Post 361: 'ENJOY YOURSELF (IT'S LATER THAN YOU THINK)'

When my grand-daughters were little, I had the pleasant duty once a week of collecting them from school. In the back of the car, on their way to their house, they always loved to sing at the tops of their voices. I taught them one or two silly songs.

Coffee Popsicles - Ellen (left) and Marianne

A particular favourite was Enjoy Yourself; It's Later Than You Think.

For a clear performance of this song on YouTube (by Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians), click here.

So I had a pleasant surprise when I discovered recently that Lasse Collin - on his wonderful website (click here to visit the site) had published a lead-sheet for the song, complete with the words.

For years, Lasse has generously provided a wonderful service to traditional jazz all over the world by making lead-sheets freely available. I do not know how many lead-sheets there are on his site, but my guess is there are about 1000. Many of them are supported by recorded performances.

Enjoy Yourself; It's Later Than You Think is not a song many bands play. But I recommend it. Why? Because every concert needs at least one 'fun' song or silly song, as a gentleman in an audience told me a few weeks ago. Also, this tune has the advantage of being very easy to play and improvise on. (That also makes it a good one for beginners, by the way.) It is fairly similar in its chord progression to Royal Telephone.

Somebody in the band should provide the vocal, as that is essential in a song where the fun is in the lyrics. You have the words provided by Lasse, but there are in fact more verses (not needed, in my view, but you can find them on the internet if you wish).

My friend Barrie in Lancaster, England, has told me this song is currently popular with Ska Bands.

The song belongs in our repertoire to the group that gives sound advice on how to conduct our lives. (I'm thinking of such as Pick Yourself Up, When You're Smiling, Try a Little Tenderness, 'Taint What You Do, Button Up Your Overcoat, Pennies From Heaven, The Clouds Will Soon Roll By, Smile, and If You Can't Be Good, Be Careful.)

Post 177: 'CHICKEN AIN'T NOTHIN' BUT A BIRD'

Chicken Ain't Nothin' But a Bird? It's a simple, romping 32-bar a - a - b - a tune.

You can find some enjoyable examples of this song on YouTube.

At first a source who is normally reliable gave me the (incorrect) information that this song was composed in 1899 by Bob Cole and J. R. Johnson. (They wrote the famous jazz number Under The Bamboo Tree.) However, I was unable to find any evidence to substantiate the theory that they wrote Chicken Ain't Nothin' But a Bird. Then reader Stan Cummins discovered that there was a 'chicken' song that Bob Cole performed at about that time, but it was a different song, so that must have caused the confusion.

A more convincing source said the song was composed by Emmett 'Babe' Wallace (born in Brooklyn, 1909; died 2006). He was a singer, a composer, an actor and a writer. I think he must have written the song in about 1939, in time for such performers as Cab Calloway (1940) to make a feature of it.

This information has since been confirmed for me by an email from Jimy Bleu (see below) who tells me he is Mr. Wallace's grandson.

The song appears to go something like this.

My name is Jimy Bleu & I'm writing to give you some information about my grandfather Emett 'Babe' Wallace who is indeed the writer of "Chicken Ain't Nothing But A Bird" (I still receive royalties on his composition) as well as standards he wrote for Benny Goodman, Kenny Durham, Django Reinhard & many others. He actually wrote "Chicken" for Ella Fitzerald whom he was dating at the time, but she was under contract to record other material, so Cab Calloway picked it up from him. In the mid '90's Burger King licensed the Cab Calloway version for their chicken sandwich campaign in which Babe received a very large amount for the use of the tune........Ella did record a few of his tunes eventually, one of them "Old Mother Hubbard" becoming a relative hit, especially when it was picked up to be used in a 'Betty Boop' cartoon.

I am actually in post-production on a documentary about him. He was a gifted singer, pianist, guitarist, composer/arranger & actor who just happened to be sort of like the character "Forrest Gump", a person who can be seen in various photographs or movies with major stars. Below are the links. However, what the writer of the blog leaves out about Babe fronting Ella's band was that they were dating. Ella was only around 18 (?) & didn't know anything about fronting & maintaining a band, so Babe took the band over for a time when Chick Webb died & left her the band in his will. I attached a photo of him with Ella as well as stills from the classic movie "Stormy Weather" he starred in. I also attached a picture of him & I about a year before he died at the age of 96.

What happened with "Stormy Weather" is that Babe was the leading man to Lena Horne. A few months before the film's wrap, the studio heads decided to cast Bill "Bojangles" Robinson as the leading man to have another top name (Lena wasn't yet well-known) & they put Babe as the 2nd lead. Bill was then in his mid '60's & they dyed his grey hair black. Babe was 34, Lena 26. The positive note about the whole incident is that Babe renewed his friendship with Harold Nicholas ('The Nicholas Brothers') & they would often go double-dating with the Dandridge sisters (Dorothy whom Harold eventually married & Vivian whom Babe has a son with)..................7 years before "Stormy Weather", Babe was given the lead with Nina Mae McKinney in a Black film classic called "Sugar Hill" (also known as "The Black Network") with Harold. I attached a pic collage of him in that film. They remained close friends until Harold's death. I took Babe to Harold's memorial here in NYC & before the memorial when Harold's wife saw Babe standing in the back, they stood up & made the usher go get him to sit up front with them.

http://illkeepyouposted.typepad.com/ill_keep_you_posted/2008/05/fine-and-mellow.html 

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0908627/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm

Post 149: 'MEET ME BY THE ICEHOUSE, LIZZIE'

Friend Ralph was playing at a jazz gig when someone in the audience requested Meet Me by the Ice House, Lizzie. Unfortunately the band could not oblige as they didn't know this song.

Ralph later did his homework and then told me I might find this number enjoyable if I looked for it on You Tube.

It turned out that Meet Me by the Ice House, Lizzie was made famous in the 1930s by the Hoosier Hotshots. The Hoosier Hotshots (based in America) seem to have combined vaudeville with very good musicianship (including some unusual home-made musical instruments) to produce comic song  recordings that were popular through the middle of the Twentieth Century.

According to one source, Meet Me By the Ice House, Lizzie was composed in 1935 by someone called Cletus M. Wickens.

So I listened to the song performed on YouTube by the Hoosier Hotshots and I had to agree it was a very attractive, amusing number, and well suited to traditional jazz. This is mainly because it has a simple 32-bar structure (16 + 16 [no Middle Eight]), with an elementary chord sequence. Its words are of course comical, so adding a vocal - if your band has a willing singer - would be fun too.

I tried to work it out by ear and came up with the following lead sheet for Meet Me by the Ice House, Lizzie. On the recording, The Hoosiers perform it in the unusual Key of D; but I have put it into F, as this is more comfortable for me on the cornet.