The Year of Tony Bennett

An Appreciation of the Art and Music of Tony Bennett

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Song of the Day: Blues In The Night

The song of the day for Sunday, December 13, 2015 is “Blues In The Night.”

About This Song

“Blues in the Night” was written in 1941 for the film of the same name by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer. Arlen wrote the music first and wrote a true blues song. Johnny Mercer, who later wrote the lyrics, drew on his southern heritage to write the exceptional blues lyrics.

About This Version

Tony Bennett recorded this version of “Blues In The Night” in 1957 for his jazz album The Beat of My Heart. For this album, Bennett chose to work with guest percussionists, including Candido and Sabu. The results were wonderful.

Blues In The Night

Listen to Blues In The Night on Spotify. Song · Tony Bennett · 1957


“Blues In The Night,” as well as The Beat of My Heart, is available from iTunes.

About Today

Today marks the centennial birthday of one of America’s greatest crime novelists: Ross Macdonald, both in Los Gatos, CA on December 13, 1915. Macdonald, he wrote the Lew Archer series, with powerful novels including The Drowning Pool, The Underground Man and The Galton Case.

I am a big fan of his writing and so, with your permission, choose to honor him today with a song, “Blues In The Night,” that he considered his favorite.

Macdonald (actually a pen name; his given name is Kenneth Millar) visited New York and 52nd Street at the end of World War II and fell in love with jazz, which remained his favorite music for the remainder of his life. He especially loved the music of Duke Ellington.

I’ve working on a website about this writer at Seeking Ross Macdonald, if you’d care to visit.

About Tomorrow

Tomorrow we begin the Fourth Annual Twelve Days of a Tony Bennett Christmas celebration! We’ll be featuring the best of Bennett’s Christmas songs, both secular and sacred.
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Song of the Day: Mood Indigo

The song of the day for Monday, November 30, 2015 is “Mood Indigo.”

About This Song

Originally titled “Dreamy Blues,” Ellington wrote this song in 1930, which is based on a theme by Barney Bigard, who is said to have learned it from his New Orleans clarinet teacher, Lorenzo Tio. Ellington wrote the song specifically for “microphone transmission” and it was first played on a 1930 radio broadcast. Audiences loved the song, and so Irving Mills wrote the lyric, changing the name of the song to “Mood Indigo.” The song has been widely recorded by instrumental and vocal artists, including Tony Bennett, Charles Mingus, Ella Fitzgerald, Thelonious Monk, Frank Sinatra, and Nat King Cole.

About This Version

Tony Bennett recorded “Mood Indigo” in 1999 for his tribute album to Duke Ellington, Bennett Sings Ellington: Hot & Cool. It was arranged by Jorge Calandrelli.

Mood Indigo

Tony Bennett · Bennett Sings Ellington / Hot And Cool · Song · 1999


“Mood Indigo,” as well as Bennett Sings Ellington: Hot & Cool, is available from iTunes.

About Today

You may have noticed that we have been playing a lot of Ellington lately. About six weeks ago, I picked up a book called Meanwhile There Are Letters, the Correspondence of Eudora Welty and Ross Macdonald. I came to the book as a fan of Eudora Welty, whom I had met in the late 1970s when I lived in Jackson, Mississippi. Welty and the mystery writer Ross Macdonald were fans of each other and began exchanging letters in 1970 until Macdonald’s death from complications of Alzheimer’s Disease. In writing these letters, Welty and Macdonald fell in love, though because Macdonald was married and because Welty was a lady, that love remained in their letters. As I said, I entered the book as a fan of Welty and along the way became a fan of Ross Macdonald. Ross loved jazz, as did Eudora, and he especially loved Duke Ellington’s music. And so I’m in a Duke Ellington kind of mood.

If any of you are interested in Ross Macdonald, I’ve started a website on him and his novels at seekingrossmacdonald.com. It’s not nearly complete, but you might find it interesting.

Oh, and a news flash: the 4th Annual Twelve Days of a Tony Bennett Christmas will start on December 14.

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Song of the Day: Blues in the Night

The song of the day for

About This Song

“Blues in the Night” was written in 1941 for the film of the same name by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer. Arlen wrote the music first and wrote a true blues song. Johnny Mercer, who later wrote the lyrics, drew on his southern heritage to write the exceptional blues lyrics.

In addition to our love for the music of Tony Bennett, we are big fans of the writer Kenneth Millar–whose pen name was Ross MacDonald–and this was his favorite song. Millar was true jazz fan and loved the American songbook. In a letter to his friend Eudora Welty, who had just seen a review of George Gershwin songs at the New Stage Theater in Jackson, Mississippi (where your author was the resident set and lighting designer once upon time), he wrote

I’m glad to hear of the celebration of Gershwin. He and Cole Porter and Ellington were the great celebrators and deserve to be celebrated. The other night, for the first time in three years (since Linda [his daughter] died) I got out some Ellington records and played them.

An author of hard-boiled crime novels after my own heart.

About This Version

Tony Bennett first recorded “Blues in the Night” in 1957 for his second jazz album The Beat of My Heart. This song features the great Chico Hamilton on drums. The Beat of My Heart was conceived and devised by Bennett and Ralph Sharon, who arranged and conducted.


“Blues in the Night,” as well as The Beat of My Heart, is available from iTunes.

About Today

For our Saturday video, we present this clip from the film Blues In The Night.

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