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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 07:43 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
| In reply to: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - keikekaze 05:30 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| As for Lucy's singing, after nine years of "I Love Lucy" on TV, Lucy's fans knew she wasn't going to sound like Barbara Cook, and they didn't expect her to, or even want her to. Everyone got what they expected--Lucy being "Lucy"--and it's unlikely that anyone was very disappointed. This is not TOO much in defense of Lucille Ball's singing - but I always feel that she deliberately sang worse (on purpose) on the sitcom because that was the joke. No, she was never a great singer, but don't think that Lucille Ball was nearly as bad as Lucille McGillicuddy Ricardo was. ;-) |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: keikekaze 10:37 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - Chromolume 07:43 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| I agree that Lucy exaggerated the "badness" of her voice when she was playing Lucy Ricardo. She's quite listenable on the Wildcat cast album--if still far from dulcet! : ) | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 11:44 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - keikekaze 10:37 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| "I agree that Lucy exaggerated the 'badness' of her voice when she was playing Lucy Ricardo. She's quite listenable on the Wildcat cast album--if still far from dulcet! : )" I think maybe she would have sounded better at the time of WILDCAT if her voice hadn't already been affected by decades of smoking. Also, since she wasn't a trained Broadway-type singer, I'm assuming she never learned to properly use what voice she had, and by the time of the recording sessions of WILDCAT, her voice might have been adversely affected by all the singing she had done in rehearsals and in even the probably few performances that took place before the sessions. (I don't know if that show played out of town pre-Broadway.) When you have an untrained singer go from rarely singing at all, only occasionally on television, to a Broadway schedule, I think chances are very high that problems will arise. |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 12:49 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - Michael_Portantiere 11:44 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
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| Wildcat played six weeks at the Erlanger in Philadelphia prior to Broadway. | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 03:53 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - AlanScott 12:49 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
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| Thanks, Alan. I can certainly see how six weeks of eight shows a week (or seven, or six) could have been detrimental to the voice of an untrained singer with a very limited vocal instrument. | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Delvino 10:04 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - keikekaze 10:37 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| And the Wildcat vocals -- which I grew up hearing -- don't create that Mame sound. She sang with what can only be described as more confidence. To my ear, she sounds better than two famous Bacall notes "aliiiiiiive" and "womaaaaan," though admittedly the two actors had different personas/temperaments while singing. I always thought Bacall got a pass rather easily, and sounds good on only one number, "I Wrote the Book" in Woman of the Year. Coleman seemed more adept at writing for the Ball range than Strouse or Kander/Ebb did for Bacall, who would've been better off without that top of the voice screech. Just my two pennies. | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 11:50 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - Delvino 10:04 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
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| "And the Wildcat vocals -- which I grew up hearing -- don't create that Mame sound. She sang with what can only be described as more confidence." Well, yes. Largely because, by the time of MAME, her voice had deteriorated much, much further from its best shape than it had by the time of WILDCAT. If Lucy had somehow been able to use a time machine and play either of those roles in her late twenties or early thirties, I'm pretty sure she would have sounded far better. |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Last Edit: PlayWiz 11:34 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
| Posted by: PlayWiz 11:33 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - keikekaze 10:37 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| There were a couple of times on "The Lucy Show", her next series after "I Love Lucy", where she sometimes sang; I remember there was one, I think the one where Wayne Newton sings to a cow(!), where they do a number called "Main Street U.S.A". She sings pretty straight, not Lucy Ricardo-ish, and it was reasonably acceptable, still sounding like Lucy. She didn't have Ricky (Desi) on that show trying to keep her out of show biz, so she didn't always have to exaggerate how bad her singing was on her 2nd series. | |
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| In addition to those mentioned below | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 01:09 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - PlayWiz 11:33 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| On I Love Lucy, she also sang in the Scottish-set dragon musical nightmare she dreamed after having seen Brigadoon or something like it in London with Ricky, and as "Sally Sweet" with Ricky as "Cuban Pete" at the Tropicana. She sang intentionally badly as gypsy lady in the operetta that she and Ethel wrote for the women's club. She also sang "Under the Bamboo Tree" with Ricky. And there's the "Sweet Adeline" episode (linking part of it) where she sang particularly badly. And "Auf Wiedersehen" (sort of). And probably some others not coming to mind. And doesn't she sing in the Merman episode of The Lucy Show? Doesn't she demonstrate to Merman how to sing like Merman? I don't remember how much she actually sings there. |
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| Link | Sweet Adeline around the piano |
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| re: In addition to those mentioned below | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 02:44 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: In addition to those mentioned below - AlanScott 01:09 pm EDT 08/01/20 | |
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| If I recall correctly, in the Merman episode, she demonstrates with the recording of Merman, and then the live Merman starts singing along. But I don't remember Lucy singing in that bit. | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: BroadwayTonyJ 10:40 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - PlayWiz 11:33 pm EDT 07/31/20 | |
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| There were at least 2 other episodes on I Love Lucy and The Lucy-Desi Comedy Specials when Lucy sang acceptably, once with Bob Hope when they sang "Nobody Loves the Ump" and also with Red Skelton when they sang "A Couple of Swells". | |
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| re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 11:55 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: No debacle. You have to be careful about books that "mix fact and fiction." - BroadwayTonyJ 10:40 am EDT 08/01/20 | |
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| ***There were at least 2 other episodes on I Love Lucy and The Lucy-Desi Comedy Specials when Lucy sang acceptably, once with Bob Hope when they sang "Nobody Loves the Ump" and also with Red Skelton when they sang "A Couple of Swells".*** I too remember a few times when Lucy sang well enough on her TV show, but I do also remember pretty clearly that she was sometimes obviously dubbed. Wish I had better recall on that, but one example of her being obviously dubbed that I seem to remember was a duet with someone, maybe Carol Burnett? |
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