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1967
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Cafe Songbook Reading Room"The Lady Is a Tramp" |
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About the Show Babes in ArmsBabes in Arms was not only a typical "Come on kids, let's put on a show" musical, but perhaps the first of its kind. The idea for it emerged while Rodgers and Hart were walking in Central Park and noticed some creative children making up their own games. It's plot was slight and far fetched but the Rodgers and Hart score produced more American Standard songs than any other show by the songwriting team. The story finds a troupe of Depression era vaudeville performers who are unable to get work deciding to light out for the territories in an attempt to make some kind of living, leaving behind their kids to fend for themselves. The youngsters decide to resist an attempt to send them to a work farm by putting on a show of their own to raise money for a local youth center. Nothing much comes of it until a deus ex machina intervenes. A French transatlantic aviator crash-lands his plane in their midst thereby generating enough publicity to make the kids' show a hit. Babes in Arms tried out in Boston and then opened in New York at the Shubert Theater April 14, 1937. Despite its lack of the de rigueur line of semi-nude show girls to stir up ticket sales, it ran for the better part of a year (289 performances), closing December 18, 1937. Rodgers and Hart had decided they wanted this show to be all their own so they wrote the book as well as the words and music; and they brought in George Balanchine for the choreography. The cast was restricted to youngsters, many of whom eventually became stars, and included Mitzi Green, Alex Courtney, Alfred Drake, Ray Heatherton, The Nicholas Brothers, Dan Dailey, Robert Rounseville, Grace MacDonald, and Wynn Murray. The show within the show that the kids put on is a revue, and all but one of the Rodgers and Hart songs are the focal points for its skits. The only exception is "My Funny Valentine." It is integrated into the main story, Billie, played by Mitzi Green, singing it about her new love "Val," short for "Valentine," played by Ray Heatherton. Richard Rodgers has noted that because he and Hart were so interested in writing songs that helped to develop the story, they went so far as to change the name of one of their characters to Valentine to make the song fit the story. (Musical Stages, p, 181, hard-bound Ed.). Introduction of "The Lady Is a Tramp" in Babes in Arms Rodgers and Hart wrote "The Lady Is a Tramp" specifically for their lead, the energetic teenage movie star Mitzi Green, who introduced it in the show. Some have thought the song is a little too "worldly" for a kid to sing, but that didn't stop it from becoming, at the time and against a lot of terrific competition, the show's biggest hit. Philip Furia and Michael Lasser write of the song that it is one of the team's best list songs and that Hart wrote the lyric, in a single day, "about a down-to earth lady who scorns such affectations as arriving late at the theater, going to crap games with royalty and wearing furs to Harlem nightclubs. Because the singer refuses to behave pretentiously, other women label her a tramp . . ." (America's Songs, p. 139). Revivals: There have been no Broadway revivals of Babes in Arms perhaps because despite the spectacular score, the book is just too slight and too dated; however, there have been two studio albums: one with Mary Martin on Columbia Records, from 1951; and one with Judy Blazer and Judy Kaye from 1989. This production uses the original 1937 orchestrations and therefore provides a rare opportunity to hear the musical portions of the show more or less as originally performed, before so many of the songs emerged as standards creating their own indelible impressions. There was also one New York concert revival by City Center Encores! in Feb. 1999, for which there is a cast album. Despite the lack of a Broadway revival, Babes in Arms has been mounted countless times in high school and stock productions using a revised book with a summer theater as the setting and in which the interns put on the show within the show. The Lorenz Hart Website in its discussion of the revivals of Babes in Arms offers a refutation of the notion that Babes in Arms has never been recreated in its original form because it is "too slight and too dated." See IBDB for complete show production dates, complete cast, other credits, songs/sung by, Broadway revivals, etc. About the Movie Babes in ArmsAlthough there was a movie Babes in Arms based somewhat loosely on this show, "The Lady Is a Tramp" was included only as instrumental background music. In fact, the forces that created the movie version of Babes in Arms (1939), with Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney) inexplicably got rid of most of the great Rodgers and Hart songs leaving only "Where or When" (and the title song of the show). "The Lady Is a Tramp" was not sung in the movie version of the show. Instead, it's melody was used as background music for the scenes in which the character Rosalie appeared--its apparent purpose to suggest the less than admirable (read tramp-like) means Rosalie employs to get the lead in the kids' show. There is a double irony here. The first irongy is that Hart's lyric for "The Lady Is a Tramp," clearly intends "tramp" to be a badge of honor signifying the down-to-earth genuineness of the lady who calls herself that. The second irony is that the movie makers ignore Hart's intended irony and use the melody to disparage the character whom the melody accompanies reinforcing her lack of genuineness. "The Lady Is a Tramp" was, however, added to the movie version of a Rodgers and Hart show for which it wasn't written. The song was interpolated into the 1957 film Pal Joey where it was sung by Frank Sinatra with a Nelson Riddle arrangement--and has since become one of Sinatra's signature songs. It was also used in Words and Music, (1948), a biopic of Rodgers and Hart, a film that makes every attempt to tell their story as it didn't happen. That doesn't, however, detract from Lena Horne's sparkling performance.
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Click here to read the lyrics for "The Lady Is a Tramp" as sung by Ella Fitzgerald
View a discography of Ella CDs at Amazon The complete, authoritative lyrics for "The Lady Is a Tramp'" can be found in:
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New York: Random House, 1975 (Da Capo paper bound ed., 2002, pictured above.
, New York, Oxford University Press, 1994. 
, 1986
, each of which includes "The Lady Is a Tramp."
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Credits(this page) |
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Performer/Recording Index
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1937
Notes: The recording of "The Lady Is a Tramp that made the charts in Nov. 1937. Edythe Wright, vocal; Pee Wee Erwin, trumpet; Tommy Dorsey, trombone; Johnny Mintz, clarinet. |
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1948 View clip of Lena singing "The Lady Is a Tramp" from the 1948 MGM biopic of Rodgers and Hart, Words and Music -- center column below.
1994
Notes: The first album above includes the original sound track recordings from Lena Horne's film work at MGM, including "The Lady Is a Tramp" from the 1948 movie Words and Music, compiled on this 2010 CD. The second is the live performance at The Supper Club in New York City in 1994 when she was 77 years old. As Scott Yanow writes in his review at CD Universe, "Horne talks the lyrics a little more than in the past but she cuts loose in spots with power, performs superior standards, takes part of a Duke Ellington/Billy Strayhorn medley as a duet with bassist Ben Brown and is not shy to hold long notes. On six of the songs 11 horns from the Count Basie Orchestra riff and play harmonies behind her; otherwise Horne is joined by her usual quartet with pianist Mike Renzi and guitarist Rodney Jones. The well-rounded set is Lena Horne's most rewarding recording in years." |
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1952 and 1959
Notes: "Digitally remastered two-fer containing a pair of [LP] albums from the Jazz great. Includes the complete original 1959 album Oscar Peterson Plays The Richard Rodgers Songbook featuring the Oscar Peterson trio with Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen. For this extended edition, we have added the complete LP Oscar Peterson Plays Richard Rodgers. Taped during 1952-53, it marks Peterson's first attempt at a Rodgers Songbook. Includes 12-page booklet" (from CD Universe album description). The CD includes two versions of "The Lady Is a Tramp." The 52-53 solo version and the 59 version with the trio. |
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1952
Notes: "This CD is a compilation of two separate recording sessions, one led by Gerry Mulligan with Chet Baker on trumpet, the other by the Chubby Jackson Big Band. Half the Mulligan-Baker quartet material was recorded at the Black Hawk in San Francisco in September 1952, the other half four months later in LA. The personnel remains the same for both. The two horn men, along with Carson Smith (bass) and Chico Hamilton (drums) were laying down the foundation of what soon would be referred to as West Coast or Cool jazz, a sound just as swinging as its East coast rival, but tempered somewhat by a more introspective rhythm approach (the use of brushes over sticks by the drummer, for example) and in the case of this group, no piano." (from Amazon customer reviewer Bomojaz |
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1956
Notes: The Rodgers and Hart portion of the seminal set of Ella Ftizgerald Songbook albums was produced by Norman Granz from the mid-fifies through the early sixties. The Rogers and Hart recordings were made at Capitol Studios, Los Angeles, California from August 27-31, 1956. Personnel includes Ella Fitzgerald (vocals); Paul Smith (piano); Barney Kessel (guitar); Joe Mondragon (bass); Alvin Stoller (drums). Buddy Bregman (conductor and arranger). |
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| Note: Both Ella and Frank made their first and most famous recordings of "The Lady Is a Tramp" at Capitol Studios in LA three months apart in 1956. | ||||
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1956
Notes: Although the album was released in 1957, "The Lady Is a Tramp" track was recorded November 26, 1956 at Capitol Studios, Los Angeles conducted and arranged by Nelson Riddle. |
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1956
Notes: "Marty Paich's arrangements serve less as background accompaniment than as a luminous foil to the equally inventive elocutions of the singer. If there's a better solution to the challenge of balancing ensemble cohesiveness with individual expressiveness, I haven't heard it" (from Amazon customer reviewer Samuel Chell |
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1963
Notes: "Peggy Lee snuck in the recording of "Mink Jazz" by recording tracks over more than a year's time at recording sessions for pop albums. Basically "Mink Jazz" was recorded at the sessions for "Sugar and Spice" and "I'm A Woman." Capitol did release it, though using the same cover photo as for "I'm A Woman," which was released on the same day as "Mink Jazz." As it turned out "Mink Jazz" was a big seller and Peggy Lee's best album. She simply is matchless as she perfectly interprets great standards to superb jazz accompaniments" (from Amazon customer reviewer, "Peg's Best |
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1973
Album Notes: CD is a compilation of two Bennett 1973 LPs of twenty-six Rodgers and Hart songs. Bennett has made four recordings of this song: 1973 (studio), 1988 live, 1992 studio, and 2011 studio (with Lady Gaga). The last of these is represented here above on the Main Stage and below. |
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1993 music-video currently unavailable
Notes: with Dick Oatts (alto sax, flute), Ken Peplowski (tenor sax, clarinet), Randy Sandke (trumpet, flugelhorn), Robin Trowers (trombone), Allen Farnham (piano), Howard Alden (guitar), Kiyoshi Kitagawa (bass), Chuck Redd (drums). |
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2005
Notes: "In case you haven't noticed, all the attention these days in the world of jazz singing is on female singers. Small wonder, when you survey the abundance of talent. Tierney Sutton, Cheryl Bentyne, Karrin Allyson, Anne Hampton Calloway--all are virtuosic performers, positively "scary" in terms of musical as well as vocal technique. Tierney Sutton may be the most "frightening" of all, based on the evidence of this impressive session. She throws down the gauntlet, raises the bar, sets a new standard in terms of not merely vocal acrobatics and jazz chops but repertory, inventive arrangements, live performance, and a "personal" rhythm section that's as state-of-the-art as they come" (from Amazon customer reviewer |
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2008 music-video currently unavailable
Notes: "The work of Richard Rodgers dominated the 20th century American stage musical, and in this century his collaborations with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and, later, Oscar Hammerstein II, still occupy the core of the Great American Songbook. On With a Song in My Heart, guitarist and vocalist John Pizzarelli presents a dozen pieces by this formidable composer. The results run the gamut from light and breezy renderings to interpretations that can bring a tear to your eye. Veteran Don Sebesky’s effective horn arrangements lend punch to a number of cuts, including “The Lady Is a Tramp,” “This Can’t Be Love,” and the title track. Pizzarelli’s father, the guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli, brings his light touch to a spare version of “It’s Easy to Remember,” and the Brazilian pianist and arranger César Camargo Mariano appears on a bossa nova-ized “Happy Talk.” (Pizzarelli also nods toward Brazilian music on “Johnny One Note,” where he references Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “One Note Samba.”) The closer, “You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught,” features a solo Pizzarelli doing a straightforward and moving version of this gem from South Pacific" (iTunes review). |
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2011
Notes: Bennett has made four recordings of this song: 1973 (studio), 1988 live, 1992 studio, and this 2011 studio (with Lady Gaga). |
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