Hal David RIP

[mjzee]

Hal David, whose simple, heartfelt lyrics made a perfect fit with Burt Bacharach's quirky melodies and resulted in dozens of hit songs, including "Do You Know the Way to San Jose" and "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head," died Saturday. He was 91.

See:

http://news.yahoo.co...-205354931.html

[JSngry]

One of the definers of 20th Century American Pop Music, to be sure.

From the sublime

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75WRBvFyh8s

To the scary-as-hell..."Walk Little Dolly" (if you can find it somewhere...)

To...whatever this is...hated it as a kid, love it now. I get it.

Sure, it was Bacharach-David, and Bacharach's production/arranging was genius unto itself, but one could well make the case that without those lyrics, those would never be POP songs, especially not successful ones.

And one could also make the case that not until or after Elvis Costello did Bacharach ever work with a lyricist who got the best out of him. Carole Bayer-Sager? Uh....no.

RIP Hal David, and thank you, sir. You served us well.

[Dave James]

New York Times article. One of the truly great writers. RIP.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2012/09/01/us/ap-us-obit-hal-david.html?_r=1&hpw

[paul secor]

"Sea of Heartbreak", written by Mr. Davis with Paul Hampton, is one of my favorite pop/country songs.

[JSngry]

wow...

[JSngry]

Find a Dionne cut called "How Can I Hurt You" it's one of the more bizarre Bacharach-David songs, mostly on Bacharach's part, this shit is really weird. but geez, who else could've kept up lyrically?

[JSngry]

Here's another one where the melody goes off on some tangents out of nowhere, and they lyrics are right there...I wonder what their practice was, who led who, or was it a 50/50...it was definitely Magic calling on Craft, and Craft had Mad Skills to answer the call, for sure.

[Hardbopjazz]

RIP Hal. Some great lyrics came from him.

[medjuck]

Let's not forget "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" which IIRC is not heard in the film.

[JSngry]

It flows better when Dionne sings it, can't find a video of it though, but...damn...this stuff just comes out of nowhere, and the lyrics are what grounds it as a song, I think.

Without those words, it's "just" a clever combination of melodic events (yeah, "just"...as if...)

"Now here I am, the last one to be loved"...DAMN, that's some strong stuff...you can't get there by just notes alone, not there.

I miss the days when a 45 could just make your world change in about 3:00, more or less. Thy were like little guerrilla raids masquerading as disposable commercial product...I guess they were both, but the notion that somebody would dare to put a song like this out for public consumption speaks to a collective courage and defiant optimism that has all but been sucked out of our world...or whatever.

Whatever, yeah, whatever. But this did happen, this off-the-wall popular music, and it was good. And Hal David was one of the ones who did it.

[Teasing the Korean]

RIP.

[GA Russell]

The New York Times article says that The Beatles did one of their songs. Does anyone know what that was?

[Dave James]

Let's not forget "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" which IIRC is not heard in the film.

My all-time favorite John Wayne film and one of Gene Pitney's more memorable songs. I never thought about it not actually being in the film. Interesting.

wow...

Am I the only one who hears a lot of Do You Know The Way To San Jose in that one? NIce song. Wonder how many the guy wrote in his lifetime?

[JSngry]

The New York Times article says that The Beatles did one of their songs. Does anyone know what that was?

"Baby It's You"

[JSngry]

The original:

Kudos to John for feeling that vocal and not just singing it. And of course, to Shirley Alston as well, just for being Shirley Alston.

[GA Russell]

Thanks Jim. As I recall, both Dionne Warwick and The Shirelles recorded for the same label (Wand/Scepter), so I was thinking that it might be a cover of a Shirelles song, but I forgot about that one.

Note: I could be wrong about Shirelles being on Wand/Scepter.

[JSngry]

You're not, although they cut a few sides for Decca before that. But no hits.

Brunswick, then Decca. Same company by then...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrwk4pgMtCg

[paul secor]

You're not, although they cut a few sides for Decca before that. But no hits.

Brunswick, then Decca. Same company by then...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrwk4pgMtCg

"I Met Him on a Sunday" on Decca was a small hit. I can recall hearing on the radio. Perhaps it was strictly an east coast success.

Edited September 2, 2012 by paul secor

[GA Russell]

I hear I Met Him on a Sunday fairly often on Sirius. Of course, I also hear The McCoys' Fever fairly often on Sirius, and that was a very minor hit where I lived in New Orleans.

[Jazzmoose]

One of the biggest.

[mjzee]

To savor a list of songs composed by Burt Bacharach with lyrics by Hal David, who died Saturday at age 91, is to delight in the majesty of their achievement: "One Less Bell to Answer," "The Look of Love," "(They Long to Be) Close to You," "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me," "This Guy's in Love With You," "What's New Pussycat?" and "What the World Needs Now Is Love"—and the incomparable string of hits they had with singer Dionne Warwick, including "Do You Know the Way to San Jose," "Don't Make Me Over," "I'll Never Fall in Love Again," "I Say a Little Prayer" and "Walk on By."

Music lovers of a certain age can recall the melodies of those songs and, just as easily, David's lyrics, which are characterized by straight talk, vernacular, concision, a narrative flow, insight, an easy wit and a bittersweet take on love, in which heartache demoralizes but never destroys.

More here:

WSJ

[danasgoodstuff]

The windows of the world are filled with rain/ when will the dark clouds disappear?

[fasstrack]

Hal David, whose simple, heartfelt lyrics made a perfect fit with Burt Bacharach's quirky melodies and resulted in dozens of hit songs, including "Do You Know the Way to San Jose" and "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head," died Saturday. He was 91.

See:

http://news.yahoo.co...-205354931.html

Bacharach and David were great. Are great.

It's nice too they made up with Dionne Warwick. Bad feelings should be gone and the soul clear when it's time to shuffle off...

Edited September 5, 2012 by fasstrack

[Ted O'Reilly]

David/Bacharach/Warwick productions all seemed to feature the same trumpeter playing the melody. Is that so? If so, anyone know who it was?

[JSngry]

Don't know who it actually was, but a buddy of mine tells the story of getting hired to play a Bacharach "Pops" concert, and Bacharach cajoling him to get the right sound by saying, "Play wispy, like fog, like smoke, like...Herb Alpert".

Now which came first, I don't know. But my buddy was thrown for a BIG loop, because Herb alpert is not exactly "respected" as a "trumpet player", if you know what I mean. But it's interesting to me that Bacharach either found his trumpet muse in Alpert, or Alpert his in Bacharach.