"Love Theme From Romeo & Juliet" | ||||
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Single by Henry Mancini | ||||
from the album A Warm Shade of Ivory | ||||
B-side | "The Windmills of Your Mind" | |||
Released | May 1969 | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 2:29 | |||
Label | RCA Victor | |||
Songwriter(s) | Nino Rota | |||
Producer(s) | Joe Reisman | |||
Henry Mancini singles chronology | ||||
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"Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet", also known as "A Time for Us", is an instrumental arranged by Henry Mancini (from Nino Rota's music written for Franco Zeffirelli's film of Romeo and Juliet , starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey). [3]
The song was a number-one pop hit in the United States during the year 1969. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart on June 28, 1969, and remained there for two weeks; [4] it was also his only Top Ten single on that chart. [5]
Rearranged by Mancini, who played the piano part himself, [6] the song started competing with rock and roll songs from the Beatles and the Rolling Stones on an Orlando, Florida radio station and spread from there. [3] It faced stiff opposition from some radio stations for being too soft. Those stations changed their tune when the song became number one, ending the five-week run of "Get Back" by the Beatles as the top song. [5]
This release topped the U.S. easy listening chart for eight weeks, where it was Mancini's sole number one on the chart. [7]
The score was used for Lana Del Rey's song "Old Money" on her album Ultraviolence (2013). [8]
The song has at least three different sets of English lyrics.[ citation needed ]
The first English version is called "What Is a Youth?", featuring lyrics by Eugene Walter, and sung by Glen Weston. This version was used in the film and was released on the soundtrack album in 1968.[ citation needed ]
The second English version is called "A Time for Us", featuring lyrics by Larry Kusik and Eddie Snyder. [9] This version has been recorded by Johnny Mathis, Shirley Bassey, Andy Williams, Stevie Wonder, Donny Osmond (on the LP A Time for Us), and others.[ citation needed ]
The third English version is called "Old Money", featuring lyrics by Elizabeth Woolridge Grant, Robert John Ellis Fitzsimmons, and Daniel Law Heath, and sung by Lana Del Rey on her third studio album, Ultraviolence (2013).[ citation needed ]
Two different sets of Italian lyrics have been written for the song.[ citation needed ]
The first Italian version is called "Un Giorno Per Noi" (A Day for Us), sung by Josh Groban, and is considered a direct translation of the Kusik and Snyder version of "A Time for Us". [10]
The second Italian version is called "Ai Giochi Addio" (Goodbye to the Games), featuring lyrics by Elsa Morante, and has been performed by prominent opera singers, such as Luciano Pavarotti and Natasha Marsh. [11]
In 1971, a Vietnamese language version of the popular melody, entitled "Chuyện tình Romeo Và Juliette," was recorded by Dạ Hương and released on a reel-to-reel compilation put out by the South Vietnamese record label Shotguns. [12]
Chart (1969) | Peak position |
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U.S. Billboard Hot 100 | 1 |
Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
---|---|---|
United States (RIAA) [13] Archived 2021-07-22 at the Wayback Machine | Gold | 1,000,000^ |
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone. |
Romeo and Juliet is a 1968 period romantic tragedy film, based on the play of the same name by William Shakespeare. Directed and co-written by Franco Zeffirelli, the film stars Leonard Whiting as Romeo and Olivia Hussey as Juliet. Laurence Olivier spoke the film's prologue and epilogue and dubs the voice of Antonio Pierfederici, who played Lord Montague but was not credited on-screen. The cast also features Milo O'Shea, Michael York, John McEnery, Bruce Robinson, and Robert Stephens.
"Bad Moon Rising" is a song written by John Fogerty and performed by Creedence Clearwater Revival. It was the lead single from their album Green River and was released on April 16, 1969 four months before the album. The song peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on 28 June 1969 and reached No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart for three weeks in September of that year. It was CCR's second gold single.
"Love Theme from The Godfather" is an instrumental theme from the 1972 film The Godfather, composed by Nino Rota. The piece was lyricized in English by Larry Kusik into "Speak Softly, Love", a popular song released in 1972. The highest-charting rendition of either version was by vocalist Andy Williams, who took "Speak Softly Love" to number 34 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 and number seven on its Easy Listening chart.
Moon River: The Very Best of Andy Williams is a compilation album by American pop singer Andy Williams that was released on October 13, 2009. A note from Williams inside the CD booklet explains that the album "was put together to coincide with my memoir Moon River and Me, published by Viking/Penguin. It includes many of the songs that you made hits. I truly appreciate that, and I hope you enjoy the songs we selected for this CD." The collection covers a wide assortment of his material, including crossover hits, stabs at the youth market, a pair of Mancini-Mercer Oscar winners, a Christmas classic, and a eulogy to Robert F. Kennedy.
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The soundtrack for the 1968 film Romeo and Juliet was composed and conducted by Nino Rota. It was originally released as an LP, containing nine entries, most notably the song "What Is a Youth", composed by Nino Rota, written by Eugene Walter and performed by Glen Weston. The music score won a Silver Ribbon award of the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists in 1968 and was nominated for two other awards.
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A Warm Shade of Ivory is a 1969 album by American composer and arranger Henry Mancini issued by RCA Records. The album peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Album Chart on 2 August 1969. Mancini's arrangement of Nino Rota’s Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet topped the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart on June 28, 1969, and remained there for two weeks.
Mancini had a side hustle as an easy-listening conductor, and his version of the Romeo And Juliet love theme is grander and less subtle than the one that Rota recorded.