That'll Be the Day - fifty years on

 

 

Incredible though it sounds, it is now the fiftieth anniversary of the film That'll Be The Day. I have never owned a copy of the soundtrack album, although its songs had a profound effect on my musical tastes, igniting my love of doo wop and rock'n'roll.

I was about fifteen when I saw the film, and at the same time the songs featured were being played on the radio: I still can the remember the moment I became aware of the beauty and the yearning in Frankie Lymon's voice when he hit a certain note during Why Do Fools Fall in Love? Around the same time there was a Chuck Berry concert on TV; I bought a Little Richard album a few days later, no Berry being in stock, and I've been listening to that kind of thing, or developments thereof, ever since. 

Ray Connolly, who wrote the screenplay, has written a piece in today's Daily Mail which provides some interesting background about the film and its sequel, Stardust, which can be read here, saying that "to be honest, of the two, I've always preferred the simple realism of That'll Be The Day, which was about ordinary people in ordinary situations."

That'll Be The Day, if you're not familiar with it, is a modest but very satisfying British rites-of-passage movie with 70s pop star David Essex (who'd already scored in the stage musical Godspell) playing a 1950s teenager with a string of conquests but no sense of direction until music starts to give his life a purpose.

I Say a Little Prayer

 

 

Like many other people, the recent news of Burt Bacharach's death sent me to youtube to remind myself of his achievements. And the thing which particularly caught my eye was a clip of a studio rehearsal before Dionne Warwick's original recording of I Say a Little Prayer. 

I don't know whether this particular bit of footage is already well known - it seems to have come from a documentary - but either way it makes for fascinating watching and listening. An enthused, immersed Bacharach (at the piano) and Hal David are present, along with a trio of backing vocalists, and even though the performance isn't quite fixed yet, it's essentially already there. This tantalising glimpse into the creative process is followed by what appears to have been the very first time the song got a public airing in live performance, before the record was released.

Nolly (review of new drama about Noele Gordon)

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have just finished watching Nolly, the new three-part ITV drama about Noele Gordon's sacking from the longrunning soap opera Crossroads, and was pleasantly surprised: the series seems very well judged, executed with a lightness of touch yet never dismissive of its subject, unlike - or so it seemed to me - the recent ITV drama about absconding politician John Stonehouse.

Nolly acknowledges the limitations of the longrunning soap in which Noele Gordon spent the greater part of her career but also makes abundantly clear what it meant to its viewers: small wonder that Dorothy Hobson, writer of an excellent book about Crossroads, appeared to give it her approval in a piece in the Daily Telegraph today.