The Burt Bacharach Discussion Forum

Here's a couple of Youtube videos, pljms, taken from Saturday night at the North Sea Jazz Festival showing that Trijntje Oosterhuis did indeed make an appearance with BB! Who'll Speak for Love is followed by Waiting for Charlie to Come Home: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_htYG3vmVk http://www.yout...

I listened to all 3 shows of the radio series and thought it was a bit of curate's egg - only good in parts - and I didn't find out much that I didn't know already. Sadly, Jackie Trent's imput was small and taken from the archives, hardly surprising, I suppose, given their apparently acrimonious spl...

My personal favourite Bacharach & David song and probably the sexiest marriage of lyric, melody and chord sequence there's ever been. The lyrics read like it should be a man's song to a woman but most if not all the most effective versions I've heard have been recorded by women, Dusty Springfiel...

Thanks, Dennis, for pointing us in the direction of Lazy Day which with all those major 7th chords is obviously very like Bacharach - well, he never denied the influence!

Yes, I have the album and I have to say it's a bit of a mixed bag, with some of Hatch's arrangements not really coming off. Returning to songs written by Tony Hatch, my 5 personal favourites virtually pick themselves: 1/ Don't Sleep in the Subway 2/ Call Me 3/ Downtown 4/ Where are you now 5/ I coul...

Part 2 of a documentary series on BBC Radio 2 about Tony Hatch is on air at 7pm this Friday. In this show, postponed from last Friday due to You-Know-Who's death, he talks about being called 'Britain's Burt Bacharach'. Here's a tv excerpt from last year featuring Tony accompanying Petula Clark on th...

Yes, pljms, it was interesting hear Mark Wynter's take on 'Another Tear Falls', never a particular fave of mine but a good song all the same and a Top 20 hit in the UK for the Walker Brothers. It would have to be pretty near the top of the list of the most mournful songs Bacharach ever composed. Her...

Yes, but which one from Donna & Josie? Anyone remembering seeing BB perform this live in the last 3 or 4 years should be able to tell us, but the only name I've seen mentioned whenever the live rendition has been discussed is John Pagano.

Thanks, Vincent, for your enquiries. Do you think you can now get one of the lovely ladies to own up to that lead vocal part?! It's only because the voice on the record seems to be about an octave lower than either of them usually pitch it that made me think it might be someone else. All I've heard ...

I'm sure I'm not alone among the British contributors to this forum in my devotion to BBC Radio 2's Sounds of the 60s, which for the information of non-Brits is on air every Saturday morning between 8 and 10 but is available on line via the BBC's Listen Again facility. For me it's an almost perfect ...

Yes, but there is a distictive female lead vocal for the 2nd verse, "Who are these people who destroy everything and sell off the future for what ever it brings and what kind of leader can't admit when they're wrong, make them stop." Her role is just as key as Elvis Costello's in this reco...

Can anyone tell me who sings the 2nd verse on BB's recording of Who are these people? It's not stated who the vocalist is in the liner notes of the CD, although she's obviously female and almost certainly black and yet doesn't sound like either Josie James or Donna Taylor.

A truly a great song and , yes, one that is uniquely Bacharach and it amazes me that it hasn't been covered outside the two recordings arranged and produced by the man himself. I used to have the Gladys Knight version on a long lost LP and hearing it again after a gap of over 30 years I was pleasant...

Yes, I happened to hear the show on the night without knowing in advance that the album was going to be featured. I've always thought that somehow Russell Davies has never quite 'got' Bacharach mainly because he's one of those presenters of a 'certain age' who like to make the distinction between th...

I wasn't keen on this either. It's funny how the so-called Greats - Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee etc etc - never 'got' Bacharach. Sinatra was especially bad - his recordings of 'Wives and lovers' and 'Close to You' are simply awful. In fact Tony Bennett was about the best of...