![]() He wrote both the music and his own lyrics, and his memorable melodies, rich harmonies and incredibly clever way with words are the perfect example of what comprises a Great American Songbook standard. Now, back to Cole Porter– who was he, and why should you care? Cole Porter was one of the most prolific and influential songwriters of the 20th century, composing hundreds of timeless songs for Broadway and the movies. Sublime, right? (not to mention the fabulous dancing!). Here’s a great sample– “The Best Things Happen When You’re Dancing”, sung by Danny Kaye, from Irving Berlins’s musical holiday favorite, White Christmas: As I stated in the About Nadia page of this blog, I want to share what I call “under-represented music”, and in so doing, open up a wonderful world of great repertoire to everyone, not only for enjoyment today, but to preserve these musical gems for the future as well. So let’s start to turn this negative into a positive! One of the things I love about performing, teaching, and now writing a blog about singing, is the opportunity to share my love for fantastic songs with audiences, students and my readers. They don’t even know what they‘re missing! That might be a metaphor, albeit an extreme one, for what’s happening to our audiences today. If you remember the musical West Side Story, there’s a great line where policeman Officer Krupke tells the young gang members “You’re depraved because you’re deprived”. Even their parents, at least another twenty-five years older, only know about the latest thing on the radio or whatever the entertainment media is pushing right now as The Next Big Thing. I find that it’s not only my late-teen/early-twenties college students who are woefully uninformed. With every year that goes by, I am more and more aghast at the dumbing-down of our arts culture in this country. I heaved a great sigh, and thus found the inspiration for this next blog post… “No one?” I followed up, even more wistfully. ![]() “How about The Great American Songbook? “ I tried again. I was met by utter silence and blank stares. ![]() “Has anyone ever heard of the famous American composer Cole Porter?” I hopefully asked my college Voice 1 class last week. ![]()
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