My Funny Valentine
My Funny Valentine is a ballad from the Broadway musical Babes in Arms, composed by Richard Rodgers with the text by Lorenz Hart from the year 1937. He was. Due to the versions of Chet Baker and Miles Davis became a popular jazz standard of the Modern Jazz
The title
The written in old-fashioned English text contains an unusual compliment: The angesungene in the song Valentine is not ideal proportioned and his mouth is too soft; nevertheless expressed the desire that he should not change because he would just as he was loved.
The song melody goes beyond 36 cycles, in the form of a song AA1BA2, part- A2 is extended by four to twelve bars. " The A- items are fully logically developed from a simple motif of the first two bars, repeated or modified in the course of the A- parts. " Harmonious the ballad begins on a minor parallel; the first parts also carry a fallacy in turn to the minor. Only in the last four bars of the song, the tonic is reached. The song is usually presented at a moderate pace.
Starting the recording mode
On stage, My Funny Valentine was presented in 1937 by Mitzi Green. The potential of the ballad was not immediately recognized. The song was therefore not included in the film version of the musical. Not until 1945 that came the song in the interpretation by Hal McIntyre and his Orchestra ( with vocalist Ruth Gaylor ) in the American charts (# 16 ), where he remained, however, only a week.
The way to Jazz Standard
But he became better known for the first time in 1952 by Chet Baker's first recording with Gerry Mulligan, who became a "cult recording"; the bassist of the band, Carson Smith, had found the then rather obscure song in a songbook. 1955 Miles Davis played the title for the first time ( with John Coltrane ) a; 1956 was followed by Ella Fitzgerald. This led finally to My Funny Valentine to establish as much recorded jazz standard in modern jazz. Miles Davis took in 1959 at a concert at a jazz party at New York's Plaza Hotel ( Jazz at the Plaza Vol 1) a more stunning version with Bill Evans and should polish the piece in his career even further.
The composition is now part of the traditional repertoire of modern jazz and was out of the above, by many musicians, such as, among others, Franco Ambrosetti, Art Blakey, Conte Candoli, Ron Carter / Cedar Walton, Bill Evans, Tal Farlow, Art Farmer, Erroll Garner Stan Getz, Jimmy Giuffre, Grant Green, Woody Herman, Barney Kessel, Eartha Kitt ( with Rolf and Joachim Kühn), Gerry Mulligan, Oscar Peterson, Bud Powell, Jimmy Raney, Dianne Reeves, Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Smith, Bobby Timmons and Larry Young recorded.
Career in pop music
In the field of popular music of the title was repeatedly sung after 1952:
Use in-game movie
Even in films of the song were made:
Important recordings in jazz
- Chet Baker, Gerry Mulligan: My Funny Valentine ( Blue Note Records, 1952)
- Miles Davis: Cookin ' ( Prestige / OJC, 1956) with John Coltrane, Jazz at the Plaza Vol 1 (Columbia, 1959) with Bill Evans, My Funny Valentine / The Complete Concert ( Columbia, 1964)
- Bill Evans, Jim Hall: Undercurrent ( Riverside, 1962)
- Chet Baker, Rachel Gould All Blues ( reissued in Celeste )