Lyr Add: Oh Lady Be Good (George & Ira Gershwin)

Subject: Lyr Add: Lady Be Good
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Feb 10 - 05:27 PM

Lyr. Add: Lady Be Good
George & Ira Gershwin, 1924

Listen to my tale of woe,
It's terribly sad but true.
All dressed up, no place to go,
Each ev'ning I'm awfully blue.

I know I'm a winsome miss
I must win some handsome guy
Can't go on like this.
I could blossom out I know,
With somebody just like you. So--

Chorus:

Oh, sweet and lovely lady, be good
Oh, lady, be good to me
I am so awf'ly misunderstood
So lady, be good, to me.

Oh, please have some pity
I'm all alone in this big city

I tell you I'm just a lonesome babe in the wood,
So lady be good to me.
(bis)

Oh lady be good to me.

Sheet music not seen; may be errors.
ASCAP Title Code 420001456.

Subject: Lyr Add: OH, LADY BE GOOD (George & Ira Gershwin)
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Feb 10 - 05:47 PM

But I have seen it!

Mick

---

OH, LADY BE GOOD
(George and Ira Gershwin)

Listen to my tale of woe,
It's terribly sad but true.
All dressed up, no place to go,
Each ev'ning I'm awfully blue.
I must win some winsome miss;
Can't go on like this.
I could blossom out I know,
With somebody just like you, so,

Refrain:
Oh, sweet and lovely lady, be good!
Oh lady,be good to me!
I am so awf'ly misunderstood,
So lady, be good to me.
Oh, please have some pity,
I'm all alone in this big city.
I tell you I'm just a lonesome babe in the wood,
So lady, be good to me!


Auburn and brunette and blonde,
I love 'em all, tall or small.
But somehow they don't grow fond,
They stagger but never fall.
Winter's gone and now it's Spring!
Love! where is thy sting?
If somebody won't respond,
I'm going to end it all, so,

Refrain:
Oh, sweet and lovely lady, be good!
Oh lady,be good to me!
I am so awf'ly misunderstood,
So lady, be good to me.
This is tulip weather
So let's put two and two together.
I tell you I'm just a lonesome babe in the wood,
So lady, be good to me!


Source: The Songs of George & Ira Gershwin, A Centennial Celebration, Vol 1

From Lady Be Good, 1924

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lady Be Good (George & Ira Gershwin)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 13 Feb 10 - 06:07 PM

Thanks, Mick. I should buy those volumes.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lady Be Good (George & Ira Gershwin)
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Feb 10 - 06:30 PM

Well worth it (though I just had a quick look on Amazon.uk and the 2 vol boxed set I have it going s/h for ca £100!).

A great partnership of a brilliant musician and a man with an outstanding way of stringing together the words of the English language. No wonder they turned out so many superb songs.

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lady Be Good (George & Ira Gershwin)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 13 Feb 10 - 11:15 PM

Remember seeing the London revival of the show in the late-60s. Aimi MacDonald & Lionel Blair were very good; but we found it, I fear, rather a tiresome, tedious, much-dated piece. Ah Me! Likewise Oh Well!

{Which not to be taken, however, as any disagreement with Mick's above assessment of the Gershwins as a brilliant combo indeed, right up there with all those other greats of that wonderfully fertile period in popular song like Porter, Berlin, Mercer, Carmichael, Warren, Dubin, Kern, Field, Rodgers·Hart/Hammerstein, [&, over here, the likes of Jimmy Kennedy] et al.}

There was a fad for such revivals about then; but we found same things true of the old Harbach Youmans Caesar No No Nanette, despite Tea For Two & I Want To Be Happy... In both cases, it's the songs which have survived far better than the Book.

The Time Passes Over, indeed ~ tho whether More Cheerful & Gay...?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lady Be Good (George & Ira Gershwin)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 11:38 PM

Interest - often forgotten that Ira long outlived George, living to be 86 [d 1983!]. After George's early death, he went on to collaborate with Kern, Arlen, Weill...