Saturday’s Songs – a Burt Bacharach Collection

I don’t watch television, except for Downton Abbey and reruns of How I Met Your Mother, viewed only when my children are around and want to while away an evening chilling to reruns of “BaBa” – their name for HIMYM. (“BaBa” is derived from the theme song, which has a lot of “ba-bas” in it.)

So, very atypically, I turned on the television early one evening last weekend before the sun went down and as it cast a melancholy golden light low across the backyard. I was home alone and wanted to see what was playing on PBS. On the screen was a very young Herb Alpert singing the Burt Bacharach (and Hal David*) song This Guy’s In Love With You, video above.

As it turned out, I’d tuned in to a PBS fundraising evening in which Robert Wagner (who hosts a music show for PBS) was leading the charge for this evening’s drumming for donations. (It’s possible this was a recording from a prior year.) For over an hour, I heard song after song written by Burt Bacharach and performed by one star after another from the ’60s and 70s. The songs were laden with memories of the good old days, that euphoric summer-song feel or classic heartbreak and longing.

Dion Warwick’s version of the Bacharach-David tune mentioned above, This Girl’s In Love With You was featured, too.

And here’s Burt with Dusty Springfield singing A House Is Not A Home. If the tune doesn’t bring back the memories for you, I’m sure Dusty’s eyeshadow, gown and hairdo will!

Remember the Carpenters? Here they are with Close To You.

And here is a visual and auditory flashback — Jackie DeShannon singing What The World Needs Now Is Love. (Has the message of this song changed one bit since this song was recorded? I’m afraid not.)

I’ve never seen the movie Alfie but in this PBS program, it was revealed that Burt Bacharach thought that Dion Warwick’s version of the song Alfie was his personal favorite of all his songs – though this was one of the songs written with Hal David*.

So, I’ll add Alfie as the last song of this Saturday’s Songs post.

If you are a Burt Bachrach (and Hal David) fan, you can make a reasonable contribution to PBS and receive one of these packages in thanks!

* From Wikipedia:
Bacharach and David hits included “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head”, “This Guy’s in Love with You”, “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again”, “Do You Know the Way to San Jose”, “Walk On By”, “What the World Needs Now Is Love”, “I Say a Little Prayer”, “(There’s) Always Something There to Remind Me”, “One Less Bell to Answer”, and “Anyone Who Had a Heart”.