Monday, January 30, 2012

Summertime.


Gershwin and DuBose Heyward's opera "Porgy and Bess" is slated to open soon on Broadway and accordingly, it's received a lot of coverage from "The New York Times."

Joe Nocera, a Times financial writer and op-editorialist wrote about it in his blog today, a follow-up from a piece he'd written a couple of weeks earlier. http://nocera.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/30/summertime-rendered-25000-ways/?hp

Nocera writes, "no song has been recorded more than “Summertime,” which has been covered more than 25,000 times – by rockers, country singers, jazz musicians and blues artists."

He then gives us about 10 versions to sample.

I haven't been able to hear them all, but the three I did hear--Miles, Billie, and Ella and Louis represent the high-water mark of something.

2 comments:

Hannah said...

janis joplin is the best

george tannenbaum said...

The Joplin is great, Hannah. Not sure it's the best, but it's certainly up there.