The Johnny Mercer show today was one of the most exhausting shows I've ever done. I thought it would be easier than normal because I had a set list planned out in advance, but I felt like I was barely hanging on from the beginning until the end. I guess because of the cold I must just not be that alert & not up to my normal speed.
Normally I like getting phone calls but I was a little short with one caller today, who wanted me to read off the last set for her because she was trying to figure out what one particular song was. I told her to go online and read the playlist on the website but for some reason she didn't want to do that, instead she wanted me to list every song title and artist for her right then over the phone. I really didn't have time for it, I was trying to cue up the next song and only had a few seconds. I don't know, maybe she was in a record store, had to buy that song immediately and couldn't wait until she got home to look it up.
Despite how I felt, I think the show went pretty well. Somehow I got through it without any flubs and with things basically going the way I wanted them to. I tried to play a good range of songs from throughout Mercer's career, from his first published song ("Out of Breath and Scared to Death of You") to his last hit ("Summer Wind"). I had to drop a couple of songs in order to finish on time, and in retrospect I think they were both okay to lose. I mean neither one was indispensable to a Johnny Mercer show. And I got my favorites in there, like "Cuckoo in the Clock" sung by Mildred Bailey, "Glow Worm" by the Three Suns, and "Friendship" by Judy Garland and Johnny Mercer, which is the most deranged song about friendship I have ever heard. What can you say about a song that includes the line "If you ever took a bullet in the brain, I'd complain! It's friendship!" I finished with a set of all the songs for which he won Oscars, which allowed me to wind up the show with "Days of Wine and Roses." Such a beautiful song.
I ended up talking much less than I had intended, both because my voice wasn't up to it, and because there were so many Mercer songs I wanted to play, I just didn't have time for lengthy talksets. I forgot a few things that I had intended to say, for instance I was going to explain the origin of the line "my huckleberry friend" from "Moon River," since everyone always wonders what that means.* Alas, I forgot entirely. Oh well, overall I think it was probably good that I didn't talk so much. Because the show is about music, not me talking.
Now I think I might skip Iron Chef America and go to bed early.
*When Mercer was a kid his family owned a summer house on an island near Savannah. Every summer he and his friends would run and play down by the river on the island, and spend all day picking huckleberries. That's where "my huckleberry friend" comes from.
i heard about the last 30m and i thought it all sounded great. "moon river" is used to great effect in a very sad, bittersweet scene in 'sex and the city' so that song is the one that almost makes *me* cry.
i am sure your annoying caller has *no* idea what it's like to do a radio show and was only thinking of her own convenience.
it's hard to understand that "oh my god, ten seconds and the next song isn't cued!" panic until you've lived it.
I'm glad you had a chance to listen! It's funny how a song can develop such a strong emotional meaning. When do they use "Moon River" in Sex and the City? For me no version of that song can touch Audrey Hepburn's. Hearing it takes me right back to the movie.
I'm sure you're right about the caller just not understanding the time pressure. I've talked to people who clearly thought we have an engineer pushing all the buttons, and we just ... I don't know, sit there drinking lattes between talksets?
in s&tc, when carrie's first big love "big" leaves town, they dance to it in his empty apartment while saying goodbye.
frankly, all i ever did up there was drink lattes. lattes all the time. nothing but lattes.
That was you? I always wondered why there were so many damn latte cups all over that place.
gosh, I bet "Moon River" worked perfectly in that scene. "Two drifters, off to see the world, there's such a lot of world to see. We're after the same rainbow's end...." I'm getting misty just imagining it :)