Word: melodye
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Two years ago, when TIME's editors were choosing "the" song of the 20th century, my suggestion was "Cheek to Cheek" - a dance-and-romance tune composed in an ambitious, 64-bar structure. Berlin pitched it smartly to Astaire's frail but persuasive tenor voice; for example, in the phrase...
Berlin's musical dexterity was both obvious and ingratiating. He heard Gershwin play with syncopation in "Fascinatin' Rhythm," then executed his own elaborate, fairly daring ricochet rhythms in "Puttin' on the Ritz," "Monkey Doodle Doo" and "Everybody Step." Profligate with melody, he tossed extra bridges into "Doin' What Comes Natur...
"Alexander's Ragtime Band" (1911), by Ray Charles (1959), on "The Genius of Ray Charles." A coon song can be a black song, as Charles transforms Berlin's antique march into a big-band raver. The band (Ralph Burns did the brassy, bluesy charts) plays the melody and Charles comes...
"Please Let Me Come Back to You" (1955), by Billy Waring, on "Unsung Irving Berlin." If ever a "new" Berlin song were to hit the charts, it'd be this country-style waltz. Not much content to the lyric, but a rolling melody that instantly insinuates itself in the listener...
"Play a Simple Melody," or "Simple Melody/Musical Demon," 1914. This was Berlin's first contrapuntal tune: two melodies - one demure, one robust - that are sung consecutively, then one atop the other. (He did it again with "I Wonder Why/You?re Just in Love" for "Call Me Madam"). It was the...