SwingDJs

I had a friend ask if I know any good uptempo versions of Our Love is Here to Stay with vocals. Her tempo suggestion was similar to this Bill Evans version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9WcUtUP7R8 so around 200bpm. All of the versions I have are closer to 130bpm. I did a little poking around on amazon but the faster ones I was finding are around 150.

Any suggestions?

kbuxton wrote:Any suggestions?

Tell your friend no self-respecting vocalist would murder a ballad by singing it at that tempo.

There are other instrumental versions that are fast. There's a nice Teddy Wilson Trio recording from 1959 that's about 185 bpm and would make a nice...quickstep, I guess. The fastest vocal version I know is Dinah Washington on Mercury, at around 140 bpm. It's good, but I always think it sounds, well, rushed. (I think Dinah's much slower recording from 1954 on "After Hours with Miss D" is way better.)

Is this a "I want this at my wedding" request? What dance are they planning on doing?

Not sure what she needed it for, but I'd passed along the link to here and before I got up this morning had a message saying to tell you thanks, your suggestion had lead her down a path where she found what she needed.

Well, glad she found what she needed. :)

Our Love is Here to Stay was the last song written by George Gershwin before he died at the way-too-young age of 38. Ira had not yet written the lyrics to the song at the time of George's death; they were added later with George in mind making them all the more poignant. It probably would be bad karma to play that song at 200+ bpm.

Speeding up naturally slower songs is a bit dicey. Surprisingly, Aretha's 200+ bpm version of Old Man River worked for me; however, her up-tempo version of Moon River fell flat. Perhaps changing Moon River from 3/4 time to 4/4 was a factor in that.

On the subject of Gershwin songs and tempos, here's an anecdote you might find interesting. George had just composed the classic Someone to Watch Over Me and was playing it for Ira who was throwing out some ideas for lyrics. The piece was originally composed to be played up-tempo. While Ira and George were talking about something or other, George was playing the piece very slowly (basic harmony and melody). My memory's a bit fuzzy but I believe Ira stopped the conversation and told George to keep playing and, of course, it ended up as a ballad.