Hal David Archives

Review: Elaine Paige’s “Miscellaneous Paige”

Posted by Mike Tobyn at 8:30 am No Responses »

Jul 242026

For UK-based fans of Musical Theatre, the BBC’s “Elaine Paige on Sunday” (of course, also available on streaming anytime) is a joy. It’s filled with the best-known songs from hit shows, less celebrated tracks from those shows, songs from shows that have not yet reached the West End, songs that reached it but sank without trace and will not be revived, and songs from shows that may be revived one day.

As a celebrated interpreter of Stephen Sondheim, Paige knows a bit about lost shows that get revived into huge hits. As an originator of key roles in musicals such as Cats and Evita, she knows what a hit show looks and feels like. And, like everyone who has worked in the theatre for nearly 60 years, she has participated in shows which died quickly, for whatever reason, but which may have contained great material.

These days her reputation could still fill theatres and concert halls, but she feels that her 78-year-old voice could not physically fill them and do justice to the work–and for her, the work is the Primary driver. However, she can still do cabaret work, and she is operating in that territory with her new album, Miscellaneous Paige. The selections have a theme of time passing, which may be a focus for someone at Paige’s time of life.
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In The Spotlight: Laura Cantrell

Posted by Mike Tobyn at 10:00 am 1 Response »

Feb 142025

In the Spotlight showcases a cross-section of an artist’s cover work. View past installments, then post suggestions for future picks in the comments!

Laura Cantrell is one of the best-known Country Music artists in the United Kingdom. Something about the purity of her voice and the clarity of her vision has a particular appeal to the British. For a quarter of a century, since her debut LP, she has been adopted by the small number of mainstream DJs that cover Country music in the UK, and she has cultivated that opportunity. Any musician who is managing to make a living from their art knows that any audience is something to be appreciated, and Cantrell has reciprocated the love. The crowdfunding for her last recording received disproportionate subscriptions from the UK, and the gratitude when it eventually came out was significant.

Born in Nashville and thus marinaded in America’s art form, Cantrell has spent much of her singing and alternate professional life in another city far from the country mainstream, New York. By choice or circumstance, she has established herself away from musical metropolises of her field, but that does not mean that she does not have a deep knowledge and appreciation of the genre. She also performs and records in Nashville. For many years she hosted a country music show on the radio, and she has a particular knowledge and appreciation of the role of women in country music, the well known pioneers and those whose stories were lost for whatever reason. Her song “Queen of the Coast” is an appreciation of Bonnie Owens, a considerable talent in her own right, but who spent much of her life backup singing and doing domestic duties for her husbands, Merle Haggard and Buck Owens.

Throughout her career, she has mixed her own songs with covers, covering similar stories, of universal themes with personal angles, often with the greats of the music accompanying her. The stories are familiar but the delivery is unique to her.
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Five Good Covers: “Trains and Boats and Planes” (Burt Bacharach)

Posted by Patrick Robbins at 11:00 am 2 Responses »

Jun 162023

Five Good Covers presents five cross-genre reinterpretations of an oft-covered song.

Many if not most of Burt Bacharach’s big hits were first released by other artists, usually Dionne Warwick. One big exception was “Trains and Boats and Planes,” a tale of transcontinental love which Bacharach thought was “too country” for Warwick; Bacharach and his writing partner Hal David had written the song for Gene Pitney to sing. Pitney, however, had other ideas; he rejected it and told Bacharach, “It’s not one of your better ones.”

Never one to sulk when insult was added to injury, Bacharach went to London and recorded the song with an orchestra. No lead vocalist, Bacharach assigned the lyrics to the Breakaways, a girl group who also sang backing vocals on Petula Clark’s “Downtown” and Jimi Hendrix’s “Hey Joe.” Their cool, detached voices suited the impassive song perfectly, but the bridge (“You are from another part of the world…”) proved to be too tricky, and Bacharach covered for them by making it an instrumental passage.

Today the song has earned its reputation as one of Bacharach’s better ones, Pitney notwithstanding. His version was a hit, and so was Warwick’s well-nigh-inevitable cover. The dozens of other covers that followed proved the song was strong enough to thrive under any approach, either with or without the bridge. Here are five of them.

In Memoriam: Burt Bacharach

Posted by Patrick Robbins at 11:30 am 1 Response »

Feb 102023

In Memoriam pays tribute to those who have left this world, and the songs they left us to remember them by.

Burt Bacharach, who along with his writing partner Hal David embodied the sophisticated pop sounds of the 1960s, died of natural causes at his home in Los Angeles on February 8. He was 94 years old.

The Best Cover Songs of April 2022

Posted by Ray Padgett at 12:42 pm 2 Responses »

Apr 292022

Aimee Mann – Brooklyn (Steely Dan cover)

If you missed the whole brouhaha when Steely Dan dropped Aimee Mann as their opening act, it’s too long to recap here. To skip to the end, Mann tweeted, “All is forgiven if Donald [Fagan] just tells me what Brooklyn is about.” And he did! So, at a recent show at City Winery, she covered it. All does indeed appear to be forgiven. Continue reading »

Bryan Ferry Records Slow and Subdued “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself”

Posted by Riley Haas at 11:30 am No Responses »

Apr 212022

bryan ferry i just don't know what to do with myself

Bacharach and David’s oft-covered “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself” was first a hit outside of North America for Dusty Springfield and then in North America for Dionne Warwick. For younger people, the most famous version is probably that of The White Stripes, whose version did pretty well in the charts too.

The most famous covers of the song stick to a pretty similar tempo and feel – even the White Stripes cover, despite upping the volume considerably. But, on his new version from forthcoming EP Love Letters, Bryan Ferry slows down the pace of the song considerably and, despite the presence of a string section, he dials back on the emotion considerably. It’s pretty subdued performance for a song that routinely lends itself to histrionics. Continue reading »