Lyrics needed to "Good Evening' Good Lookin'" 1940

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Eyeball · #1 Post by **Eyeball** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 11:05 am

I looked on line, but no luck.

Anyone knw a better place?

Thx!@

trev · #2 Post by **trev** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 6:10 pm

Will you be singing it for us?

Haydn · #3 Post by **Haydn** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 7:00 pm

Who sang the original?

Eyeball · #4 Post by **Eyeball** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 9:44 pm

trev wrote:Will you be singing it for us?

Yes, but I charge extra for lap dances!

Eyeball · #5 Post by **Eyeball** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 9:45 pm

Haydn wrote:Who sang the original?

The only recording I am aware of is by BG with HF singing.

Haydn · #6 Post by **Haydn** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 6:10 am

Can't find any lyrics, sorry. Do you know who wrote the song?

Swifty · #7 Post by **Swifty** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 9:03 am

This probably has the lyrics on it.

anton · #8 Post by **anton** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 2:26 pm

Apparently, it was first recorded by one Erhard Bauschke in Berlin in 1939. (BG's version is from 1941.)

Nice song. Helen Forrest vocals are quite intelligible me thinks. What words can't you pick out? Here's my take:

Good evenin' good lookin'
What's cookin' tonight
I've got a meny all dreamed up
What say we get teamed up
Oh let's go do things
Good evenin' good lookin'
Let's do it upright
Put all our cares in the fire
We're gonna play higher
Than a kite
We'll dine and wine
Where debs and celebs all go
And grab a caf or coffee (?)
End at that barbecue stand (?)
Good evenin' good lookin'
That moon is so bright
What a pity to waste it
Come on let us taste it
Oh let's get going
Tonight's the night

Btw, this song is not on the new Mosaic BG set since that one focuses on instrumentals - it has a few vocal tracks with BG, Cootie Williams and Fred Astaire though.

Eyeball · #9 Post by **Eyeball** » Fri Dec 26, 2008 9:04 pm

anton wrote:And grab a caf or coffee (?)
End at that barbecue stand (?)

That spot!

'coffee and a barbeque sandwich'?

'coffee at a barbeque stand'?

And grab a cab for "coffee and"(?)
at a barbecue stand (?)

"Coffee and" meaning 'coffee and do-nuts'.

Thx for typing it out. I'll fix your typos here, if I may.

Good evenin' good lookin'
What's cookin' tonight
I've got a menu all dreamed up
What say we get teamed up
Oh let's go do things
Good evenin' good lookin'
Let's do it upright
Put all our cares in the fire
We're gonna fly higher
Than a kite
We'll dine and wine
Where debs and celebs all go
And grab a caf/cab or coffee (?)
End at that barbecue stand (?)
Good evenin' good lookin'
That moon is so bright
What a pity to waste it
Come on let us taste it
Oh let's get going
Tonight's the night

Eyeball · #10 Post by **Eyeball** » Fri Dec 26, 2008 9:09 pm

anton wrote:Apparently, it was first recorded by one Erhard Bauschke in Berlin in 1939.

What's the source of that information, please?

Who are the composers? Could it be the same song title, but a different song?

Curious!

Eyeball · #11 Post by **Eyeball** » Sat Dec 27, 2008 7:18 am

Dug out the CD -

"And grab a cab for "coffee and" at a barbecue stand"

That's the lyric HF sings.

Thx, Anton!

Tho the answer is now largely complete, you might want to try listening to "PEEK-A-BOO TO YOU" by Glenn Miller with a vocal by The Modernaires.

It's a Johnny Mecer lyric, it seems, and it baffled 3 experienced listeners- an ESL-er, a bandleader/songwriter and me.

anton · #12 Post by **anton** » Sat Jan 03, 2009 6:24 am

Eyeball wrote:
anton wrote:Apparently, it was first recorded by one Erhard Bauschke in Berlin in 1939.
What's the source of that information, please?

Who are the composers? Could it be the same song title, but a different song?

My source was The Jazz Discography by Tom Lord. It does not list composers, and it is in fact a different song! Check out the preview here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0011NEBZ0

Now that we've established that Erhard Bauschke is off-topic, here's a nice song by him (and some additional info) on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHunO4EUfRc

anton · #13 Post by **anton** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 10:41 am

Eyeball wrote: Tho the answer is now largely complete, you might want to try listening to "PEEK-A-BOO TO YOU" by Glenn Miller with a vocal by The Modernaires.

It's a Johnny Mecer lyric, it seems, and it baffled 3 experienced listeners- an ESL-er, a bandleader/songwriter and me.

Wow, that's tricky! I suppose it's the end lines that are difficult - from "Mum, hand me my ..." Did you check out different versions of Little Red Riding Hood, looking for clues?

Eyeball · #14 Post by **Eyeball** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 12:14 pm

anton wrote:
Wow, that's tricky! I suppose it's the end lines that are difficult - from "Mum, hand me my ..." Did you check out different versions of Little Red Riding Hood, looking for clues?

That line was the hardest of all the hard lines....and that 'Mum/mow/whatever' 'word' is still not determined. We all simply gave up.

There was a lot of email back and forth between me and Bill Elliott as we tried to figure out this very complicated and near undecipherable lyric. I think it is on my old hard-drive. The ESL guy with the web site had so many errors in his online version; the 40s hipster slang/patois was just beyond him. Bill pointed out that at the phrase "pow-wow" Paua Kelly backed off the mic to avoid popping the letter 'p' hard, so it came out "phoa" instead of "pow", then she sounds like she dropped the word "and" after "fowling piece" which screwed up the meter of the song for interpretive purposes - she made it sound like something else or something was missing.

Yeah - "fowling piece"! Hahaha - WTF??!?!?! Who's gonna use that in a pop song? Apparently Johnny Mercer. That was the part we were really stumbling over.

http://www.nefkom.net/al-foster/p-titles.htm

"SOLVED! A cooperative effort between myself and Bill Elliott, the Los Angeles swing orchestra leader. We kept bouncing ideas back and forth, boosting them or shooting them down. Then Bill got out his rhyming dictionary and what he found was so arcane it was hard to believe. Finally, Bill, who is a big Johnny Mercer fan, got in touch with the library in Atlanta, Georgia, where Mercer's archives are kept. A librarian retrieved the information and verbally told Bill: 'Hand me my fowling piece, I'll police those charms'. This will be confirmed by Rick Gerber, who has secured a copy of the sheet music for PEEKABOO TO YOU."

Peekaboo to you, you dreameroo
Whoever let you out alone?
Peekaboo to you with all that woo-woo
Walkin‘ in a danger zone.
Don‘t you know the big bad wolves are out
Prowlin‘ the neighborhood?
And you look mighty good
Little red riding hood!

Take a look at how they hold a pow-wow
Take a listen to the sighs.
Take a look at me and you can see
I’m jealous with the light green eyes.
Mom, hand me my fowling piece
I'll police those charms
Then I’ll say peekaboo, peekaboo to you
In my arms...!

anton · #15 Post by **anton** » Sat Oct 17, 2009 1:54 am

Eyeball wrote: Tho the answer is now largely complete, you might want to try listening to "PEEK-A-BOO TO YOU" by Glenn Miller with a vocal by The Modernaires.

It's a Johnny Mecer lyric, it seems, and it baffled 3 experienced listeners- an ESL-er, a bandleader/songwriter and me.

Seems like Eyeball has disappeared from this board, but anyway...

Found another version of "Peekaboo To You", with Bea Wain (who sang with the Larry Clinton Orchestra), where the lyrics are very clear. She indeed sings "Mom, hand me my fowling piece", and later, "Mama, hand me my blunder bust" (!).

http://catateblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Bea%20Wain

It sounds like a 40's recording, but it is not listed in the Jazz Discography. Anybody knows?