Search found 358 matches
- Fri Jan 25, 2008 9:11 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Woman
- Replies: 8
- Views: 6818
I attended several concerts in which Burt played New York Lady. Once, at the Garden State Arts Center, it was exactly as in the album (I believe some key members of the Houston Symphony were present). The following time, at the same venue, it was far from the original. Same applies to the other time...
- Thu Jan 17, 2008 1:59 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Article in The Japan Times
- Replies: 0
- Views: 1966
Article in The Japan Times
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/rss/fm20080117r1.html Burt Bacharach: Been there, wrote that By WAYNE GABEL Special to The Japan Times Let other musicians measure their success with applause and awards. Burt Bacharach's been there and done that. The writer of 48 Top 10 hits and winner of seven Grammy...
- Sat Jan 12, 2008 8:54 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Burt on Qantas
- Replies: 6
- Views: 5963
- Sat Jan 12, 2008 9:18 am
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Burt and Politics
- Replies: 0
- Views: 1863
Burt and Politics
Has anyone heard anything about Burt and the primaries of the two major parties? Is he supporting any candidate?
- Sat Jan 12, 2008 9:15 am
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Burt on Qantas
- Replies: 6
- Views: 5963
- Sun Dec 30, 2007 8:46 am
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Finally...www.burtbacharachpage.com
- Replies: 5
- Views: 4563
- Thu Dec 27, 2007 1:41 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Composer proves he’s got staying power [and then some!!!]
- Replies: 1
- Views: 2191
Composer proves he’s got staying power [and then some!!!]
http://www.aspentimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll ... e=printart
Burt Bacharach plays the Wheeler
At 79, composer proves he’s got staying power
Composer-pianist Burt Bacharach performs Thursday at Aspen’s Wheeler Opera House. (Olaf Heine)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stewart Oksenhorn
Aspen, CO Colorado
December 27, 2007
ASPEN — Burt Bacharach doesn’t tend to have that movie moment in his songwriting — that instance when the musicians put the final touches on a song, and the singer, the band and the producer all look at one another, then break into that big smile that says, “Hit record!†Bacharach has had a staggering number of hit songs — 70 that have made the top 40 since he first made the charts, in 1957. (That first hit, “The Story of My Life,†as recorded by Marty Robbins, was No. 1 on the Country and Western charts.) But the element Bacharach typically listens for, to see if a song is going to take a prominent place on radio, is one that doesn’t announce itself the moment the session is done.
A great song, at least by the standards of someone who has composed many of them, has to sound as good after the 50th spin as it did on the first.
“It’s something that doesn’t wear me out, doesn’t beat me up,†said Bacharach from his home in Los Angeles, explaining what he tries to put into his songwriting. “So it’s not, you listen four or five times and you love it, and then you say, ‘OK, enough with that.’ If I get tired of it quicker than I should, I have to rethink it.â€
The best of Bacharach’s songs — “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head,†“I Say a Little Prayer,†“Walk on By†— have stood that test of time, working their way into the collective American consciousness. Often, his songs have been reworked decades after they were first recorded; such artists as rockers the White Stripes (“I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myselfâ€), the folk-punk Ani DiFranco (“Wishin and Hopin’â€), and the British New Wave band Naked Eyes, who had a 1982 hit with “Always Something There to Remind Me,†have honored Bacharach by reinterpreting his songs.
Bacharach himself has similarly been favored by the passing of time. While he’s no longer the hit-making machine he was through the ’60s and early ’70s — when he and lyricist Hal David were churning out tunes for singer Dionne Warwick — he has been embraced by a younger generation of artists and fans. The cover of “Definitely Maybe,†the debut album by British rockers Oasis, featured a photo of Bacharach; the band’s singer, Noel Gallagher, once performed Bacharach’s “This Guy’s in Love With You†with the composer. Elvis Costello made an entire album, 1998’s much-lauded “Painted From Memory,†with Bacharach, and the two are at work on a new batch of songs, likely to be recorded by Costello’s wife, jazz singer and pianist Diana Krall. Bacharach has made appearances in all three “Austin Powers†films, making the 79-year-old improbably recognizable to hordes of 10-year-olds. He has likewise made three appearances on “American Idolâ€; in the most recent of them, finalists competed in singing a 12-minute medley of Bacharach songs.
In a way, Bacharach’s popularity with the likes of Gallagher and Costello — not to mention hip-hopper Dr. Dre, who added loops and drumbeats to Bacharach’s 2005 album “At This Time†— is improbable enough. The composer specialized in a brand of light, romantic music that may have been popular and enduring, but was hardly the essence of cool or dwelled on the cutting-edge. Bacharach himself says that the main ingredient in his music has been accessibility — an element that normally fades over the years. But what the younger crowd is responding to isn’t Bacharach’s persona, but his way with a song.
This continuing relevance underscores another facet to the music. For all of their easy hummability, Bacharach’s songs have more complexity to them than is evident on the surface. His music employs distinctive time changes and unexpected chord progressions, to go with their incomparable melodies.
Perhaps even more than the individual songs, Bacharach has created a signature. A Burt Bacharach song, even divorced from Hal David’s lyrics, sounds like a Burt Bacharach song, whether sung by Dionne Warwick or Tom Jones, Christopher Cross or B.J. Thomas. Much of that has to do with the fact that Bacharach is not only a composer, but an arranger and producer as well, with his hands firmly on how his songs are framed and adorned.
“It just may have something to do with the orchestration, the way it’s presented,†said Bacharach, who performs at the Wheeler Opera House on Thursday, Dec. 27. “So much of the music has been born with the songs and the orchestration at the same time. ‘What’s New Pussycat’ and ‘Walk on By’ are very different — but there’s a common thread there that I haven’t figured out. I haven’t tried to figure it out. But people say it sounds like a Burt Bacharach song.â€
Bacharach may have been a king of the ’60s, and remains a vital creative force, but there have also been low periods in his career. The one that seems still to be at the front of his mind is the 1973 remake of the classic 1937 film, “Lost Horizon.†The artistic difficulties in making the film were severe, and the critical and commercial rejection that followed seemed inevitable. Taking a significant portion of the blow were the songs themselves; the experience was enough to split the Bacharach/David writing team, and cause the former to rethink even his past accomplishments.
“It was a disastrous picture,†said Bacharach. “I didn’t want to write anymore. I just wanted to hang out at the beach. You don’t look at the body of work you’ve already done. You’re just right in the moment: ‘That’s a failure.’â€
Time, however, has led to a different perspective. “I’ve gone back to the score, and it’s pretty good. It’s got good songs,†he said. “The movie just wasn’t good, but it didn’t have anything to do with me. It’s out of your control when it goes up on the screen.â€
In the context of all that Bacharach is capable of, a film debacle from 35 years ago seems like a mere pebble in the road. After his Aspen performance — which features an eight-piece band, three singers, and Bacharach playing piano and doing a spot of singing himself — he is off to Hawaii, then Japan and Australia. All of those subsequent appearances are symphonic concerts, with Bacharach conducting the orchestra in his arrangements of his songs.
Asked if he could think of anyone else who had such a deep involvement — composing, arranging, producing, conducting — with a repertoire of songs, Bacharach could come up with three names: David Foster, whose songs include the movie hits “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion),†and “I Have Nothing,†from “The Bodyguardâ€; Henry Mancini, known best for his movie and TV scores, but was not much of a presence on radio; and his friend Elvis Costello, the former punk rocker who has taken up composing classical music and arranging and singing jazz.
“Outside of that, I don’t know who else,†said Bacharach. “As far as an overall package of singing, writing, producing, writing the arrangements, I think there’s just me.â€
Burt Bacharach performs Thursday, Dec. 27, at 8 p.m. at Aspen’s Wheeler Opera House. Tickets are $100 and $125 for reserved seating, with limited, premium seating for $175, available at www.aspenshowtickets.com and at the Wheeler.
stewart@aspentimes.com
Burt Bacharach plays the Wheeler
At 79, composer proves he’s got staying power
Composer-pianist Burt Bacharach performs Thursday at Aspen’s Wheeler Opera House. (Olaf Heine)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stewart Oksenhorn
Aspen, CO Colorado
December 27, 2007
ASPEN — Burt Bacharach doesn’t tend to have that movie moment in his songwriting — that instance when the musicians put the final touches on a song, and the singer, the band and the producer all look at one another, then break into that big smile that says, “Hit record!†Bacharach has had a staggering number of hit songs — 70 that have made the top 40 since he first made the charts, in 1957. (That first hit, “The Story of My Life,†as recorded by Marty Robbins, was No. 1 on the Country and Western charts.) But the element Bacharach typically listens for, to see if a song is going to take a prominent place on radio, is one that doesn’t announce itself the moment the session is done.
A great song, at least by the standards of someone who has composed many of them, has to sound as good after the 50th spin as it did on the first.
“It’s something that doesn’t wear me out, doesn’t beat me up,†said Bacharach from his home in Los Angeles, explaining what he tries to put into his songwriting. “So it’s not, you listen four or five times and you love it, and then you say, ‘OK, enough with that.’ If I get tired of it quicker than I should, I have to rethink it.â€
The best of Bacharach’s songs — “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head,†“I Say a Little Prayer,†“Walk on By†— have stood that test of time, working their way into the collective American consciousness. Often, his songs have been reworked decades after they were first recorded; such artists as rockers the White Stripes (“I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myselfâ€), the folk-punk Ani DiFranco (“Wishin and Hopin’â€), and the British New Wave band Naked Eyes, who had a 1982 hit with “Always Something There to Remind Me,†have honored Bacharach by reinterpreting his songs.
Bacharach himself has similarly been favored by the passing of time. While he’s no longer the hit-making machine he was through the ’60s and early ’70s — when he and lyricist Hal David were churning out tunes for singer Dionne Warwick — he has been embraced by a younger generation of artists and fans. The cover of “Definitely Maybe,†the debut album by British rockers Oasis, featured a photo of Bacharach; the band’s singer, Noel Gallagher, once performed Bacharach’s “This Guy’s in Love With You†with the composer. Elvis Costello made an entire album, 1998’s much-lauded “Painted From Memory,†with Bacharach, and the two are at work on a new batch of songs, likely to be recorded by Costello’s wife, jazz singer and pianist Diana Krall. Bacharach has made appearances in all three “Austin Powers†films, making the 79-year-old improbably recognizable to hordes of 10-year-olds. He has likewise made three appearances on “American Idolâ€; in the most recent of them, finalists competed in singing a 12-minute medley of Bacharach songs.
In a way, Bacharach’s popularity with the likes of Gallagher and Costello — not to mention hip-hopper Dr. Dre, who added loops and drumbeats to Bacharach’s 2005 album “At This Time†— is improbable enough. The composer specialized in a brand of light, romantic music that may have been popular and enduring, but was hardly the essence of cool or dwelled on the cutting-edge. Bacharach himself says that the main ingredient in his music has been accessibility — an element that normally fades over the years. But what the younger crowd is responding to isn’t Bacharach’s persona, but his way with a song.
This continuing relevance underscores another facet to the music. For all of their easy hummability, Bacharach’s songs have more complexity to them than is evident on the surface. His music employs distinctive time changes and unexpected chord progressions, to go with their incomparable melodies.
Perhaps even more than the individual songs, Bacharach has created a signature. A Burt Bacharach song, even divorced from Hal David’s lyrics, sounds like a Burt Bacharach song, whether sung by Dionne Warwick or Tom Jones, Christopher Cross or B.J. Thomas. Much of that has to do with the fact that Bacharach is not only a composer, but an arranger and producer as well, with his hands firmly on how his songs are framed and adorned.
“It just may have something to do with the orchestration, the way it’s presented,†said Bacharach, who performs at the Wheeler Opera House on Thursday, Dec. 27. “So much of the music has been born with the songs and the orchestration at the same time. ‘What’s New Pussycat’ and ‘Walk on By’ are very different — but there’s a common thread there that I haven’t figured out. I haven’t tried to figure it out. But people say it sounds like a Burt Bacharach song.â€
Bacharach may have been a king of the ’60s, and remains a vital creative force, but there have also been low periods in his career. The one that seems still to be at the front of his mind is the 1973 remake of the classic 1937 film, “Lost Horizon.†The artistic difficulties in making the film were severe, and the critical and commercial rejection that followed seemed inevitable. Taking a significant portion of the blow were the songs themselves; the experience was enough to split the Bacharach/David writing team, and cause the former to rethink even his past accomplishments.
“It was a disastrous picture,†said Bacharach. “I didn’t want to write anymore. I just wanted to hang out at the beach. You don’t look at the body of work you’ve already done. You’re just right in the moment: ‘That’s a failure.’â€
Time, however, has led to a different perspective. “I’ve gone back to the score, and it’s pretty good. It’s got good songs,†he said. “The movie just wasn’t good, but it didn’t have anything to do with me. It’s out of your control when it goes up on the screen.â€
In the context of all that Bacharach is capable of, a film debacle from 35 years ago seems like a mere pebble in the road. After his Aspen performance — which features an eight-piece band, three singers, and Bacharach playing piano and doing a spot of singing himself — he is off to Hawaii, then Japan and Australia. All of those subsequent appearances are symphonic concerts, with Bacharach conducting the orchestra in his arrangements of his songs.
Asked if he could think of anyone else who had such a deep involvement — composing, arranging, producing, conducting — with a repertoire of songs, Bacharach could come up with three names: David Foster, whose songs include the movie hits “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion),†and “I Have Nothing,†from “The Bodyguardâ€; Henry Mancini, known best for his movie and TV scores, but was not much of a presence on radio; and his friend Elvis Costello, the former punk rocker who has taken up composing classical music and arranging and singing jazz.
“Outside of that, I don’t know who else,†said Bacharach. “As far as an overall package of singing, writing, producing, writing the arrangements, I think there’s just me.â€
Burt Bacharach performs Thursday, Dec. 27, at 8 p.m. at Aspen’s Wheeler Opera House. Tickets are $100 and $125 for reserved seating, with limited, premium seating for $175, available at www.aspenshowtickets.com and at the Wheeler.
stewart@aspentimes.com
- Fri Dec 07, 2007 4:57 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Bacharach-David Musical Love Sweet Love
- Replies: 6
- Views: 6235
Reviews from those who attended (LA Times):
http://www.calendarlive.com/stage/61665 ... iews.event
One of the reviwers, Steven Stanley, refers us to his complete review. For ease of reference, here's he direct link:
http://www.lastagescene.com/lovesweetlove.html
http://www.calendarlive.com/stage/61665 ... iews.event
One of the reviwers, Steven Stanley, refers us to his complete review. For ease of reference, here's he direct link:
http://www.lastagescene.com/lovesweetlove.html
- Wed Dec 05, 2007 1:34 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Bacharach-David Musical Love Sweet Love
- Replies: 6
- Views: 6235
LA TIMES REVIEW
http://www.calendarlive.com/stage/cl-et-lovereview3dec03,0,5246318.story?coll=cl-stage-features [LOS ANGELES TIMES] THEATER REVIEW 'Love Sweet Love' The musical showcasing the tunes of Burt Bacharach and Hal David pays off in the long run, thanks to the director-choreographer and a wonderful cast. B...
- Wed Dec 05, 2007 8:04 am
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Put Your Youtube.com Links Here! (if you want)
- Replies: 1313
- Views: 1323014
- Wed Nov 28, 2007 9:22 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Bacharach-David Musical Love Sweet Love
- Replies: 6
- Views: 6235
http://www.sgvtribune.com/lifestyle/ci_7542257 Revisiting the look of love BY STEVEN D. HARRIS, CORRESPONDENT Preview LOVE SWEET LOVE What: The words and music of Burt Bacharach and Hal David Where: Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts, 12700 Center Court Drive, Cerritos When: 8 p.m. Friday, 2 an...
- Fri Nov 02, 2007 2:52 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Bacharach-David Musical Love Sweet Love
- Replies: 6
- Views: 6235
- Wed Oct 31, 2007 11:12 am
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Academy Awards 2000 Medley!
- Replies: 1
- Views: 2434
The Oscars 2000 Suite written, arranged, and performed by Mr. Burt Bacharach:
http://download.yousendit.com/C8E1AD2A6E7D4255
(Courtesy of Mr. Keith Burke.)
http://download.yousendit.com/C8E1AD2A6E7D4255
(Courtesy of Mr. Keith Burke.)
- Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:40 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Academy Awards 2000 Medley!
- Replies: 1
- Views: 2434
Academy Awards 2000 Medley!
Now on YouTube!!!!!!
Part 1:
Here's Part 2 (though it's easier to use the link on the above page):
What a treasure this man is! Thank you Burt!
Part 1:
Here's Part 2 (though it's easier to use the link on the above page):
What a treasure this man is! Thank you Burt!
- Sun Oct 14, 2007 7:51 pm
- Forum: The Burt Bacharach Forum
- Topic: Reference site with plenty of info and song clips
- Replies: 0
- Views: 2051