Bing Crosby was born on 3rd May, 1903.
Bing said of his profession: “I think popular music in this country is one of the few things in the twentieth century that have made giant strides in reverse.”
For my personal tastes, popular music’s peak was spread across the middle of the twentieth century: Bing, Count Basie, Glen Miller, Sinatra, Elvis, Hank, The Beatles, Dylan, The Beach Boys, Van Morrison, Joni Mitchell, David Ackles, Michael Murphey, The Dillards, Steve Young, Paul Siebel and Willie Nelson. (The last four of the links here are to songs whose gentle feel might have a resemblance to the feel of the great crooner’s music.)
(For all his undoubted cleverness, the 1980’s-1990’s ethos of Eminem – and other rappers – just doesn’t stack up with the spirit of Gentleman Bing.)
I rate the zenith of last century’s popular music as lasting from 1965 with the Nobel Prize quality of Highway 61 Revisited to 1972’s return to something like highbrow vaudeville through David Ackles’ critically revered album “American Gothic“, which included Love’s Enough a song that could have been written for Bing:
“Every time you fall in love / that’s the best time of all. / It’s holding sunlight in your hand, / it’s heaven come to call ………”
Apart from the Beatles, Van and Joni, all of my personal favourites listed above from last century were Americans.
God Bless America – the nation which showed the world how to sing.
Bing helped kick that off.
Geoff Fox, 3rd May, 2023, Australia
(The above Word Art is words added by me to a photo by Allen Warren and is published by me under a GNU Free Documentation License)
FREEDOM, DEMOKRASI AND CIVILISED HUMANITY 