How Singers Fall in Love With Songs
By BARRY SINGER/The New York Times
When Patti LuPone appears at Carnegie Hall on Feb. 28, she won't be
singing
only her greatest hits. Mostly she'll be singing her greatest regrets.
For
the concert, Ms. LuPone has put together a one-woman revue that she
calls
"Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda," songs she never sang on Broadway — but wishes
she
had.
This conceit raises a fundamental, if rarely asked, question: How do
singers
choose their songs?
For Ms. LuPone the answer is sharply contrarian. "I was always drawn to
songs
written for the second- banana female character or even the male lead;
not
Maria's songs in `West Side Story,' but Anita's; not Marion the
Librarian's
songs from `Music Man,' but Harold Hill's `Trouble.' Why? Because those
are
the songs with guts. The female leads always get the romantic melodies.
But
their songs are just too passive for me."
Ms. LuPone's unexpected take on song selection is only one answer among
many.
Ask other good singers to think aloud about this issue and many
surprises
emerge.
"To choose a song, I always start with the lyrics," Ray Charles said in
a
recent interview. "The lyrics must capture my attention. The music
complementing the lyrics is what makes the song work for me." His simple
observation has profound implications. It helps to explain the
constancy of Mr. Charles's soulful expressiveness as a singer. One
doesn't
think of Ray Charles as a lyric interpreter in the narrowest sense.
Instead,
he is seen as making songs his own by internalizing them so intensely,
both
as a pianist and as a singer, that they become universal statements that
actually transcend the lyrics. What we now learn is that he, in fact,
views
the music as largely an extension of the words.
Diana Krall acknowledges that she, too, listens to lyrics first, judging
new
songs from a theatrical, narrative perspective. "I want to sit across
the
table from you and just tell you the story," Ms. Krall said not long
ago. "I
get into a character as I sing a song — it's a story in my head. Though
I
want the audience to find their story in it, too. So I don't tell them
everything."
For other singers, the attraction begins with the melody. "Because I'm a
musician primarily, I listen to the music first," said the cabaret
legend
Blossom Dearie. "If I don't like the music, then I don't do the song.
Lyrics
are the icing on the cake for me."
Her view is shared by Harry Connick Jr., the young singer and pianist
who
recently composed his first Broadway score. "Melodies stick in my head
quicker than unfamiliar lyrics do," he said. "Though, if a song's got a
great
melody and corny lyrics I probably won't do it. I also check out the
chord
changes; most of the songs I pick have to have real solid harmonic
bases."
The focus on either lyrics or melody is not necessarily exclusive. As
the
jazz singer Cleo Laine observed: "The best lyricists are musicians, too.
And
any good composer is just painting words with music."
Tony Bennnet, when asked about his own guidelines for choosing a song,
replied with a favorite quotation: "Yip Harburg, one of America's
greatest
lyricists of popular music, used to say: `When the melody touches your
heart
emotionally and the words hit your brain intellectually, more than
likely
you'll find you have an excellent song to sing.' "
But can this be accomplished systematically? Or is the whole business
ultimately about intuition?
The answer to both questions is yes. Technicians that they often are,
jazz
singers may approach their material more rigorously than, say, pop
singers.
Still, as Billie Holiday wrote in her memoir, "Lady Sings the Blues,"
"With
me, it's got nothing to do with working or arranging or rehearsing. Give
me a
song I can feel."
And then there is a pop singer like Cher who, in a recent interview,
said, "I
probably listen to at least l0 songs for every one that I ultimately
choose."
She quickly added: "I know if I'm going to like a song in the first l0
to l5
seconds because it just `does something' to me. The strange thing is, I
don't
really think I'm going through any mental process at all; I'm hearing,
but I
don't think I'm listening, especially to the words. Later, I find out
that I
must have been listening, because a theme becomes apparent. After I
recorded
the songs for my upcoming record, someone said: `Did you know how many
times
the words "strong," "lonely" and "love" appear in these songs?' Somehow
I mu st be hearing more than I think." Beyond a singer's initial
subjective attraction to a song, there is the
matter of audience taste. For a cabaret performer like Bobby Short, the
nightly grind of live performance dictates a particular pragmatism.
"I go back to what I heard Marian Anderson say once: `First a song has
to be
beautiful," Mr. Short said. "However, `beautiful' covers a wide range of
things. I have to admire a song's structure and what it's about. But I
also
have to determine how I can transfer my affection for a song to an
audience;
I have to decide whether I can put it across. Nothing is more
heartbreaking
than to break your back learning a song that is difficult and then find
that
it doesn't fly with an audience."
So, how do singers find new songs to sing?
"I may just hear something on the radio," said Mr. Connick. "That's how
I
recorded `Tie a Yellow Ribbon Around the Old Oak Tree' — I first heard
it on
the radio and found myself humming it and I thought, `Well, that's
pretty
cool.' And the lyrics didn't bug me too much. The melody was just so
easy to
sing and it's real fun to play piano on."
New material often comes via musical directors and other professional
conduits. Until the rise of the singer-songwriter in the 1960's, record
company A & R (Artists & Repertory) people did most of this work
directly
with music publishers, matching singers to songs. "There was always an
element of corruption in it," said George Avakian, the director of the
Popular Album Department at Columbia
Records throughout the 1950's and 60's. "Usually, in exchange for the
latest
hit — what they called their `push song' — A & R guys had to take on a
publisher's lesser-known stuff. These were the songs many black artists
like
Billie Holiday early on, or Fats Waller, were offered; literally given
stacks
to choose from. Some of these songs were actually pretty good. Though
Fats
was a master at making good records out of bad songs."
As Ms. Dearie pointed out, composers remain a singer's best source.
"People
come to me with songs all the time and I also have friends, like Dave
Frishberg, who brought me `Peel Me a Grape' and, with Bob Dorough, "I'm
Hip."
Sometimes one singer finds a song because another singer sings it. "I
recorded `Peel Me a Grape' in the 1960's," said Ms. Laine, "because
Blossom
Dearie was working in London and she thought it would be ideal for me."
This interaction has its limits, though. Almost every singer interviewed
for
this article maintained he or she would never touch songs associated
with
greats of the past.
"I would never sing a Billie Holiday song like "God Bless the Child,"
insisted Ms. Krall.
For Ms. Laine, Peggy Lee's "Love Me" is strictly off limits.
Ms. Dearie has a short list of standards: ` "Stardust,' `My Funny
Valentine'
and `The Man I Love.' I leave them alone," she said.
As for Mr. Connick, there is only one Frank Sinatra: "A lot of those
Frank
tunes I wouldn't do, especially those that were written for him, like
`Come
Fly With Me.' That's just his stuff. `One for My Baby.' I mean what are
you
going to do with that? It's Frank's."
As for Sinatra, what drew him to a song was apparently elemental.
"Sinatra
once sat through a demonstration of perfectly decent new songs by some
songwriter," said Jonathan Schwartz, the radio personality and Sinatra
expert. "Sinatra, though, remained unimpressed. And all he said to the
songwriter was: `But where's the chick?'
"Of course, later in life, Sinatra sang on other themes," Mr. Schwartz
added.
"But at his peak, it was always about one thing, really: where's the
chick?"
In the end, the relationship between singers and songs is not just
romantic
but erotic. And as in any affair of the heart, it isn't the head or even
just
the heart that rules.
"Yep," Ms. LuPone concluded, pointing to her own head. "I do like to
feel a
song up here. But," she went on, gesturing well below her belt, "I
really
have to feel it here. That's where all good songs have to go."
Copyright 2002 The New York Times
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