Swinging On a Star: The Songs of Jimmy Van Heusen
Frank Sinatra said he’d BE Jimmy Van Heusen if he could only pass the physical. The two came up together and were best friends. “Come Fly With Me” Marissa Mulder brightly begins with swinging clarity. (Lyric- Sammy Cahn) She leans out palpably extending the invitation.
Jimmy Van Heusen, born Edward Chester Babcock 1913 –1990, composed 1000 songs from 1938-1975; 85 were recorded by Frank Sinatra. In later days when a Paramount contract kept him from collaborating with anyone but then severely alcoholic, Johnny Burke, he wrote under pseudonyms. Van Heusen (spontaneously renamed after the shirt company) scribbled ideas on any and every surface.
At Syracuse University, Jimmy met Harold Arlen’s brother, Jerry with whom he began to write songs for the Cotton Club Revue. Their first contract produced a sweet, easy ballad, “The Dreamer in Me”: Please be sympathetic when I get poetic…“Darn That Dream” (Lyric-Eddie DeLange) follows with signature breathy delivery. Neither diminishing nor obscuring, Mulder sighs into it. “Darn” is actually imbued with meaning rather than just notes. …Bless it too/Without that dream/I never would have you, she sings, eyes momentarily closed. (This is not an artist who shuts us out.)
Jon Weber, Marissa Mulder
“Imagination” was a tune composed as an adolescent for his then girlfriend. Johnny Burke came up with the lyric. Delicate guitar and muffled bass make it dreamy. Van Heusen and Burke were known as “The Gold Dust Twins” in Hollywood. “Swingin’ on a Star” from Going My Way won an Oscar, the first of four for the honoree. Mulder sings it with a twinkle in her eye.
The partners wrote for 23 Bing Crosby films. During the war, Van Heusen rose at the crack of dawn to work as a test pilot for Lockheed – under his birth name – then went to the studio to put in hours as Van Heusen. “Who the hell is going to hire a guy knowing he could be killed before a movie is finished,” Burke commented, keeping the secret. A trio of their songs includes the rarely performed “Monday or Always:” Won’t you tell me when/We will meet again/Sunday, Monday, or always…Mulder is doleful. Jon Weber caresses piano keys with feeling and finesse.
“Jimmy had his pick of all the great lyricists. He didn’t try too hard,” the vocalist notes. Among songs he wrote with Johnny Mercer is a gauzy “I Thought About You.” The vocalist barely moves but for a graceful occasional arm or hand gesture. Everything funnels into lyric meaning. She has a way of bridging phrases with sustained focus and emotion. “Burke wrote perhaps his most devastating lyric when he was really ill,” Mulder reflects. “Here’s That Rainy Day” accompanied by shimmering guitar is from the short-lived Carnival of Flanders which, like other Van Heusen Broadway efforts, bombed. Cloaked in melancholy sentiment, she’s entirely believable.
Jon Weber, Marissa Mulder, Ahmad Johnson, Phil Ambuel, Lance Conrad
In 1953, the composer teamed up with Sammy Cahn to write a musical production of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town in which Frank Sinatra played The Stage Manager. Wilder stipulated the show be performed only once, live. Its title song arrives like an old valentine: You will lose your heart/in this our 2 x 4 town… As Mulder sets the scene, Weber paints with music: Look to your heart/When there are words to say/And never leave your love unspoken…
“Love and Marriage” (Lyric Sammy Cahn) and “Personality” (Lyric Johnny Burke) embody Van Heusen’s upbeat temperament. The latter begins a capella with only percussion. Mulder shifts her hips and flirts: She knew how to use her—perso-nal-i-tee. Angie Dickinson said of Van Heusen, “You would not pick him over Clark Gable any day, but his magnetism was irresistible.”
“Come Dance With Me” arrives classy, Latin swing; a country club orchestration. Mulder sways, arms out. Drums groove: Come on, dance with me/Romance with me on a crowded floor…ooo la, la, la la… “Call Me Irresponsible” and “All the Way” were also Oscar winners. The first emerges casual and cool, hand in hand with lilting guitar. Picture Sinatra’s hat down over an eye. “It’sssss undeniably true, she sings savoring the thought. During the second, the vocalist seems to roll out phrases like ribbons. (Lyric-Sammy Cahn)
Young Jimmy Van Heusen (Public Domain)
“But Beautiful” (Lyric Johnny Burke) with only Weber’s spellbinding piano, floats us out on a cloud. “I have to believe that at his core, he was an incurable romantic,” Mulder says. The composer did eventually marry at 56. His bride outlived him. Jimmy Van Heusen is buried near the Sinatra family in Desert Memorial Park near Palm Springs. His gravestone reads “Swingin’ On a Star.”
“He played piano beautifully, wrote gorgeously poignant songs about romance… he had a fat wallet, he flew his own plane; he never went home alone.” (James Kaplan about Jimmy Van Heusen in Frank: The Voice, 2010.)
Marissa Mulder has an aptitude for swing, yet never sounds like a lounge singer. Lyric meaning is paramount. When her voice vibrantly fans out, it’s not stressed. She knows when to hold and when to fold.
Arrangements are skilled and appealing.
My single caveat is the artist’s terrifically researched patter needs editing by half.
Swinging On a Star: The Songs of Jimmy Van Heusen
Marissa Mulder
Jon Weber – MD/Piano
Lance Conrad – Guitar, Phil Ambuel-Bass, Ahmad Johnson- Drums
The Cutting Room
44 East 32nd Street
Photos by Alix Cohen
