The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

Menu

Navigation

You are here: Home / Forum / Lush Life

Lush Life

by 12 Comments

Those of us who are that way inclined can probably agree that Billy Strayhorn was a genius. He became Duke Ellington’s main muse at the age of 23 and collaborated with him for the rest of his life until his early death at the age of 52.

My favourite Strayhorn song, and in my top ten favourite songs altogether, is Lush Life. Top instrumental version is Coltrane’s, top vocal, Ella Fitzgerald or Blossom Dearie, can’t decide. Strayhorn wrote the song, music and lyrics, between 1933 and 1936. That’s 18 to 21…those chords! Those lyrics!

Now this has surfaced – the very first recording, Carnegie Hall on November 13, 1948. Strayhorn on piano, Kay Davis on vox. Another magnificent version to add to the collection. Do give it a listen. H/t to Richard Williams, who retweeted the tweet.

2

Comments

  1. Those lyrics:
    I used to visit all the very gay places
    Those come-what-may places
    Where one relaxes on the axis
    Of the wheel of life
    To get the feel of life
    From jazz and cocktails

    The gals (girls) I knew had sad and sullen gray faces
    With distingué traces
    That used to be there
    You could see where
    They’d been washed away
    By too many through the day
    Twelve o’clock tales

    Then you came along
    With your siren song
    To tempt me to madness
    I thought for awhile
    That your poignant smile
    Was tinged with the sadness
    Of a great love for me
    I guess (Ah, yes,) I was wrong
    Again, I was wrong

    Life is lonely again
    And only last year everything seemed so sure
    Now life is awful again
    A troughful of hearts could only be a bore
    A week in Paris will ease the bite of it,
    All I care is to smile in spite of it.

    I’ll forget you, I will
    While yet you are still burning inside my brain.
    Romance is mush,
    Stifling those who strive.
    I’ll live a lush life in some small dive…
    And there I’ll be, while I rot
    With the rest of those whose lives are lonely, too..

  3. Lovely to hear Billy play it.
    I love Blossom Dearie’s version.

    .
    Incidentally it makes a little more sense to alter the spelling of one part of the lyric as it was shown above:

    You could see where
    They’d been washed away
    By too many through the day
    Twelve-o’clock-tails

    You can tell that was the intention by how both Ella and Blossom sing it.

  4. What a song! Talk about a standard. So many versions!

    Jan Lundgren Trio

    Donna Summer

    Bill Friisell

    Jeanette Lindström

    Zara nicked the title (unwittingly?) and had a MEGA hit.

    • The first version I ever heard was Donna Summer’s. How very ‘civilian’ of me. Though perhaps the version I’ve heard most is Carmen McRae’s.

Leave a Reply