Mortifying Memories in Music

Have you ever heard the song, The Little White Cloud that Cried?

This is the cloud I am sure.

And it brings back embarrassing memories.

I was almost a teenager when that song was a teenage rage, and I saved up and rushed out to buy my first record.  Trying to impress some cool teens at school, I told them how much I loved the voice of the girl who sang that song!  They laughed and said, “Johnnie Ray is a GUY!”

To this day I still recall the acute embarrassment of not being “with it” or “cool” enough to know such a vitally important fact of life.

From en.wikipedia.org

And have you ever heard the song,  Unchained Melody?

I was a young girl once with a new boyfriend named Bob.  We only dated for about two weeks when he moved away.  He wrote tear stained letters that made me cry and I wrote emotionally charged letters back.  That was before texting, emails, and Skype of course.  Bob’s letters were heart-wrenchingly poignant (written in cursive and in ink) and I had no idea the words were not his own.  And then I discovered he copied them from a song!  AND  he wrote the same letters to another girl who was just as smitten.  Each stanza was a new letter.

Oh, my love, my darling
I’ve hungered for your touch
A long, lonely time
Time goes by so slowly
And time can do so much
Are you still mine?
I need your love
I need your love
God speed your love to me…

I wonder whatever happened to Bob. 

From en.wikipedia.org:  “The Little White Cloud that Cried” is a popular song written by Johnnie Ray and published in 1951.  The biggest hit version was recorded by Ray and The Four Lads in 1951.  It was a #2 hit on the Billboard magazine chart that year and one side of the one of the biggest two-sided hits, as the flip side, “Cry,” reached #1 on the Billboard chart.

 

From en.wikipedia.org :  “Unchained Melody” is a 1955 song with music by Alex north and lyrics by Hy Zaret.  North used the music as a theme for the little known prison film Unchained, hence the name… since become one of the most recorded songs of the 20th century, by some estimates having spawned over 500 versions in hundreds of different languages.  

 

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