The song of the day for Monday, September 11, 2017 is “Just in Time.”

About This Song

“Just in Time” is one of the great songs from the 1956 musical Bells Are Ringing: featuring music by Jule Style and lyrics from Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The song was introduced by Judy Holliday and Sidney Chaplin. Holliday and Dean Martin sang it in the 1960 film version of Bells Are Ringing.

About This Version

Today’s version of “Just in Time” is from Bennett’s 1962 concert at Carnegie Hall, which was beautifully recorded and released as Tony Bennett at Carnegie Hall. Ralph Sharon arranged all of the songs for the concert and conducted the orchestra.

About The Concert

Tony Bennett’s June 9, 1962 concert at Carnegie Hall is truly legendary and the resulting album is rightly regarded as one of the greatest recordings of a live concert ever made (thank you Frank Laico).

The concert came on the heels of the great success of “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” which had been released to great acclaim just a few months earlier.

Though some so-called critics felt that it was too soon in Bennett’s career to play Carnegie Hall, Bennett knew it was exactly the right time. And, in fact, the concert was completely sold out in less than two weeks.

Bennett relates in his autobiography The Good Life:

When “San Francisco” was peaking in early 1962, I was invited to appear at Carnegie Hall for the first time. Carnegie Hall had never featured a “pop” singer like myself as a solo performer. It was unprecedented. To my surprise, Columbia backed me completely. Goddard said, “You’ve got to play Carnegie Hall, and we’d love to make a record out of the concert.”

…

I put everything I’d been studying for the last twenty years into practice for that show. During the fifties I’d opened with swingin’ numbers like “Sing You Sinners” or “Taking a Chance on Love,” and sometimes I didn’t grab the crowd right away like I wanted to. One night when I was hanging with Count Basie I was talking to him about this, and he said, “Why open with a closer? Start with a medium-tempo number like ‘Just In Time,’ and give the audience a chance to settle in.”