The INSANE True Story Behind This Song That's Blowing Up on TikTok

I've been seeing this sound on Tik Tok a lot [Music] lately adorable right but what does this trend have to do with plagiarism Art Tatum the Soviet Union and a lost work from Dimitri Shostakovich that was written on a bet if that sounds as confusing yet intriguing to you as it does to me then buckle up let's dive in so the trend on Tik Tok uses this song written by what appears to be like a stock music Creator from the UK called Cavendish music the song that they wrote is called love letter and it sounds like [Music] this sounds very nice what a nice it's just like a nice and light kind of just Little swing thing you know but here's the thing it's like three notes away from being straight up plagiarism now did Cavendish music plagiarize this song No but was it clearly a remake of another very famous jazz standard yes the tune in question here is a 1924 composition called t for two t for 2 was written by a Broadway composer named Vincent Gans and it was written for the show no no net and in 1925 one of the first recordings of this tune by Maran Harris was number one on the US Billboards for 11 weeks and it sounded like this upon for Q and Q for just me for you and you for me yeah that's what a number one hit sounded like in 1925 so the styles are so different here that it might not yet be that obvious as to how these two are related but if we go back to love letter [Music] right and then we go to the marry and Harris recording of t for [Music] two right so we [Music] have now if we translate that into the same key as Love Letter we can start to hear the similarities a little more clearly compare that to both Melodies are using the exact same chord progression which goes now of course in and of itself none of that is plagiarism after all you cannot copyright a chord progression and a Melody just has to be different than than the melody that was originally written so no copyright infringement going on here but it's very clear that this is just another version of t for 2 without actually being t for 2 and in case we needed any more proof that that's exactly what's going on here when we listen to the next part of the original nobody us to see us or US no friend or relations weekend V so he get basically the same Melody except instead of being we now go up a major third once again let's move this into the key that love letter is written in and we can really see what's going on here after we have that first section we move the whole thing up a major third into the key of C and if we listen to love letter where do we go [Music] next C [Music] major exactly the same chord progression so there's absolutely nothing wrong with Cavendish music creating another version of t for 2 after all it's a beautiful chord progression and this is a beautiful Melody so I'd say they did a great job with it but it is really interesting in that it uncovers the story behind T4 2 which I did not know is nearly as in-depth as it actually is the next place we're going to go is to the legendary jazz pianist Art Tatum and art did a few different really famous recordings of t for 2 in 1933 1939 and again in 1953 but the one I want to focus on is actually a 1939 version that most people have never even heard before it is so sick and it goes like [Music] this yikes all right so it's really out of tune we're going to have to deal with that right [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh wow okay so um without getting too into the Weeds on the insane technique of Art Tatum the thing I want to point out about this version of t for 2 is what art does the second time around check this [Music] out what okay hold on the song [Music] goes but heart just completely changed the Harmony and did something that for 1939 was like a good 20 years ahead of its time I mean art was just on a whole other level when it comes to Harmony instead of just sticking in a flat our home base 2 five 2 5 1 4 3 6 2 5 2 5 1 it's very very conventional chord progression extremely simple and art said that's not good enough for me I want to take it to the next level and instead of playing it that way art played two five another two five but now up a half step okay crazy now another two five but up a all [Music] step and then just walked it down [Music] chromatically now notice the way that he did that he wound up back at a flat major 7 the chord it's supposed to end on so he looked at this thing and he was like all right I could play or some version of an art Tatum run but he said that's kind of boring I don't want to just stick in a flat why don't I just move all over the place and as long as I end up back at a flat who cares how we get there and instead he [Music] goes absolutely insane art was just so ahead of his time operating on a harmonic level that nobody had ever seen before he absolutely changed the course of Jazz and all of music and it's examples like that that show us exactly why but that's not even the craziest thing about this song what does shastovich have to do with t for 2 in 1927 a symphonic conductor by the name of Nikolai Malco made a bet with Shostakovich that he couldn't arrange an Orchestral Version of t for two in under an hour both shastovich and Malco had heard the tune in a play at a theater in Moscow in 1927 now of course at the time the big bad American jazz music was seen very negatively in the Soviet Union but Mala was one to say that hey this Fox Trot thing is not bad music and Shostakovich himself had developed an interest in popular music as well so the BET was made and 45 minutes later shastovich emerged with [Music] this you know what's even more impressive impressive about this version the more impressive thing about this version is that Shostakovich even orchestrated the verse as with a lot of these popular broadway songs that would ultimately become Jazz standards the part that became most popular to play was the part after the introduction section which we call the verse in jazz now verse in pop music today means something a little bit different it's sort of the same it's just structured differently so Shostakovich actually did the verse here but when the theme itself comes in [Music] and probably what's going to happen because this melody is very rep it's it repeats itself a lot and it just moves around in the key yeah we get it past between parts of the orchestra it's a very common orchestration technique but it's just so fascinating to hear this [Music] song from somebody like shastovich in this context oh it's beautiful [Music] oh gorgeous 45 [Music] minutes oh man 45 minutes to create this now it gets even more interesting from here first of all this wasn't known under the name t for2 because in 1920 Soviet Union American equals bad so this was actually called Tahiti Trot so shostakovich's version is Tahiti Trot Opus 16 but it wasn't long before the Soviet Union began to crack down on this so-called Fox Trot or light music as they called it they thought that it was a gateway to debauchery and drug use they looked at much of the American style of the Roaring 20s as a bad example of what Russians should not do and in fear of being seen as a supporter of so called light music Shostakovich actually made a public statement that he regretted writing the arrangement and did not want to be seen as a supporter of this light music furthermore he had stated that he had sent demand to Malco to stop performing the piece Soviet Russia in the 1920s was wild so the piece stopped being performed and before too long it was forgotten and in fact by 1942 it was labeled as a lost work of shastovich people knew that it had existed but there was no Trace left but that's not where the story ended Nikolai Malco maintained in his Memoirs that he had kept the original orchestration of the piece and after his death the work resurfaced and in 1984 almost 60 years after Shostakovich wrote his arrangement to heedy trot Opus 16 or t for two was reborn and that's how we can hear it today oh man poor sh toov he probably just felt I mean fear first of all but like imagine writing something like this and having your literal government be like yeah you should probably get rid of that what a crazy time but luckily it was saved from being lost forever and now we get to experience it just like it's brand new t for 2 has such a rich history and I wouldn't even call it one of the more famous jazz standards it's a great song that many people know and many people play but it P in comparison to the popularity of something like all the things you are when all the things you are or Autumn Le drift by the window still it's a great song with an absolutely phenomenal chord progression and when you use some incredibly inventive tools like Art Tatum used it can go to some really really amazing places pretty crazy all from a few Tik toks about babies seeing the inside of washing machines huh music is cool so cool in fact that I run this entire channel on the premise of sharing music and sharing the things that excite me about music and in the past I've supported this YouTube channel in the maybe more traditional YouTube sense of like taking sponsorships for example but I always thought it would be just so much cooler if I could create something that I made and make it directly for you and I wanted to create something that would give you the tools to do exactly what I do in these videos which is listen to music and just kind of know how it's constructed and being able to use the piano to demonstrate and build these things so that you can play them and that is why I built the intro to piano chord and right now you can still get 50% off the course using the link in the description below but that is running out so be sure to jump over there quickly Before Time runs out and take advantage of that the intro to piano course is my packaging of everything that I wished had been explained to me when I started playing the piano I had great teachers but over time certain things worked for me and certain things didn't work for me in terms of understanding all of this stuff so all of those moments where something just clicked I took note of that and the intro to piano course is the combination of all of those things that I've discovered in my piano playing career that hopefully can make the process of learning for you way easier and way faster the course has everything you need to get started playing this instrument the literal physical process of playing the keyboard but also it contains all of the things that you need to know about the basic building blocks of music and the combination of all of that stuff is exactly how I listen to music on this channel and help you understand how it's built so if you want to do that for yourself with literally anything you listen to it makes the process of listening to music so much more enjoy enable because you actually like understand bits and pieces of what you're hearing you can figure things out in real time and you start recognizing things all over in different types of music it just makes listening to music like the most fun thing ever and so if you want to experience music on that level too then start with the intro to piano Course once again it's 50% off for a very limited time there's only a few days left for that so please use that link in the description check it out it is the best way to support this channel it's how I support what I do here and how I'm able to keep doing it so if you enjoy the videos here and you'd like to support the channel I am so grateful for that so thank you so much for checking that out and thank you for watching this video that's all for today and we will see you in the next one [Music]

Channel: Charles Cornell

Views: 109,510

Keywords: Charles, Charles Cornell, Charles Cornell Studios, Studios, Cornell, Piano, Piano Covers, Piano guy, tea for two, love letter, cavendish music, love letter cavendish music, tea for two shostakovich, shostakovich, tahiti trot, soviet union, art tatum, art tatum 1933, art tatum 1939, art tatum 1953

Id: gERKLTpsy-Y

Length: 15min 22sec (922 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 14 2024