I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Laramie, Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead.
ART NOTES— an exhibition entitled Seeing Loud: Jean-Michel Basquiat and Music— the first large-scale multidisciplinary exhibition devoted to the role of music for one of the most innovative artists of the second half of the 20th century (with 100 works along with numerous sound clips, film footage and archival documents) — is at the Montreal Museum of Art in Québec through February 19th.
YOUR WEEKEND READ is this review of journalism-oriented movies by Eric Alterman, a retired journalism professor — two are current films, and there is also a list of numerous classic (and more recent) films he feels do a good job of explaining the profession.
THURSDAY's CHILD is named Pickles the Cat— a British Columbia kitteh freed from a vehicle’s engine block by firefighters, who found it messy but unhurt … and reunited with his family (after going missing two years) due to his microchip.
THE OTHER NIGHT yours truly hosted the Top Comments diary with a look at — just four years after a similar case — a dog hoarding situation affecting my local Humane Society, with state police arresting a guy who had 27 Labs in squalor.
FRIDAY's CHILD is named Gina the Cat— who went missing from the home of former Vermont governor Madeleine Kunin (who is age eighty-nine) but after eleven days was located … with the use of a a Havahart trap.
BRAIN TEASER— try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC ...… and the usually easier, less UK-centered New York Times quiz.
OLDER-YOUNGER BROTHERS?— stand-up comic Shecky Greene and the late pro wrestling star Bruno Sammartino.
...... and finally, for a song of the week ...........................… one of the songs that Carol King wrote the music for that I liked before — but in recent years have appreciated even more — is Crying in the Rain, which I had assumed her then-songwriting-partner (and husband) the late Gerry Goffin had written the lyrics for.
But it was a different lyricist — also at their famed Brill Building songwriting firm Aldon Music — when, on a whim, two partnerships decided to switch partners for a day — that Gerry Goffin partnered with Jack Keller, leaving Carol King to work as a pair with Howie Greenfield. And despite the result being a #6 hit for the Everly Brothers in 1961, they never collaborated again. Thirty-six years after his passing, the story of Howie Greenfield needs to be told.
Greenfield (before working with Jack Keller) began writing with his friend from his Brooklyn neighborhood, Neil Sedaka— and their output eventually resulted in four #1 songs and numerous Top Ten hits. Yet when they initially auditioned for Al Nevins (the business partner of Don Kirshner, creating the Aldon music company) Nevins asked them, "Where did you steal these songs?" Finally convinced they were on the level, he hired the pair.
Following the British invasion (and the attendant success of the English stars) the pair took a hiatus from the frantic pace of trying to write hit songs, with Greenfield turning his attention to creating lyrics for such television favorites as "Bewitched," "Hazel," "Gidget" and "The Flying Nun." They did reunite in the early 80’s.
Alas, while Greenfield was in a a domestic partnership with cabaret singer Tory Damon from the early 1960’s: Greenfield died in Los Angeles in 1986 from complications from AIDS (just eleven days before his 50th birthday). Damon died from AIDS complications a few weeks later and is buried next to Greenfield. Howie Greenfield was inducted (five years posthumously) into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1991.
To me: this is his most enduring song. Perhaps a testament to the enduring quality of it: here are two renditions by European musicians many years later.
I'll never let you see The way my broken heart is hurting me I've got my pride and I know how to hide All my sorrow and pain I'll do my crying in the rain
If I wait for cloudy skies You won't know the rain from the tears in my eyes You'll never know that I still love you so Though the heartaches remain I'll do my crying in the rain
Raindrops falling from heaven Could never wash away my misery But since we're not together I look for stormy weather To hide these tears I hope you'll never see
Someday when my crying's done I'm gonna wear a smile and walk in the sun I may be a fool, but ‘till then, darling, you'll Never see me complain I'll do my crying in the rain I'll do my crying in the rain
The first is from a trio — the Norwegian pop-trio Faber/Hugo/Sordal, recorded at a hotel room in Kristiansand, Norway.
The second is a vocal ensemble from Cologne (Köln) in Germany— Die Erben roughly translates as “The Heirs”. The first two minutes of this (nearly) six minute video is percussive sounds (to create the sounds of a thunderstorm) .. afterwards, a more full music (and a vibrant chorus) comes in. What might Howie Greenfield have thought, about such international attention?