Composed by Ray Henderson , with lyrics by Mort Dixon
I still remember my surprise when I learned that this song had fi rst been a hit in 1926—I had assumed it was of more recent vintage. The lyrics, with their laments about “cares and woe,” seem more aligned with the Great De- pression or perhaps the Cold War than the Roaring Twenties, and the plain- tive, mostly diatonic melody reminds me more of the pop-folk fare of the 1960s than the speakeasies of the Jazz Age. Yet no fewer than four versions of “Bye Bye Blackbird” were hits in 1926, and Gene Austin’s sprightly rendi- tion, which was the biggest seller of them all, climbed all the way to the top of the chart.
Austin is mostly forgotten in the new millennium, but he was one of the fi rst popular singers to adapt his style to take advantage of the close-miked ap- proach made possible by the new recording technology of the era. The crisply articulated, conversational style of his delivery infl uenced a range of more famous artists, including Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra. Nonetheless, listeners today are likely to dismiss Austin’s approach to “Bye Bye Blackbird” as quaintly vaudevillian, and prefer the faster tempo and sassier attitude of Josephine Bak- er’s Paris recording from 1927.
The song was destined to have a strange future. In the years leading up to World War II, it was more popular in Europe than in the United States—per- haps due to Baker’s advocacy—but who would have expected Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels to sponsor the recording of an alternative version of “Bye Bye Blackbird,” with new lyrics designed to demoralize the British soldiers with exhortations of “bye bye” to the British Empire.
The Yankees are still out of sight I can’t make out wrong from right Empire, bye, bye
Bye Bye Blackbird 53
The arrangement is surprisingly nuanced, but the pervasive German accent of the lead singer Karl Schwedler is a giveaway that this broadcast wasn’t coming from the Cotton Club or Roseland. Meanwhile, few jazz versions of this song were recorded in the United States during World War II and the early postwar period.
The song made a comeback in the 1950s, but had a little help from Holly- wood. It appeared in the 1954 fi lm The Eddie Cantor Story as well as the 1955 movie Pete Kelly’s Blues , and was recorded by Peggy Lee, who received an Oscar nomination for her performance in the latter fi lm (but, contrary to many ac- counts, did not sing it on screen). The Henderson-Dixon standard received an even bigger boost in jazz circles the following year when “Bye Bye Blackbird” was recorded by Miles Davis—who had been born a few days before the song fi rst topped the chart—in a gripping combo version that also featured John Coltrane. In the aftermath of these fresh interpretations by Lee and Davis, more jazz cover versions were made in the three following years than had appeared in the previous three decades. For the most part, Miles’s relaxed medium-tempo ap- proach has served as the template for later performances, but if you want to see how far a soloist can push this old song, you are advised to track down Albert Ayler’s 1963 recording of “Bye Bye Blackbird.” Coltrane would also revisit the composition in later years and interpret it in an expansive manner, as demon- strated by his 1962 live performance in Stockholm, which would result in his fi rst Grammy Award—albeit one granted posthumously in 1981.
The song requires a very modest range and, given the mostly stepwise mo- tion of the melody, “Bye Bye Blackbird” stands out as one of the easiest jazz standards for vocalists and would-be vocalists. But the meaning of the words is far more problematic, and Mort Dixon’s lyrics have puzzled many commenta- tors over the years. For some, “blackbird” potentially signifi es an antebellum slave or—according to one popular view—the customer of an overworked pros- titute. The song’s early association with Eddie Cantor, well known for perform- ing in blackface, may have convinced others that pejorative minstrel associations are hidden in the phrases. Then again, one listener recalls his father insisting that the song was about a Jewish landlord in New York who was tired of dealing with his black tenants and decided to sell his properties and move to Florida. A separate verse that is rarely sung these days also refers to a bluebird—which convinces me that a straightforward ornithological interpretation of the title phrase is the most plausible.
recommended versions
Josephine Baker, Paris, January 1927
Peggy Lee, from Songs from Pete Kelly’s Blues , Los Angeles, May 10, 1955 Miles Davis, from ’Round About Midnight , New York, June 5, 1956
54 Bye Bye Blackbird
Ben Webster and Oscar Peterson, from Ben Webster Meets Oscar Peterson , New York, November 6, 1959
John Coltrane (with McCoy Tyner and Elvin Jones), from Bye Bye Blackbird , live at Koncerthuset, Stockholm, November 19, 1962
Albert Ayler, from My Name Is Albert Ayler , Copenhagen, January 14, 1963
Rahsaan Roland Kirk, from The Case of the 3 Sided Dream in Audio Color , New York, May 14, 1975
Patricia Barber, from Nightclub , Chicago, May 15–19, 2000