Fondly Remembering Blossom Dearie
October 30, 2024 4:10 PM   Subscribe

...because I was in a mood:

Blossom Dearie -- Lucky To Be Me

Remembering the inimitable Miniaturist, Lapidarist, MetaMusical Polymath and Human Library of Alexandria of American Popular Song -- Blossom Dearie

Blossom Dearie -- Someone to Watch Over Me

Blossom Dearie -- Desfinade

Blossom Dearie -- Doop Doo Dee Doop

Blossom Dearie -- Thou Swell


Blossom Dearie -- Winchester In Apple Blossom Time

Blossom Dearie -- I Like You, You're Nice

From NPR In Memoriam 09/28/2012: Blossom Dearie on Piano Jazz

All Songs Blossom Dearie On YouTube

Previously 02/08/2009:
Goodbye Blossom Dearie by the long absent paddbear
posted by y2karl (33 comments total) 46 users marked this as a favorite
 
It's not mentioned explicitly in the post but my grandfather used to sing me the Blossom Dearie song Rhode Island Is Famous for You; it's a fun song and I appreciate the memory.
posted by an octopus IRL at 4:12 PM on October 30 [9 favorites]


Nice
posted by Phanx at 4:14 PM on October 30


...my grandfather used to sing me the Blossom Dearie song Rhode Island Is Famous for You; it's a fun song and I appreciate the memory.

My bad -- it nearly made the explicit mention cut but here 'tis now...

Blossom Dearie -- Rhode Island Is Famous For You
posted by y2karl at 4:22 PM on October 30 [6 favorites]


Perfect, thank you
posted by pt68 at 4:25 PM on October 30


Thanks for this. Blossom Dearie will always be in my personal pantheon of great jazz singers (and pianists, let us not forget she accompanied herself). So smart, so funny, so ready and able to put the knife in, too. I would not wish to imagine a world where Blossom Dearie had never existed.
posted by JimInSYR at 4:28 PM on October 30 [4 favorites]




Blossom Dearie -- Peel Me A Grape Live.
posted by y2karl at 4:47 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


I love Blossom Dearie. Every bit of this is wonderful.

Thank you, y2karl!
posted by kristi at 4:52 PM on October 30


YouTube Blossom Dearie On TV
posted by y2karl at 4:53 PM on October 30


And how about Blossom Dearie - I'm Hip

Look at me swing, ring-a-ding-ding
I even call my girlfriend 'man' I'm so hip

posted by hangashore at 5:03 PM on October 30 [5 favorites]


That LP of Comden and Green songs is sublime - she forever owns "Some Other Time" as far as I'm concerned.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:09 PM on October 30


I can’t do links from my phone.

Beatles do a jam called “ They Call Me Blossom Dearie.”

She also does an official song called “Hey John” about John Lennon. Both are easily found on YouTube.

Being an attorney, I am also partial to “My Attorney Bernie.”
posted by flarbuse at 5:19 PM on October 30 [4 favorites]


I can't be the only one here who was introduced to her via Schoolhouse Rock:
Figure Eight
Unpack Your Adjectives
posted by Daily Alice at 5:23 PM on October 30 [12 favorites]


I have a Blossom Dearie story. I swear it's true. I attended a high school in a suburb of Buffalo NY during the years 1960 thru 1964. This occured probably in 62 or 63. We had a after school hangout near the school which was a pizza point. In those days we called them pizza parlors. It was frequented mostly after high school football games and basketball games. It was divided down the middle by a wall. One half was booths, the other half was tables with checkered tablecloths. We kids always sat in the booth side. However the entrance door opened up into the table side for some reason. One day after s game a bunch of us entered the pizza parlor and there was a small grand piano set up with a tiny lady singing out a time. The name tag on the piano said Blossom Dearie. I was entranced by the name. My friends didn't notice or didn't comment anyway. I knew nothing of jazz yet. So several years later when I noticed a LP in the window of a record store. It was Blossom Dearie. I figured she was paying her dues by playing these kind of spaces. But still hard to believe a pizza parlor would hire her even though she was probably unknown but for a few jazz folk.
posted by Czjewel at 5:34 PM on October 30 [12 favorites]


And how about Blossom Dearie - I'm Hip?

For a second there I thought she might be covering Harry "The Hipster" Gibson there but no...
posted by y2karl at 5:38 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


She was a great live performer:

Blossom Dearie - When in Rome

Snap those fingers!
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 5:54 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


A friend of mine was her drummer for a while sometime in mid-late 90's. I saw them play in a small midtown nightclub several times, she hungout with us for drinks and was just as charming, funny and energetic as you could imagine. And yes, she was in her 70's.
posted by Walleye at 6:04 PM on October 30 [9 favorites]


All the apple trees, blossoms in the breeze, as the hammock swung

Just a dream ago, when the world was young.

She was amazing!
posted by Savannah at 6:07 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


An all-time favorite.
posted by niicholas at 6:17 PM on October 30


I took over a jazz show at my local university radio station some years back without knowing all that much about jazz. I knew a bit more than maybe the average mook who likes and listens to rock but in the grand scheme of things, I really knew very little. On my first show I played some old Quincy Jones and got a call from a listener: "that's not jazz! What are you doing? Get that other guy back in the studio, he knew what he was doing!" I felt then and I still feel today that Quincy in the 60's was definitely jazz but either way, I didn't feel all that great on that first show.

I think that it was the same show, day 1 that I came across Blossom Dearie. I took a 20 second listen and decided that she had to go on - now this was jazz! I cued it up, hit the play button and sat back in wonder as I listened to this person who sounded like she was a little wisp of a thing who could be doing voice over acting for Disney unapologetically doing her thing. And I fell in love. It might have been Give Him the Ooh-La-La. Anyway, the break comes and I say what the songs were and then I say her name along with, "yes, that's really her name". I was such a newbie at the time and but I learned a lot and discovered a lot from doing that show. She's one of the few jazz musicians that I can safely say that I know exactly where I was when I first heard her, and I could probably track down the exact day and time.

Thanks for the post, y2karl, and for giving me the opportunity to dredge up some memories.
posted by ashbury at 6:35 PM on October 30 [12 favorites]


A cover...

Blossom Dearie -- Sophisticated Lady
posted by y2karl at 7:58 PM on October 30


Another...

Blossom Dearie -- I Won't Dance
posted by y2karl at 8:02 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


One of my faves: You Fascinate Me So.
posted by myopicman at 8:15 PM on October 30 [1 favorite]


She's the best! Thanks for the post!
posted by TheCoug at 8:51 PM on October 30


Delightful
posted by latkes at 10:32 PM on October 30


Like a lot of people with a connection to the Biggest Little, I found my way to Blossom Dearie through Rhode Island Is Famous for You so for a while I mostly listened to her older stuff, but it’s really worth checking out her later material. I really like the live album Me and Phil, recorded in 1993, that she made with bass player Phil Scorgie, which is available on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music and Deezer.
posted by Kattullus at 12:02 AM on October 31 [2 favorites]


"I saw them play in a small midtown nightclub several times, she hungout with us for drinks and was just as charming, funny and energetic as you could imagine. And yes, she was in her 70's."

Same. I saw her close to the end of her run, and to say she was delightful hardly suffices. Easily one of the best shows I've ever seen. I was on a cloud the entire time.
posted by Capt. Renault at 7:02 AM on October 31 [3 favorites]


I can't be the only one here who was introduced to her via Schoolhouse Rock

You are most definitely not! The melancholy beauty of Figure Eight (song and video) lives rent-free in my head forever
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 7:37 AM on October 31 [1 favorite]


And let's not forget her work with the Blue Stars of France.
posted by the sobsister at 8:30 AM on October 31


edit: missed the link above
posted by aleph at 9:03 AM on October 31


I must confess that this is the first time I had heard her version of My Attorney Bernie. Various covers of this were popular on my local Jazz station in the 90s, but always sung by men. I think I always heard it as a silly novelty song, and missed out on the saucier interpretations.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 4:02 AM on November 1 [1 favorite]






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