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 and 8 p.m. Dec. 1, 3 p.m. Dec. 2
Cost: $22-$50
Information: (562) 916-8525,
(562) 467-8818
www.cerritoscenter.com
What does the world need now that there's just too little of? Some songbook stalwarts might suggest a grand revival of Burt Bacharach and Hal David. If you're in agreement, you won't want to miss what the Cerritos Performing Arts Center has to offer in five shows next Friday through Sunday: the Southern California premiere of "Love Sweet Love," a new musical built around the most memorable tunes of the incomparable songwriting team. (Thousand Oaks also offers a performance at the Civic Arts Theatre on Tuesday, Dec. 4 at 8 p.m.)
Thirty-one songs are covered in the three-act play penned by Ben Wolfe. "The Look of Love,", "I Say A Little Prayer" and "What's New, Pussycat?" are just a few.
There is a timely aspect as well to this show. Hard to believe, but this
year marks the 50th anniversary collaboration of Bacharach and David, who partnered in 1957.
"Love Sweet Love" (four years in the making) is a set of stories that focus on five women looking for love in all the wrong places. It is based in modern-day L.A.
Wolfe started devising the play in 2003 after being inspired by the musical "Mama Mia." He had never met Bacharach personally and has only lunched with David on one occasion. So he's especially anxious to hear their feedback on "Love Sweet Love."
"I'm actually not that fond of musical revues," Wolfe said. "But Burt's and Hal's work still resonate as it did years ago, and that's the definition of a classic.
"I've tried to be loyal to what I think their feelings are with the music. Their songs are so theatrical; they seem to tell stories."
Hal David, now 86, plans to see the play at its Dec. 4 showing in Thousand Oaks.
"I'm looking forward to hearing my songs in context with a live story line," David said. "I still love hearing my songs on the radio. Nowadays, you never know what you're going to hear over the air. But there are still some stations that play the great standards."
David said he doesn't know the exact number but estimates he has co-written 200 songs with Bacharach, and has written lyrics to another 600 songs with other collaborators dating back to the late 1940s.
David grew up in Brooklyn and was editor of his high school paper. He played the violin and formed a small band which played for weddings and other local engagements. David would often frequent the remnants of Tin Pan Alley for sheet music.
"I used to go around to the music publishers; they'd give out sheet music and I would study the lyrics," he said. "There was one written by Yip Harburg and Harold Arlen called "Poor You." Part of the lyrics went:
`I'm sorry you are not me.
For you will never know
what loving you can be.'
"I thought: what a fantastic way of saying `I love you!' That really gave me a jolt into thinking I could have my own originality."
David wrote songs and poetry throughout his youth.
"There were guys whose work I loved: Irving Berlin and Johnny Mercer; they were in a class by themselves," David said. "I knew Johnny and had a very long telephone relationship with Berlin about 10 years."
Did the Bacharach-David duo ever feel intimated by other legendary songwriting teams, such as Rodgers and Hart and Styne and Cahn?
"At the time we were writing, especially in the early days, we didn't think about competing with others," David said. "We were just trying to write today's hits and I guess we thought we were pretty good. Then all of a sudden, we had a whole bunch of hits and little by little, they became classics. We never thought in terms of the future that they would be standards.
"We started out in New York and met almost every day in the Brill building for about 17 years," David said. "It was still filled with music publishers when we were there. We wrote in the same little room with an upright piano. Eventually, we moved back and forth between New York and Los Angeles.
"Sometimes Burt would take my lyric home and I would take his music home. Other times we'd be writing three songs at once. We wrote during the day and made records at night with people like Dionne Warwick and Jack Jones. We'd be writing every day, sometimes up to the last minute.
"Often, there would be a song we finished one day and recorded the next," he said. "That doesn't happen anymore.
"Burt and I started in the period when rock `n' roll broke out, only we weren't writing that type of music," David said. "Looking back, it's amazing that we were able to break through and write things that the public accepted so well.
"I think that was pretty much the last time that good songs were able to be heard," he said. "It's a tough world to be in now and hard to break through with anything of quality."
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