No Strings
Songs of Irving Berlin
The saga of Irving Berlin is vast and wonderful. In a 65-year career, he lived many lives, giving us a staggering 1,500 songs, 18 musicals and 19 movie scores. Arriving a destitute child from war-torn Belarus, he made pennies singing in bars as a little boy, and grew up to build NYC’s Music Box Theater at 33, and made an unlikely love match with a genuine heiress, eloping to a breathless international press - his wedding was carried above the fold in the New York Times. He volunteered for both World Wars, founded ASCAP, and handed over the future earnings, in perpetuity, of “God Bless America” to the Boy Scouts of America. George Gershwin called him the greatest songwriter in the nation’s history. Jerome Kern said, “Irving has no place in American music; he is American music.” Sammy Cahn added, “You couldn't have a holiday without his permission.”
Frank and I wanted this recording to be not simply a singer accompanied, but rather a collection of duets for piano and voice. With 1,500 to choose from, settling on our mutual favorites, and then restricting ourselves to eleven songs, was a job of work, boy.
SUFFER
Suffer came about because someone on Twitter told me I’d like Maurice Tani’s songs, and I did like them. Then the pandemic came, and the city went silent. Possibly it was the weird hush – NYC is not meant to be quiet – that made me need new music. Something different, to break up the monotony. And I wanted musical comfort food. Maurice’s songs come from California, but remind me of Kansas and the music I grew up with there. So I found him on Facebook, where he accepted my friend request and went so far as to suggest Suffer. As I hummed the tunes and considered the lyrics, they made their way east, where my city put a put a stamp on them and settled them into a slice of Venn diagram where Jazz and Americana cohabit.
Thanks to Maurice for accepting my friend request, for listening to the drafts, and for being supernaturally generous. Thanks to the boys for their work, and the gods of Gmail and Logic for making it possible to create this record remotely, socially distanced and safe in our homes.