Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Autumn Leaves

Tomorrow is the first day of Fall
Autumn Leaves" is a much-recorded popular song. Originally it was a 1945 French song "Les feuilles mortes" (literally "The Dead Leaves") with music by Joseph Kosma and lyrics by poet Jacques Prévert. Yves Montand (with Irène Joachim) introduced "Les feuilles mortes" in 1946 in the film Les Portes de la Nuit. The American songwriter Johnny Mercer wrote English lyrics in 1947 and Jo Stafford was among the first to perform this version. Autumn Leaves became a pop standard and a jazz standard in both languages, both as an instrumental and with a singer.

On December 24, 1950, French singer Edith Piaf rendered both French and English versions of this song on the radio programme The Big Show, hosted by Tallulah Bankhead.

Here is Nat King Cole's version. I tried to put Edith's version on here, but each time it took me to Nat King Cole's, when you go to his video, you can see Edith's in the right hand column, after listening to Nat King Cole, click Edith's
Click here



5 comments:

Arkansas Patti said...

Wow, "The Dead Leaves" really doesn't incourage listening. Glad they changed the title. Beautiful song.

Heidrun Khokhar, KleinsteMotte said...

The Edith's video comes with gorgeous fall pictures. Thanks for this post. I enjoyed hearing her again.

Margaret Cloud said...

I always enjoyed listening to Nat King Cole, he had a lovely voice.

Renie Burghardt said...

Beautiful oldie! I have a CD of Autumn Leaves with Sinatra singing it.

Happy Autumn!

ChrisJ said...

I'm always happy to hear Nat King Cole.The Christmas my husband and I were officially 'a couple', he had a popular record, something to do with cotton fields at home. How could I have forgotten the words to that song! Senior moments becoming more prevalent.