Review: Glenn Miller, "Moonlight Serenade"
Glenn Miller and I were heroes
When it was discovered
That I was the most beautiful
Boy of my generation,
They told Glenn Miller,
Whereby he got inspired
And wrote the saxophone
Wrote the reed sections--
like sautergain & finn--
and then they all did dance
and kissed me mooning stars
and I became the Yokum
of the wall-gang, flowers,
and believed in truth, & loved
the snowy earth
and had not truck
and had no responsibility
a bhikku in my heart
waiting for philosphy's
dreadful murderer
B U D D H A
- Jack Kerouac, "Mexico City Blues: 179th Chorus"
So I've been playing the piano a lot lately. Mostly just a bunch of messing around, trying to learn songs by ear or rearranging from guitar tabs found on the Internet. Every now and then, I'll flip through the piles of sheet music we've got here at home.
This week, I flipped open my big songbook and found Glenn Miller's "Moonlight Serenade." You know the tune, even if you don't know the words or can't recognize the name. It's that slow, reedy number usually played in 1930's or '40s period movies, where the soldier's dancing with his girlfriend at some USO ball. He's shipping out, may never come back; tears begin to glimmer in her eyes. That tune.
The song itself is beautifully simple. It's in F. No introduction: it gets right to the point: The chords are beautiful, and the best thing about the song is that it sings itself. It's a lilting melody, soft, breathy; it's the last thing you want to hear before you close your eyes and find yourself being kissed.
Every time I play it, I get goosebumps at the second chorus. Mitchell Parish's lyrics breath:
So don't...let me wait--
come to me, tenderly, in the June night--
I stand....at your gate--
and I sing you a song, in the moonlight...
It was a different world back then, when lush songs like this were everywhere, and the world was trashing in the agonies of its rebirth.
When it was discovered
That I was the most beautiful
Boy of my generation,
They told Glenn Miller,
Whereby he got inspired
And wrote the saxophone
Wrote the reed sections--
like sautergain & finn--
and then they all did dance
and kissed me mooning stars
and I became the Yokum
of the wall-gang, flowers,
and believed in truth, & loved
the snowy earth
and had not truck
and had no responsibility
a bhikku in my heart
waiting for philosphy's
dreadful murderer
B U D D H A
- Jack Kerouac, "Mexico City Blues: 179th Chorus"
So I've been playing the piano a lot lately. Mostly just a bunch of messing around, trying to learn songs by ear or rearranging from guitar tabs found on the Internet. Every now and then, I'll flip through the piles of sheet music we've got here at home.
This week, I flipped open my big songbook and found Glenn Miller's "Moonlight Serenade." You know the tune, even if you don't know the words or can't recognize the name. It's that slow, reedy number usually played in 1930's or '40s period movies, where the soldier's dancing with his girlfriend at some USO ball. He's shipping out, may never come back; tears begin to glimmer in her eyes. That tune.
The song itself is beautifully simple. It's in F. No introduction: it gets right to the point: The chords are beautiful, and the best thing about the song is that it sings itself. It's a lilting melody, soft, breathy; it's the last thing you want to hear before you close your eyes and find yourself being kissed.
Every time I play it, I get goosebumps at the second chorus. Mitchell Parish's lyrics breath:
So don't...let me wait--
come to me, tenderly, in the June night--
I stand....at your gate--
and I sing you a song, in the moonlight...
It was a different world back then, when lush songs like this were everywhere, and the world was trashing in the agonies of its rebirth.