but it works.

One of the great melodies from Hollywood was David Raksin's theme for The Bad and the Beautiful. Dory Langdon Previn added lyrics in 1960 for use on June Christy's LP Off-Beat. I find June's singing effortful, which doesn't complement the suave melody. Pete Rugolo's arrangement is good.

So several different types of film songs are represented - taken directly from the soundtrack, with words added later on, exploitation records that adopt the film's title but not its music, even a song tacked on to the end of the film just for the American market.

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