Night And Day

Night And Day was performed in public for the first time on Nov. 7, 1932 at the Wilbur Theater in Boston, Massachusetts by Fred Astaire in the musical Gay Divorce. 80 years ago Gay Divorce had a different meaning than today. In fact, when the musical was made into a movie in 1934, the thought-police insisted it be titled The Gay Divorcee because, as everyone knew, a divorce was a somber experience and couldn't possibly be gay, but one of the two parties involved could be gay....as in happy. Really.
Anyway, Gay Divorce played two weeks in Boston, moved on to New Haven for a week then opened on Broadway on Nov. 29, 1932. After 248 performances it closed on July 1, 1933 and then opened in London's West End at the Palace Theatre on Nov. 2 and ran for another 180 performances. When it closed, Astaire headed for Hollywood and never appeared in a stage production again.
All the songs in Gay Divorce were written by Cole Porter of which Night And Day seems to be the only one that outlasted the stage production.
Night And Day had sort of a strange trip along the way,  slowly evolving into a late 20th century jazzy-singer type of standard. It remains popular today, being recorded every year by a number of people, most of whom I am not familiar with. I know in recent years Rod Stewart and Smokey Robinson have both recorded it, but then they both go back 50 years or so themselves.
The song has an unusual and complex structure and Porter claimed to be inspired by hearing an Islamic call to worship while in Morocco.
Astaire recorded the song around the time the musical opened in 1932.

 

In 1934 RKO produced the movie version of Gay Divorce and I believe the only song included in the movie from the musical was Night And Day. You can watch the clip of the song and Fred and Ginger dancing here: The Gay Divorcee - Fred and Ginger

In the 1930's and early 1940's many of the big name orchestra's recorded the song but none of them strayed far from the original. The first interesting recording was done on December 13, 1939 by Billie Holiday. Her performance of it was very smooth and flowing.

 

 Frank Sinatra cut it for the first time on Jan. 19, 1942. A somewhat wimpy version very similar to Fred's original recording 10 years earlier, but typical of the crooner style of that time. He went on to record it at least four more times, each one quite different from the others, and it became one of his signature tunes for quite a few years.

 

Still a long ways from becoming a "jazz standard", by the early 1950's Billie Holiday's 1939 recording still remained the most adventurous version that I've ever heard. In the early 1950's Les Paul and Mary Ford had a very popular radio show and were producing a lot of hit records for Capitol. Of course, Les Paul is an amazing story in itself which I can't go into here. Les produced recordings in his garage or basement on electronic equipment he built himself that was years ahead of its time. Every sound on their records was made by Les' guitar or Mary's voice......s. Their recording gave the song some rhythm and Mary's many vocals gave it some emotion.

 

In the 1950's the song seems to have found itself more popular than ever. In 1954, Frances Faye recorded it at a much faster tempo with a very jazzy backing, perhaps partially inspired by the big 1954 mambo craze, but I believe this is the recording that set the song in a whole new direction. If there were earlier similar recordings, I've not heard them. 

 

In 1955, on November 10 to be exact, Thelma Grayson recorded the song and took it a step further in that new direction. With a driving bass and excellent jazz piano and sax and, most important, a vocal range miles wider than Frances Faye's, Thelma established Night And Day as a jazz standard. I also like her use of the seldom used opening ("like the beat beat beat of the tom tom") in a very straight and innocent manner with the band kicking off as she says "night and day".

 

Next up is Ella Fitzgerald and her recording of March 26, 1956. With a big band backing her, Ella, whose voice was an instrument itself, took the melody and lyrics to places they hadn't been before.
It became one of Ella's most popular songs in her performances.

 

With the ladies turning the song into something much different than Frank Sinatra recorded in 1942, Frank gave it another go on Nov. 26, 1956. It's a far cry from 1942.

 

A lot of people were recording Night And Day now. Both bands and orchestra's doing instrumental versions and singers such as Doris Day and Shirley Bassey. To drive the nail completely into the jazz standard board, Anita O'Day did this 1959 version at 100 miles per hour. 

 

The 50's were over and the song had come a long way in a few short years. Now popsters like Pat Boone, Steve Lawrence, Sonny Til and Brenda Lee were doing the song. In 1961 Frankie gave it a third go, this time almost returning to his 1942 crooning style. Maybe he couldn't keep up with the likes of Ella and Anita, etc.?

 

1964 saw Night And Day go full-fledged jazz classic when Stan Getz and Bill Evans entered the studio on May 6 to cut it.

 

Screaming Jay Hawkins recorded it on May 3, 1965. What's interesting about his recording is its sort of Bossa Nova rhythm, pre-dating Sergio Mendes recording by two years.

 

 By the mid-60's it was inevitable that a beat group/pop group would give it a whirl. In 1966, Florida's The Razor's Edge did just that.

 

Next up is one of my favorite version's of the song done by Sérgio Mendes & Brasil '66 with the vocals by Lani Hall (Mrs. Herb Alpert) and Janis Hansen from 1967....taking the song in a new direction. 

 

Let's jump ahead 15 years...the whole new wave thing is in top gear and Hull, England's alt rockers Everything But The Girl make their debut with.....

 

and we'll leave it in 1990 with Irish rockers U2 - who ten years earlier played at The Paradise in Boston in front of about 40 people and is about 3 miles west of where Night And Day was first performed for the public.