It is as if it is the perfect combination of words and music: direct in its message, refreshingly simple in its delivery. But to be honest, this song does hail from an era when like life, most songs were simpler and by today's standards embarrassingly romantic. “Thinking of You” is a song that was penned by the “old-school” songwriting team of Bert Kalmar & Harry Ruby. Now, you may be wondering who were Burt Kalmar and Harry Ruby? Well, they were just a couple of ordinary guys who happened to write a lot of delightful songs. And at least one song, in my humble opinion, is a most remarkable one—perhaps one of the most well-crafted love songs ever written.
Both
Bert and Harry began their days in New York City (growing up within
blocks of each other). And like many of us, both set out to do one
thing and ended up doing another. Sound familiar? Bert
wanted to become a magician. And Harry? Harry wanted to become a
professional baseball player. They both ended up becoming
songwriters and partners in a very successful songwriting team.
However, their first loves—magic and baseball—remained a passion all their lives and were a running theme in the MGM musical biography
Three Little Words (Fred Astaire, Red Skelton & Vera Miles
1950).
Even
if “old-school” romantic songs aren't exactly your cup of mocha
latte,
you might warm up to a familiar Kalmar & Ruby song (written with
Oscar Hammerstein II), which was featured in the 1993 movie Sleepless
in Seattle,
“A
Kiss To Build A Dream On”. After
hearing it for years,
I
was delighted to learn that Kalmar & Ruby wrote this
song. It is solid!
Louis Armstrong-"A Kiss To Build A Dream On"
One
of Kalmar & Ruby's more lucrative and enduring collaborations was
with Groucho Marx & the Marx Brothers. Groucho's famous theme
“Hooray
For Captain Spalding”,
was written by Kalmar & Ruby and first introduced in the 1928
Broadway musical Animal
Crackers, which
starred the Marx Brothers.
For
me personally, I sense a special quality about this song on
top of everything else. I cannot quite put my finger on what it is
though. In interviews, songwriters (especially songwriters from the
golden era of songwriting) have at times spoken of a phenomenon they've
experienced while in the process of writing a song. They've described
experiences that some
might see as “spiritual”—where music and lyrics seemed
to be supernaturally revealed to them as if coming from without rather than from within. Some songwriters have
also described how they have dreamed entire songs while sleeping.
One such instance was for the 1927 musical Strike
Up The Band. Composer George Gershwin described how he dreamed the entire title
song while sleeping. I too have had my own experiences of sleeping and
dreaming songs. Whatever it is that can be surmised from these
accounts, the possibility that songs...music having a spiritual
side to it, can probably be one thing. Perhaps there is something
about the Kalmar-Ruby song along this
nature
that it is I am sensing.
Fred Astaire, Vera Ellen perform "Thinking of You" with Red Skelton (as Harry Ruby) at the piano, in a scene from Three LittleWords (1950)
I
appreciate the ability that music and songs have to gently remind
us of the ideas that matter most to us in life. Connecting with a beautiful
love song, however momentary, reaffirms we are more
than
just our problems, we are more than our tragedies, we are more than our fears. We are the ever hopeful
supporters of the very
things
that this harsh life tries desperately to destroy. And to that end
I say, there can never
be enough beautiful love songs.
Don Cherry sings "Thinking of You"
Harry (left at piano) Bert (on right)
