Judy Garland at Carnegie Hall: The Greatest Night in Entertainment History

on April 23rd 1961 Judy Garland performed a program of 26 Jazz standards musical theater hits and songs from her phography for an audience of over 3,000 people the concert was recorded for Capital Records and releases a live album later that year the event as preserved by the hit record has subsequently been dubbed the greatest night in entertainment history it was wrote music editor of radio TV m Don Mills a triumphant Tor to force that should be on every record shelf of every follower of Show Business her dynamism coupled with the contagion of the audience makes this album a vibrant never to be forgotten experience a chorus of other critics agreed now the greatest night in entertainment history is quite a label a good PR tagline for sure but could it possibly be true did Judy Garland give one of the best concerts of all time that night in this video I'm going to do a deep dive on Judy at Carnegie Hall what led up to it what she sang how she sang it and the Legacy that the album still carries to this day before we get started I want to give a huge thanks to movie for sponsoring this video movie is a cur to streaming service dedicated to elevating great Cinema from around the globe and you can get a whole month free at movie.com beind rewind according to her biographer Gerald Clark Judy Garland called 1961 the best year of her life the year marked a shift in the tide when misfortunes finally seemed to stop piling up and professional successes took their place and she needed it the 1950s had been a particularly tumultuous time she parted ways with her home studio of 15 years MGM and although she had found critical success with 1954's AAR is Born the production was plagued with difficulties indicating the trouble she'd experienced with her mental health and substance abuse at MGM had followed her beyond the Studio's Gates her personal life didn't Fair much better either she filed twice for divorce against her husband Sid L although that wouldn't be official for a few years yet L had developed a gambling habit that quickly drained her bank account of any money she made performing and by 1956 they owed about $21,000 to the IRS in back taxes the Press painstakingly chronicled the couple's money problem like in 1958 when she failed to appear in a New York Court to settle her tax bills was placed under civil arrest and was forced to surrender $10,000 worth of costumes and jewelry when she couldn't afford to pay her bond and that was just the beginning of her legal battles CBS abruptly cancelled a three-year exclusive deal with Garland to produce television specials stories like these piled up and by 1958 The Narrative around her was clear Judy Garland the little girl with the big voice whose life pattern resembles that of a yo-yo has plummeted to the NAT of the downbeat once again keep in mind that during all of this she was still working she maintained a rigorous schedule of concert performances throughout the 1950s very well reviewed concerts in fact for example she played 19 consecutive weeks at The Palace Theater in New York City and won praise for a seven- night run at the Metropolitan Opera with 14 standing ations in one night and rave reviews from critics Lis fun in the New York Times wrote that magnetism that she always has managed to exert upon the audience is as powerful as ever the smooth voice that comes from deep down continues to stir the emotions and set an audience on the edge of its seat still the chaos of the past few years finally took its toll and in November 1959 Garland was taken to the hospital in New York City where she was diagnosed with acute hepatitis likely caused or exacerbated by her chronic substance abuse issues she lay in bed for 7 weeks having fluids drained from her body and was eventually discharged in January 1960 her illness forced her for the first time in a long time to pause Gerald Clark writes during her months of enforced inactivity Judy had had time as well as reason to look closely perhaps for the first time at who she was and where she was going she decided to to leave Los Angeles for London feeling that she could better revive herself away from the judgmental busy Hub of Show Business her health improved rapidly and before long she was back giving concerts sounding better than ever before a run at the Palladium in London in August 1960 was rousing success and things only seem to improve from there one of the first major changes left was replaced as Garland's business manager by Freddy Fields a talent agent who had just started his own agency and was looking to build a small But Mighty list of prominent clientele Fields believed he could harness Judy's Newfound energy to Stage a comeback and began enacting a plan to completely rehabilitate Her Image throughout 1961 first in January of that year it was announced that Garland had nabbed a role in Stanley Kramer's Judgment at nurmberg Irene Hoffman would be a small but crucial role a good fit for the actress readjusting to life on set after 6 years away from Cinema the role wouldn't require learning any complex choreography or music she didn't carry the pressure of being a lead and it demonstrated her dramatic range in a way her musical comedies normally didn't success in that role could open the door to New Opportunities Down the Line concerts were of course also part of the plan so Fields arranged a 16 City Tour throughout the United States that would end at Carnegie Hall in in New York City Garland selected and ordered the songs herself and hired Mort Lindsay as the musical director and conductor for the tour who Barbara stron fans might recognize as the musical director of a happening in Central Park although some arrangements were recycled from previous albums Lindsay's contributions should not be understated the arrangements at the band are no small part of why the album succeeds the way it does which we'll hear more about later fields Garland also intentionally Stripped Away extravagant or showy elements from the show many of Garland's previous concerts were more like musical variety shows complete with multiple costume changes sets and supporting acts for example her show at the Metropolitan Opera featured comedian Alan King a supporting group of singers and dancers as well as costumes recalling her film roles the idea for the new tour was to let Judy shine no dancers no no gimmicks gone are the Male Chorus Line and the comedians the costume the tux and the top hat bit there were just be one costume change at intermission the sheath Mandarin effect of the First Act replaced by black slacks and a blouse in the second variety's review of The Carnegie Hall concert later stated adding that the costuming gave her unusual mobility and she used it to Advantage with the hand mic she pranced and skipped around the stage heightening her singing with the AA of complete physical Joy although there's obviously no video recording of the actual concert Judy did perform many of the songs on the set list on television throughout the 1960s offering a hint of what it might have been like to watch her that night I believe she's even wearing the same costume she wore at Carnegie Hall in the television special shot right after the concert and the commentary about her Mobility really does check out she feels a ton of space dancing and skipping around audiences would find they hoped that Garland's voice and physicality alone could sustain a show and they did in February 1961 with a brief break to film Judgment at nurg the tour began these shows in cities like Birmingham and San Francisco began Judy's comeback in Earnest as she impressed local paper after local paper with her performances these readers were all aware of the ups and downs mostly Downs Judy had faced over the past decade and that context framed how they perceived her work so for example this review of her stop in Buffalo literally listed off every low point in her life over the past decade or so but emphatically followed it up with any doubts that her followers may have had that she could climb to the Top Again were washed this week in Buffalo at kleinan Music Hall Judy Garland received the greatest Ovation I have ever seen or heard any artist receive when she reached the conclusion of her 2hour one woman show as another paper put it has Judy Garland health problems marital problems weight problems career problems nobody in Dallas Music Hall Monday night could have cared less this finally was the Judy everyone knew recognized and loved the stage for her comeback was set the success of this tour gave Judy's record label Capital Records the confidence that a live album recorded at the tour's final stop Carnegie Hall would be worth the effort live albums had sold well for other artists in the past Billy Holiday had recorded a live album at Carnegie Hall in 1956 to promote her autobiography lady sings the blues elep Fitzgerald had recently recorded one in West Berlin that earned her a pair of Grammys and so Judy was given the green light for her own live recording a rumor circulated for many years that Capital Records only wanted to do a Carnegie Hall album because it was so hard to get Judy into the studio to fulfill her contractual recording obligations that they basically gave up and just decided to catch her performing the set live but that's not the case she had already successfully recorded two full albums with them over the course of a year that's Entertainment released in 1960 and the London sessions also recorded in 1960 while she was living in London but that had yet to be released as will friedwald writes in his book The Great Jazz and pop vocal albums Capital held back on releasing the British material as they had realized that a live album from Carnegie Hall was a possibility and so on Sunday April 23rd 1961 a crowd of 3,165 people took their seats at Carnegie Hall Judy knew how to milk an audience Mart Lindsay told Vanity Fair in 2011 I see her standing in the wings she's not doing anything just looking across the stage she's looking at me and I'm looking at her I look in the audience and there's Ethel Merman and Rock Hudson and Benny Goodman all these big shots sitting down in the first row waiting and waiting is she going to come out is she going to do it but she knows what she's doing finally she gives me a nod and I start the [Applause] Overture if you're a fan of Judy Garland I can't imagine a better Overture to Hype you up for the show than this one it's a orchestration weaving together arguably her three most famous songs the trolley song for Meet Me In St Louis over the rainbow from The Wizard of Oz and the man that got away from a star is born each of these songs are later played in the concert so I won't go into too much depth about them here but needless to say the Overture certainly does its job and by the time Judy Garland actually took the stage at about 8:45 p.m. the audience is audibly thrilled and prepared for the show the track ends with lengthy Applause before Garland immediately launches into her first song of the evening the concert really begins with when you're smiling the whole world smiles at you written by Mark fiser Joe Goodwin and Larry Shay who was musical director at MGM in the 1930s originally written in 1928 the song had become a popular standard by 1961 performed by anyone and everyone you can imagine although it became most associated with Louis Armstrong when you smiling Garland's Arrangement takes a quicker Tempo when you're smileing when you're smiling the but more significantly what differentiates her version is the inclusion of a patter section A short comedic interlude written specifically for her by Roger Edens her mentor and singing coach at MGM Who provided additional music and lyrics for her throughout her career many examples of which appear on this album with Eden's new lyrics She lists a series of scenarios that might get a person down but follows each up with an encouraging note if you're deceived she sings don't get peeved if your husband bluntly tells you you're too Stout don't you pout and for this new section the though brief establishes some of the basic themes that recur throughout the concert first it is unabashedly theatrical as friedwald points out Garland's opening Salvo makes it clear that she comes from a theatrical background rather than a jazz or big band One a majority of her Arrangements don't read merely as new orchestrations of standards they read more like theatrical adaptations of Standards a single song will vary in tone and tempo as we'll see in songs like Stormy Weather or include new lyrics to give more of a narrative Arc as is the case here but they're usually tailored to give Garland an opportunity to more explicitly act a song rather than straightforwardly sing it that acting brings us to the second thing this section does it reminds us that Judy Garland is specifically a musical comedy Entertainer listening to the section is sufficient to understand that she's Hamming it up and really going for the laugh here but later television performances give us some Clues as to what she might have actually done on the stage if your husband bluntly tells you you're too Stout don't you pout the new lyrics give her a platform to do this kind of acting in a way that performing the standard as written wouldn't have the jokes she actually makes point to the third and final function of the new section it would have been impossible to be a fan casual or otherwise of Judy Garland and not read these lyrics as a meta commentary on Garland's own life many songs throughout the album carry a double meaning at once uh standard standards and subtextual references to the singer's complicated and public life sometimes the references will come in the form of self-deprecating humor as she does here for example the line about being Stout Garland's weight had been a topic of conversation virtually from the minute she began acting MGM constantly pressured her behind the scenes to lose weight and assigned her unhealthy methods to ensure that she did throughout the late 1950s she gained weight for various reasons not insignificantly the hepatitis that made her body physically unable to process excess fluids and seemingly no one could write an article about her without mentioning it Lis fun wrote in his review of her concert at the Metropolitan Opera for example that she was clearly in a desperate battle with calories another wrote of that performance that she was so bulky it was startling a vast majority of the reviews of her 1961 tour include similar commentary monitoring how she'd trimmed down a bit since her last appearance the word plump was used a lot as of course was Stout so when Judy Garland gets up on stage to sing with a smile on her face slapping her own waist if your husband wly tells you you're too Stout don't you pout and for the audience recognizes the joke as extremely personal laughs and claps she has acknowledged a kind of in joke creating a sense of intimacy between herself and the audience member based on shared knowledge and a sincere willingness to actually go there Garland by referencing the criticism diffuses it defiantly robbing critics of their ability to harm her with their words the next track provides another perfect example Garland goes directly into her next song A medley combining two Broadway hits almost like being in love by musical theater Duo learner and low for the 1947 musical Brigadoon and this can't be Love written by Richard Rogers and the Ren's Hart for the 1938 musical the boys from Syracuse after this medley she finally talks to the crowd I'm so excited my goodness here she launches into a story about her recent European tour where she visited with a particularly Chic French friend of hers she said you must go to my hairdresser uh because obviously you need somebody so she arranged so she goes to this hairdresser the woman recommends and he builds up a tall hairstyle that's much higher than anything she could have anticipated I walked out balancing my hair and uh her hair melts from the lights and her sweat and she's left with a sloppy mess on her head stories like this and jokes like the Stout joke are at the heart of what formed Judy Garland star Persona since its earliest days within the stable of MGM Stars Garland was most often framed in contrast to the Studio's more glamorous figures she wasn't clothed in elegant gowns like Joan Crawford she wasn't a mysterious deity like GR Garbo she wasn't the object of lust like Jean harlo she was more of the typical girl next door her characters had to blossom into their own plucked from obscurity and lifted into success by hard work and pure talent she might lose out on her Crush to Lana Turner but she would make a joke out of it and by the end of the film you'd be rooting for her MGM would never let her look truly silly or humiliated but her being in silly situations scrambling to keep composure were consistantly part of the joke in an era where many stars were treated with reverence and frequently sought that reverence by peacocking the illusion of perfection Garland went the opposite direction as she did on screen she insisted on emphasizing her normality or what scholar Richard Dyer termed her ordinariness in his book Heavenly Bodies she sweated she gained weight and everybody could laugh about it on her terms after they paid a bunch of money money to see her perform at the nation's foremost concert venue the story Judy tells at Carnegie Hall may or may not be a true story i' wage or not it varied from concert to concert I arrived there and they sent me to a very famous terribly Chic hairdresser but it means something that this is the kind of story she wanted to tell to entertain her audience it's essentially a standup set performed by an expert in self-deprecation who does doesn't see herself on the pedestal her Superstar status might ordinarily suggest that she resides on jokes like this run throughout all of the talking tracks on the album like I don't know why it is that I can't perspire I just sweat so unladylike the hair appointment story gets a punchline with the opening of her next song George gerswin and Buddy D Silva one of the founders of Capital Records wrote the song do it again for the 1922 Broadway show the French doll this wasn't the first time Garland performed do it again it appeared on her 1958 album Judy and love that version begins with the original lyrics and a quicker Tempo do it again I may the Carnegie Hall Arrangement begins with a new verse and dramatically slows the tempo transforming it into a deeply romantic intimate piece that shows off a different facet of her skill set do it [Music] again as John Wilson wrote In The New York Times there are basically two sides to miss Garland as a singer the Lusty voiced belter craftily Adept at theatrical type of projection and the easy casual singer who works on intimate terms with her audience this is the latter the song is also an excellent study in the way different performance Styles and orchestrations affect the mood of a song Consider for example that probably the second most famous performance of this song was done by Marilyn Monroe at a Uso show at Camp Pendleton the same lyric in Marilyn's hands feels completely different won regret it come get it [Music] regret is [Music] come the tenderness of Judy's rendition is a standout for me on the album sure the audience can relate to the awkwardness of a bad haircut but they can also connect to the quietness and honesty of this performance that so earnestly communicates a vulnerability usually only expressed in private after do it again's piercing intimacy we land firmly back in the land of the standard American song book with you go to my head another song she had recently recorded in her London sessions this track is primarily remembered for Garland's brief slip of memory she tries to save herself with an inelegant scat adjacent string of nonsense words before finally finding the lyric again are you intoxicate my soul with your as hard as it may be to admit Judy at Carnegie Hall is not technically a perfectly sung album by this point in her life Garland showed signs of vocal damage that occasionally peaked through in her performances and unlike albums today these cracks or wobbles were not smoothed into Oblivion or erased in [Applause] [Music] post but for many Garland fans that was kind of the point for the woman who had embodied the mighty Underdog in films and real life for years imperfection equaled authenticity in reviews throughout her tour critics pointed out the strain in her voice but framed it as a feature not a bug of the event texture that added emotional depth to her delivery her voice is shaky at times almost tremulous and then big blaring brassy yet to the audience each note is personally touching another paper remarked The Voice doesn't quite have the LT it once possessed the body is somewhat dumpy but the brilliant tremulous smile is the same the emotional depth has been doubled and the yearning the unique yearning that Judy gets into her voice has reached the point of infinity collapse in memory though a quotee unquote mistake isn't quite the same thing as a vocal stumble however Garland was known to have trouble remembering things there are outtakes of the Judy Garland show that prove as much but then again as friend of the channel lipsa pointed out the closer you look this particular lapse in memory recurred in the same spot throughout her tour with aile i' always forget these words qu and I forgot the gar either this was an especially difficult lyric to remember perhaps because the tempo in the live version was significantly faster than the original recording that or it's a bit a play on the imperfections a play on her reputation for unreliability both are frankly believable to me alone together was composed by Arthur Schwarz with lyrics by Howard Deets a man who hadn't an absolutely fascinating career as both a highly successful Lyricist and also one of the most important publicity men in Hollywood serving as mgm's director of advertising and publicity like yeah the guy who wrote the lyrics for the bandwagon also came up with Leo the Lion like the MGM lion anyway Schwarz and Deets wrote this song for the 1932 Broadway musical flying colors and it eventually became a jazz standard sung by The Usual Suspects including Judy Arland who recorded a version for her album That's Entertainment her recording at Carnegie Hall is broadly the same as that version although there was a conspiracy theory for years that she had actually messed up on the night of the concert and re-recorded it for the album release because it was the one track on the original that didn't line up correctly from track to track freed wall debunks that too Garland started the song Standing slightly too far away from the microphone and then the tape ran out mid song on capital's main recorder both problems were easily solved on capital's definitive CD issue released at the time of the 40th anniversary in 2001 the volume level was adjusted and a backup tape with the complete performance of Alone Together was utilized so now everything plays smoothly from you go to my head into alone together and everything's fine at the end of the track Garland gives us more banter if I'm known at all I'm known for singing very sad tragic songs are just marches and holiday songs but she adds setting up the next section I do like sing Jazz and they won't let me I don't know who they are but they won't let me this she says is her opportunity to do more straightforward Jazz Renditions so she gathers a small section of the band for the next few songs who cares is another new arrangement of a Broadway hit from the 1930s of the I sing with music and lyrics by George and Ira gerswin in fact the next three songs were all written in the 1920s and 30s put on the Ritz is a 1927 song by Irving Berlin that Clark Gable once performed in a [Music] film he was not good she follows this with how long has this been going on again by George and IA gerswin for the 1927 musical funny face which also appears on that entertainment finally just you just me which was written for the 1929 musical film Maryanne starring Maran [Music] Davies these songs go by really quickly but represent another broad theme of the concert Nostalgia uel bort points out in his 33 and to third book on the concert that of the 28 songs that make up judia Carnegie Hall only two were written in the 1950s more than half in fact date to the 1920s and 30s to the Great American song book Garland came from Vaudeville the studio system a time in which musical theater ruled the box office when pop music came primarily from Broadway and her set list purposely indulges in these roots she isn't interested in a new arrangement of a contemporary pop hit like Runaway by Dell Shannon she means to evoke a past era to draw a through line from the origins of pop music to the present the complicated implications of which we'll talk about more in a minute that this concert occurred in 1961 is interesting in and of itself a year that seemed to represent a kind of pivot point in culture symbolically cleaving the 20th century in two John F Kennedy was sworn in as president and initiated an escalation of the Vietnam War the studio system had all but abandoned the haze code that censored immoral content in films to give you an idea of how divided the music industry was by two halves of a century at the Grammys that year 80-year-old Stravinsky won for best classical album of the Year while Chubby Checker won for Let's Twist Again concert Gos in 1961 would have understood Garland as a nostalgic act the word appears again and again in articles about her work her singing style often seems to be Associated more with the past than the present it conveys a period feeling John Wilson wrote in the New York York Times about her Carnegie Hall concert the New York Times review of The Met show which more explicitly utilized villian tropes said the ritual in this sort of show inevitably calls for Nostalgia a Sentimental jog to memory of the younger and brighter days Miss Garland is indulging in the ritual to the fullest as you might imagine pop music also became the 1961 equivalent of a culture War issue as Pop Culture moved toward Elvis Presley and Tina Turner there were obviously folks who yearned for the good old songwriting of yester year as one disgruntled concert goer put it perhaps it was unfamiliarity or old age or lack of associations but I'm believing what I read that the composition of good pop music is a dying art what's more fun than hearing some great old tune pegging it in time and remembering with a Pang of the people you knew and loved in 1944 the things you were doing in 1949 or 1953 this sort of thing you can enjoy with Judy Garland's music but how in heaven will today's teenagers be able to get all dewy-eyed remembering the antics of Elvis and the other oily haired young men who sing such awful songs if the show is partly about looking back in time it was also about looking back in time at Judy's filmography the next song is the first in the show that directly dips into that work the man that got away was written for the 1954 film a star is born with lyrics by IRA gerswin and music by Harold arand Arin was perhaps Garland's most important composer having written get happy and over the rainbow in addition to several other standards she covered throughout the years he was there that night too she even calls him out at one point Harold Harold St this number in A Star is Born is icon it's the scene in which Norman M really listens to the yet to be famous Esther blet sing for the first time after drunkenly interrupting her show earlier than in the evening because this song was originated by Judy Garland the music was essentially already tailored to her skills as a performer it tells a story allowing her to act through the song it's big emotional the carnegy hall version doesn't have to do much to make the song even bigger and yet it achieves this with very simple changes this version has a slightly slower Tempo and a prominent use of strings that gives the song a more wistful quality than in the film where it needed to believably pass for a jazz band playing in a dingy bar after hours where the film gently eases in the brass dreams you dreed all G [Music] Str the concert version wants to smack you in the face with it and it's absolutely sickening dreams you dream have all gone [Applause] [Music] astray the song is like a bomb going off just explosive with heartache Garland also demonstrates that she knows when and how to deoy weakness to great effect in the film this is a practice performance for a group of friends she ends the song in a relatively positive mood another successful exercise for the team at Carnegie Hall she allows the performance to better match the lyric she's sad regretful grieving like this version from the Judy Garland [Music] show that go [Music] it's a touching performance that brings to mind this quote from film historian Richard chickle at her finest Miss Garland especially in her maturity seems always about to be destroyed by her own inner forces it puts a quiver of passion in her voice and a chill in the listener's spine at every moment of a Garland performance you feel that you stand with the star on the brink of disaster and a hundred times a night she saves herself and her sympathetic admirers from the abyss songs like this were Garland's bread and butter both technically as one of the great belters of entertainment history and thematically romantic yearning was a staple of young Judy's repertoire writes beton Court the tragedy Garland so carefully evoked in her singing was all always about heartache she had as she often joked plenty of experience in the matter it's true most of the showstoppers on the album deal with themes like the man that got away at least except for the finale of Act One San Francisco was written for the 1936 film San Francisco that takes place in the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake starring Janette McDonald and Clark Gable Roger Edens again provided Garland with a newly WR prologue that functions much the way the patter section does in when you're smiling it turns a rather straightforward musical ODed to a city into a musical comedy number that plays with the audience's prior knowledge she begins I never will forget Janette [Music] McDonald of course in reference to the 1936 film Janette McDonald Donald like Garland was a star of movie musicals though she and Garland had very different star personas an anenu who sang in an operatic soprano she became known for her films with baritone Nelson Eddie in which they constantly cred love songs at each other in San Francisco McDonald sings this song what seems like a million times and the orchestration has maybe 2% of the vivacity of [Music] judies [Applause] Garland's new prologue pokes fun at this kind of corny repetitive operatic Love Song and [Music] sing critic Andrew Saras later wrote that Janette McDonald's fans were less than thrilled about this this song might not seem like an intuitive closer for act one at first particularly following one of her most famous songs but Garland's energy is undeniable in this number and watching the footage of her sing it one does get the sense that she really did love performing it she's extremely animated and makes some of the most clever entertaining choices in the entire show this is my favorite and you will love to see me perpendicular hanging on listening to this song this 41 woman becomes the theater just in an enormous all-encompassing presence it's an effervescent end to the First Act leaving the audience eagerly awaiting what's in [Music] store the second act opens with that's Entertainment written for the 1953 musical the bandwagon with Music by Arthur Schwarz and lyrics by Howard deetz the song became an Anthem of sorts for MGM employed as a nostalgic throwback tune representing the Golden Age of Hollywood in the 1950s it was used as a theme song for the television show MGM parade which essentially just showed clips of old MGM films the MGM parade brought to you this week by pel Mel famous cigarettes a compilation film in 1974 that broadly did the same thing with MGM also used it as a title Garland the face of MGM musicals for many years also selected the songs as the titular track for her 1960 album the song's a slightly odd one positing that you can really make entertainment out of anything the world is a stage after all which probably means you can predict exactly how Todd Phillips is going to use it in Joker to Garland takes its message to a personal level following her performance with a story about how a reporter in London who'd been very very nice to her in person going on and on about how well she looked only to only to publish a story the next day with the headline Judy Garin arrives in London and she's not chubby and she's not plump she's fat that's certainly not News That's Entertainment what more could Judy give I can't give you anything but love with music and lyrics by Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields was first son by Adelaide Hall in 1928 and later included in the Broadway show blackbirds of 1928 the song was recorded multiple times throughout the 1930s and 40s and appeared in multiple films I can't give you anything but love baby I like to see your looking well [Music] baby [Music] do your mind but most famously was sung by Lena horn in the 1943 film stormy weather Garland is again given new lyrics to add a theatrical metatouch to her version she sings that it's someone's birthday but she can't afford a single present I'm much too broke i f [Music] this is a clear nod to Garland's financial troubles but it's also an odd Edition in a sense although it's not typically sung as part of the standard there is a prologue to the song that includes a line about being broke and it's unclear why that version is not used but it's tough to be brok it's not a joke kid it's a curse Garland's version much like do it again in the First Act uses a much slower Tempo than is usually performed it's such a bouncy Melody but Garland gives it a Melancholy touch transforming the song from a defiant happy go-lucky in the face of poverty tune to something elegantly mournful I can't give you anything but [Music] love baby [Music] where the filmed version takes a typical MGM approach Furnishing horn with a gilded gown and filling the instrumental break with a dance [Music] sequence in her television performances Judy dispenses with her energetic roaming of the stage to dreamily pensively remain still during the instrumental break the next song picks up the mood come rer come shine was written for the 1946 musical St Louis Woman by Harold arand and Johnny Mercer another founder of Capital Records the song was originated by DEA green in a cast that included Pearl Bailey and Harold Nicholas of the tap dancing Duo the Nicholas Brothers Garland's version here Swings with a heavy Conga presence a lively pickme up after her somber version of I can't give you anything but love so Lively in fact she ends the track with the banter I think after all of that Insanity we should calm down Garland invites the audience to join her for a short collection of three songs accompanied solely by Mort Lindsay on the piano first your nearer by Richard Rogers and Loren Hart for the 1940 film too many girls where it's lips synced by Lucille Ball near than my head is to my pillows next a foggy day written by George and Ira gerswin for the 1937 film a damsel in distress and finally if love were all written by NL coward Garland takes the time to introduce two of these three songs worrying that either the audience had either not heard of them or that they might be bored by simple piano accompanyment these songs aren't the most famous standards nor are they recognizable hits from her films so that she takes the time to introduce them specifically suggests that she likes them they're here because she wants to sing them not because they're crowd Pleasers she's obligated to include with that in mind the final line of if love were all hits like a ton of bricks but believe that since my life began the most I've had is just a talent to amuse what follows is one of the most jarring transitions in the concert we go right from that gut-wrenching lyric that reflects on a life spent entertaining others into Zing went the strings of my heart a song Judy Garland had been singing since she was 12 years old and according to Fred Wald was apparently part of her audition for MGM now the little lady uh standing here beside me uh isn't exactly a celebrity yet she's only 12 years old she probably won't be famous all maybe for a couple of years her name is Judy Garland and I'm sure that you remember her singing here uh about 4 weeks ago well since her last appearance here she signed a 7-year contact with the MGM Studio isn't that great gu she later sang the song for the studio in the 1938 film listen darling these clips jux suppos in such an interesting way the pre-teen Garland is so raw and seemingly uncomfortable at least compared to the highly experienced warm performer weed decades later holding the audience in the palm of her hand I heard a robin sing about a nest set up all night just seemed to be in perfect hary Zing strings of my heart that skill holding the audience in the palm of her hand is on display in the next track Stormy Weather was written by Harold Arland and Ted Kohler for Ethel Waters who originally premiered it at the famous Harlem nightclub The Cotton Club in 1933 the songstress most often associated with the song however was Lena horn who sang it in the 1943 film of the same name one of the only movies from a major studio with an all black cast in the 1940s Garland had been singing the song for years before finally recording it as part of her London sessions which is the version she sings at Carnegie Hall there are no additional lyrics to her version but her Arrangement differs so drastically that it almost feels like a different song altogether as I mentioned earlier in the video stormy weather is perhaps the best example on the album of Garland's Arrangements matching her ability to act a song the introduction is bold but it quickly peels back to reveal a forlorn Judy the horns moan in the background as she smartly softens her voice to express her weariness and misery everywhere Stormy Weather the volume and the strings become more defiant as she pleads with the heavens all I do is pray that the Lord above will let me walk in the Sun once more and just when everything drops and you expect a huge belt of emotion she [Music] weeps everything I had is gone Stormy Weather soon the anger sets in can't go everything I had is gone exhaustion leads to a final release [Music] raining oh [Music] [Music] [Applause] every emotion conveyed by Garland in this song feels earned by Years Of Heartache men who disappointed her romantically men who stole all her money journalists who giddily chronicled every detail for the world to read as her body broke down under the weight of it all it's an extraordinary performance that perfectly illustrates the sense of drama and self-reflection unique to Garland's concert style she follows this with a medley including a trio of songs from her films she sang You Made Me Love You in the 1937 film Broadway Melody of 1938 that Performance Set a major precedent for her career because yes Roger Eden wrote additional lyrics way back then too a verse from the perspective of a fan writing to Clark Gable rewald notes that MGM released the song as a bide in 1939 opposite Garland's recording of Over the Rainbow from with the Wizard of Oz for me and my gal is the titular song from for me and my gal which she performs with Jean Kelly and does some of the worst fake piano playing I've ever seen this was also released as a single and was a major hit in 1942 and finally the trolley song from the 1944 film Meet Me In St Louis a year or so ago the trolley song became a bit of a meme online trolley ding ding and to be honest this isn't even an exaggeration everyone went absolutely feral for the trolley song in 1944 it is difficult to State how extremely popular that song was like it was to the point that five different versions of the song charted in 1944 and 1945 ding ding dinging ding ding my [Music] heart of the three songs in this medley the trolley song was the only one specifically written for Garland the others had roots in another artist she was often compared to an artist who originated the next song on the album Al [Music] Jolson You Made Me Love You for Me and My Gal Rocka by your baby with a Dixie Melody and swanie which she sings as an encore at Carnegie Hall were all either originated by or popularized by Al Jolson a singer and actor who is primarily remembered today as the most prominent purveyor of blackface in American entertainment today we rightly condemn his routine as a racist act that caricatures and dehumanizes black people through exaggerated stereotypes this unfortunately was not how he was received in the early 20th century when his blackface Act made him one of the most popular performers of the era and earned him the moniker the world's greatest entertainer because jolon was known for his unique singing style and so-called musical comedy and because jolen was really the first figure to blend the role of movie star and recording artist Judy Garland was often characterized as The Heir Apparent to jolson's title of world's greatest entertainer and her films made over references to Jolson to Foster that connection most jarring MGM put her in blackace as a child in films patterned after the popular minstral shows performed by Jolson more subtle were the post-war homages to Vaudeville like the born in a trunk sequence from 1954 as a star is born as Brian CD points out in his article Judy Garland's American drag Garland sings One of jolson's greatest hits swanie and is dressed with a top hat a jacket and tie and white gloves her costume is a stylized version of the jolsen attire although blackface was generally abandoned in mainstream popular entertainment by 1961 julson remained a beloved cultural figure in White America and tributes to him during this time were anything but taboo CD explains by the early 1950s jolson's black face was a central figure of nostalgia in American mass culture not only due to its role in the history of Cinema familiar to 50s audiences from the 1951 film singing in the rain but also in relation to the very popular new jolon films of the late 1940s the Al Jolson story and Jolson sings again the latter being the top grossing film of 1949 although Garland's performance at Carnegie Hall makes no over gesture to Jolson other than singing some of his Greatest Hits Rocka by baby and Swan among them CD is absolutely correct in his article to interrogate the function of nostalgia particularly when it evokes an era that so prominently featured racist tropes Bon Court I think expresses the implications of choosing these songs best Swan encapsulates what makes Judy at Carnegie Hall such a quintessentially American classic its Nostalgia mired as it is in blackface entertainment and minstral SE Works hand inand with Garland's effervescent performance to create a document about about a country's backward-looking gaze forever yearning for a past that existed only in its own imagination Garland packaged Nostalgia for an entire generation of Americans who were all too eager to smile alongside her forgetting not only their troubles but the questionable cultural ones this song's history cannot help but Shore up alongside the dreamy river it so exalts Rocka by baby is the off sensible end to the concert but of course 's no way Garland's going home yet the audience demands more Encore after Encore until she eventually exhausts the sheet music her band has available she begins with the perennial favorite Over the Rainbow which I don't feel I need to get into as it's easily the most famous and accessible of her songs this rendition is worth listening to however as it reads completely different on the other side of several decades worth of ups and downs lyrics that sound aspirational and hopeful sung by a teenager sound despairing and fatigued coming from an adult Judy then comes swanie then after you're gone a standard written in 1918 and sung by virtually everyone including Barbara Strand and Judy Garland in their huray for Love medly on the Judy Garland [Applause] show by now the audience is clamoring for more Judy still sounds fresh and seemingly able to continue all night if she could but she ends finally with Chicago another 1922 song with special lyrics by Roger Edens it's by no means the best song in the show but the end of this album to me is overwhelmingly thrilling the band tries to play her off like three or four times with an instrumental version of Over the Rainbow and over the music you can just hear the cheers and Applause from the audience completely over overwhelming the space you're forced to imagine how electric that room must have felt I mean this is really what it's all about isn't [Applause] [Music] it there's something about digging into the history of something that is so intangible I I can read you the stats about how well the album sold I can try to convey with numbers how popular something was or quote reviews but somehow that always seems insufficient to understand what a performance feels like and means hearing the love in these final moments makes everything feel alive suddenly if Judy articulates our innermost emotions through her performances on this album then these fans also articulate our emotions by Comm communicating the appreciation we have for an artist that we cannot cheer for ourselves that is a profound connection to make Across Time news immediately rang out Judy Garland at Carnegie Hall was rousing Success New York Times review waxed poetic about her ability to connect with the audience looking trimmer and a good deal more youthful than she has in years Miss Garland was always in control of herself she soothed the the tender songs as only she knows how to soothe tender songs and she projected the loud ones with all the Vigor at her command always making her audience feel as one listener remarked as if she's just singing to you variety echoed few singers around can get as much out of a song as Miss Garland everything she's got goes into him and she's got plenty the tones are clear the phrasing is Meaningful and the vocal passion is catching to some observers it was akin to witnessing a kind of religious experience the religious ritual of greeting watching and listening to Judy Garland took place last night in Carnegie Hall indeed what actually was to have been a concert and was also turned into something not too remote from a Revival meeting at the end of each song that the audience in a religious-like ferver applauds cries and shouts we love you Judy we love you the Isles were jammed during The Encore turns applauding her every curtsy and even saluting her three children who were lifted on the stage by Rock Hudson who had a first row seat with appreciative cheers the XOXO Gossip Girls head a hopper and Luella Parsons both claimed they had never seen anything like it in their lives Hopper wrote Judy Garland took a jam-packed audience in Carnegie Hall in her arms and they hugged her right back never saw the like in my life Parsons added if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I wouldn't have believed an audience could get so hysterically excited cheer and scream and try to rush up as they did at the Judy Garland concert at Carnegie Hall the pictures prove as much it's worth noting that by this point Garland was known to have a prominent gay following and that too was frequently mentioned in reviews of her concerts although rarely in explicit terms instead most journalists opted for coded language often with a condescending tone like it's too bad that the cultists have taken over indeed absconded with the Judy Garland Legend which has turned into to a catty little click of ecstatic young men in denims and fluffy pullover sweaters the concept of Diva worship and Judy Garland's role as a gay icon has evolved over time from acceptance to rejection of it as a kind of cringey pasti to insisting her death prompted The Stonewall riots to course correcting that because it absolutely didn't but it's undeniably true that this album is filled with adoration and has lived on in part because of the gay men who enjoyed it and if you want to read more about that I would suggest picking up pretty much anything by Richard Dyer who's written extensively on this topic since the 1970s or Manuel beton cours 33 and the third book which thoroughly digs into this topic and is generally fantastic the album was released in July 1961 and received similarly glowing reviews those of you who are Judy Garland fans must own this album and anybody who is looking for a wonderful recorded entertainment should also have it I've never been a Garland nut but I keep listening to these two records said one journalist another wrote she is more than an idol she is one of the great singers of popular songs this recording is a remarkable performance taken as a whole in fact it strikes me as the greatest Judy Garland performance I've ever heard topping by sheer quantity the soundtrack of a star is born if you ever liked a Judy Garland performance you ought to own this album and people definitely bought it Judy at Carnegie Hall charted for 73 weeks on the Billboard charts including 13 weeks at number one placed number one on the pop album charts and stayed there for 199 weeks it was the fastest selling two- dis album in history and it won four grammies best solo vocal performance best engineering contribution of a popular recording best album cover and album of the year making Judy Garland the first ever female artist to win that award the album has never been out of print since 1961 for Garland her tour but more specifically the success of her performance at Carnegie Hall was a resounding affirmation of her star power and talent it was the comeback Freddy Fields had planned for a triumph over naysayers who assumed her career was done for it was even the Fulfillment of a prophecy for older fans who could remember her singing in 1943's Thousand cheer the joint is really jumping down a Carie a song that actually is a great illustration of culture shifting with time the song talks about swing displacing classical music in the legendary venue as a new exciting art form ining Berlin in the begin those for a is reallying on a h Judy would become another one of those swinging acts Shifting the culture of Carnegie Hall while ALS also representing a nostalgic act herself a generation of pop artists soon to be displaced by Rock the success of the concert signaled the start of a new era for the star the concert encouraged CBS to settle its outstanding disputes with Garland and signed her for a series of new television specials her 1962 TV special with Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra recycled a lot of material from Carnegie Hall many of the clips I've played in this video and was a Smash Hit another special with Phil Silvers and Robert goule followed in 1963 as well as her short-lived television variety show that ran from 1963 to 1964 her performance in Judgment at nurg was also widely praised the film received 10 Academy Award nominations including Judy Garland for best supporting actress although she lost to Rita Moreno's incredible turn as Anita in Westside Story film critic Andrew Saras once called Judy Garland one of the earliest cautionary figures of Hollywood horror folklore and I admit that on this channel I've often fallen into the Trap of outlining her sorrows and struggles rather than the qualities that made her special as a performer I hope this video corrects that 1960 through 1962 were certainly high points of Judy Garland's career a positive streak that gave us a glimpse of what a happy healthy Judy Garland might have gone on to do had she been allowed to remain that way Mort Lindsay told Vanity Fair that he didn't think she took drugs at all during the 1961 tour while her daughter florena left offered a more tempered assessment that she was as sober as she could be there were more financial troubles down the line more bad relationships more suffering but there will always be this album a snapshot of Garland at her best and most captivating so is this the greatest night in entertainment history as if that's a possible thing to answer who knows maybe there's as good an argument for this as there is for anything else I sure would make the argument hopefully this video has convinced you to check out the album if you haven't already or revisit it if it's been a while if the concert itself is an exercise and Nostalgia then that is also certainly the case now when listening to music has become a much more fractured act dictated by playlists and algorithms it's rare at least in my experience to sit down and listen to an album in full and really pay attention to what it's trying to do of course I say this like the day after an album drops that demands exactly that but when researching for this video I really did just sit down and play it straight through doing nothing else but listen which felt almost as nostalgic and outdated an act as Vaudeville must have felt to audiences in the 1960s but that is the way I'd recommend listening if you can you'll begin to appreciate the details that put you in the room like where she goes to get a sip of water after do it again and you can just hear her heels clacking on the stage as she walks around for me these innocuous moments that don't feel like they belong in an album make the experience special and remind me that this is a thing that actually happened as it happened a moment people live if you like this video and are interested in supporting the channel since this video will most definitely be demonetized please consider checking out my patreon where I offer perks like polls for future videos and access to exclusive content okay so once you finished feasting on the audible Delight of judet Carnegie Hall it's time to indulge in something really visually stimulating and may I suggest the short films of Susan pit trained as a painter in the 1960s pit became known for luscious handmade animated films that used surrealist dreamlike imagery that Revels in the sticky corners of the psychosexual imaginary her films are an absolute trip sensuous bizarre colorful open to interpretation asparagus which took her 4 years to hand paint by the way addresses so much in just 18 minutes gender identity the role of art is the kind of work that makes me excited about animation again and reminds me that it's a deeply underrated medium and not limited to like whatever Pixar movie is winning an Oscar this year and you can watch these films right now for free on movie movie is a curated streaming service dedicated to elevating great Cinema from all around the globe from Iconic directors to emerging aurs there's always something new to discover with movie each and every film is hand selected by a wonderfully talented team of curators you can discover the best of cinema at your fingertips any time anywhere with a diverse library that includes not only filmmakers like pit but also James Ivory Barry Jenkins and Justin Trier On Demand movie truly makes being a copile easy and exciting thankfully because movie is sponsoring this video you can check out all of these films right now for free all you have to do is click the link in my description below just go to movie.com beind rewind for a whole month free access a world of Cinema with just one click get your month free at movie.com beind [Music] rewind [Music] [Music] no

Channel: Be Kind Rewind

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Length: 68min 48sec (4128 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 02 2024