My Old Flame

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"My Old Flame" is a 1934 song composed by Arthur Johnston with lyrics by Sam Coslow for the film Belle of the Nineties . It has since become a jazz standard.

Contents

History

"My Old Flame" first appeared in the 1934 film Belle of the Nineties when it was sung by Mae West, backed by the Duke Ellington Orchestra. [1] Six weeks after filming wrapped with West, Ellington recorded the tune with singer Ivie Anderson, [2] released on Commodore 585. [3] It became a No. 7 hit for Guy Lombardo later that year but it was not until the early 1940s that the tune re-emerged, entering the repertoire of the orchestras of Benny Goodman and Count Basie. [2]

Notable recordings

"My Old Flame" has since become a jazz standard, and sung by the likes of Billie Holiday, Peggy Lee, Dinah Washington, Helen Humes and Marlena Shaw, with instrumental interpretations by Charlie Parker for the Dial label in 1947, Gerry Mulligan with Chet Baker in 1953, trombonist J.J. Johnson on his 1957 album Trombone Master , Sonny Rollins on his 1993 album Old Flames and many others. [1] The tune was also recorded by the Stan Kenton orchestra, [2] and Zoot Sims in a "sensitive rendition" according to Jazz Improv magazine. [4] Spike Jones recorded a spoof version with vocals by Paul Frees (imitating Peter Lorre). [5] John Scofield included the song in his 2022 solo album. [6]

Lyrics and structure

The music has an AABA structure. [7] It is written in the key of G major, and features a change to B♭ in the 'B' section. [7] [8]

As a vehicle for West, while the lyric contains "characteristically flippant lines – 'My old flame/ I can't even remember his name' – it suggests that her brazen sexuality is the carapace for a lost youthful love": 'But their attempts at love/ Were only imitations of/ My old flame'. [9]

Related Research Articles

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<i>Belle of the Nineties</i> 1934 American Western film by Leo McCarey

Belle of the Nineties is a 1934 American Western film directed by Leo McCarey and released by Paramount Pictures. Mae West's fourth motion picture, it was based on her original story It Ain't No Sin, which was also to be the film's title until censors objected. Johnny Mack Brown, Duke Ellington, and Katherine DeMille are also in the cast. The film is noted for being the premiere performance of the jazz standard "My Old Flame", performed by West with the Duke Ellington Orchestra.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">1950s in jazz</span> Events of the 1950s related to jazz music

By the end of the 1940s, the nervous energy and tension of bebop was replaced with a tendency towards calm and smoothness, with the sounds of cool jazz, which favoured long, linear melodic lines. It emerged in New York City, as a result of the mixture of the styles of predominantly white swing jazz musicians and predominantly black bebop musicians, and it dominated jazz in the first half of the 1950s. The starting point were a series of singles on Capitol Records in 1949 and 1950 of a nonet led by trumpeter Miles Davis, collected and released first on a ten-inch and later a twelve-inch as the Birth of the Cool. Cool jazz recordings by Chet Baker, Dave Brubeck, Bill Evans, Gil Evans, Stan Getz and the Modern Jazz Quartet usually have a "lighter" sound which avoided the aggressive tempos and harmonic abstraction of bebop. Cool jazz later became strongly identified with the West Coast jazz scene, but also had a particular resonance in Europe, especially Scandinavia, with emergence of such major figures as baritone saxophonist Lars Gullin and pianist Bengt Hallberg. The theoretical underpinnings of cool jazz were set out by the blind Chicago pianist Lennie Tristano, and its influence stretches into such later developments as Bossa nova, modal jazz, and even free jazz. See also the list of cool jazz and West Coast musicians for further detail.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1930s in jazz</span> Events of the 1930s related to jazz music

Swing jazz emerged as a dominant form in American music, in which some virtuoso soloists became as famous as the band leaders. Key figures in developing the "big" jazz band included bandleaders and arrangers Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Glenn Miller, and Artie Shaw. Duke Ellington and his band members composed numerous swing era hits that have become standards: "It Don't Mean a Thing " (1932), "Sophisticated Lady" (1933) and "Caravan" (1936), among others. Other influential bandleaders of this period were Benny Goodman and Count Basie.

References

  1. 1 2 "My Old Flame". Jazzstandards.com. Retrieved 24 May 2020.
  2. 1 2 3 Gioia, Ted (2012). The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire. Oxford University Press. p. 283. ISBN   9780199769155.
  3. ↑ Bratkovich, Colin (8 May 2014). Just Remember This. Xlibris Corporation. p. 421. ISBN   9781483645193.
  4. ↑ "Jazz Improv, Volume 7, Issues 3-4". E.S. Proteus. 2007. p. 215.
  5. ↑ Gilliland, John. (197X). "Pop Chronicles 1940s Program #23 - All Tracks UNT Digital Library". Digital.library.unt.edu. Retrieved 2021-03-01.
  6. ↑ Jurek, Thom (2022). "John Scofield: John Scofield". AllMusic . Retrieved 6 July 2022.
  7. 1 2 "My Old Flame: Music and Lyrics Analysis". Jazzstandards.com. Retrieved 24 May 2020.
  8. ↑ Townsend, Peter (2007). Pearl Harbor Jazz: Change in Popular Music in the Early 1940s. University Press of Mississippi, Jackson. p. 140. ISBN   978-1-57806-924-8.
  9. ↑ Furia, Philip; Patterson, Laurie (2010). The Songs of Hollywood. Oxford University Press. pp. 120–121. ISBN   978-0-19-533708-2.
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