Tony Bennett at 100: A Life in 12 Songs

...and the stories behind them

I don’t think I’ve ever published a setlist ahead of a gig—tempting fate, seems like—but this one’s special, given the afternoon I spent with Tony Bennett that changed the course of my life. For Are You Having Any Fun: Elizabeth Bougerol Celebrates Tony Bennett at 100, Aug 3 in NYC, we narrowed down Tony’s 70 (!) or so albums to a dozen songs, easily one of the most fun/really difficult things I’ve ever attempted. Here’s a little backstory on each.

I Left My Heart in San Francisco — Written in the early ‘50s by songwriters George Cory and Douglass Cross, who’d moved from San Francisco to Brooklyn and wrote it out of homesickness. Bennett recorded it on January 23, 1962, arranged by Marty Manning, for the album of the same name. His pianist Ralph Sharon had actually forgotten about the song, stuck in a drawer (for about ten years, music historian Will Friedwald told me), until he rediscovered it before a 1961 tour stop in San Francisco, where a bartender in Hot Springs, Arkansas told them he’d buy the record if they ever cut it. It was originally the B-side to “Once Upon a Time” before Columbia flipped the single, and it won Bennett the 1963 Grammys for Record of the Year and Best Solo Vocal Performance.

Until I Met You — Released on the album I Wanna Be Around... in 1963. This tune started out as the instrumental “Corner Pocket,” written by Basie’s longtime rhythm guitarist Freddie Green, and first popularized on the band’s 1957 album April in Paris. It wasn’t until Donald Wolf set words to it that it became the vocal standard “Until I Met You,” which Sarah Vaughan sang first with the Basie band in 1961, before Bennett cut his own version the following year.

Love for Sale — Cole Porter wrote this for the 1930 Broadway revue The New Yorkers, where it was sung by a prostitute advertising her wares — scandalous enough that it was banned from radio play, and the show’s producers replaced the planned white lead with a Black singer to perform it. Bennett recorded it October 24, 1957, for The Beat of My Heart (an unusual, singular drum-fueled album), featuring guest percussionists Sabu and Candido giving it a Latin-percussion treatment. He’d return to the song 64 years later as the title track of his poignant final studio album, a 2021 Cole Porter tribute with Lady Gaga made after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis.

I Can’t Believe That You’re in Love With Me — A 1926 Jimmy McHugh/Clarence Gaskill standard. Bennett recorded it for his first true studio album, Cloud 7 (1955), a deliberate pivot from his his Italianate pop hit-parade singles toward a jazz-combo sound with guitarist Chuck Wayne’s group. Underscoring this shift? Cloud 7 didn’t even have Bennett on the cover — instead it’s one of those random-cute-girl-on-an-album-cover shots.

It Had to Be You — The 1924 Isham Jones/Gus Kahn chestnut (later immortalized in Casablanca and When Harry Met Sally). Bennett cut a studio version on March 24, 1964, with the Ralph Sharon Trio for the album When Lights Are Low. He revisited it three decades later on his celebrated 1994 MTV Unplugged album, which won two Grammys including Album of the Year.

I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face — From the 1956 Lerner & Loewe musical My Fair Lady, originally sung by Rex Harrison as Henry Higgins. Bennett recorded it with Count Basie and His Orchestra in 1959 for the album Basie/Bennett, arranged by Ralph Sharon — a big-band reworking of a wistful show tune.

Close Your Eyes — Written by Bernice Petkere, dubbed the “Queen of Tin Pan Alley” by Irving Berlin herself. Bennett recorded it in 1961, for the album My Heart Sings, arranged and conducted by Ralph Burns, with a band featuring Milt Hinton and Zoot Sims — he’d also cut an earlier version back in 1954-55.

The Very Thought of You — Ray Noble wrote and first recorded it in 1934 with Al Bowlly on vocals at Abbey Road, making it a US hit. Bennett’s most famous version came decades later: In March 2006 he recorded it as a duet with Paul McCartney for Duets: An American Classic, arranged by Jorge Calandrelli — fittingly, they tracked it at Abbey Road Studios, the same building where the original was cut 72 years earlier. But first place, for my money, is the version on 1966’s A Time for Love, where Bobby Hackett on cornet does a sort of response to Bennett’s call with each phrase. Arrangement by Johnny Keating, and nothing short of gorgeous.

The Best Is Yet to Come — Cy Coleman and Carolyn Leigh actually wrote this one for Bennett, not Sinatra (who later made it famous and, rumor has it, had it engraved on his original tombstone). Bennett recorded it in 1960 with Coleman himself arranging, releasing it as a single that year before folding it into 1962’s I Left My Heart in San Francisco. He also cut a live version at his historic June 1962 Carnegie Hall concert.

Are You Having Any Fun — Written by Jack Yellen and Sammy Fain and made popular in the 1939 Broadway revue George White’s Scandals (which I’d never heard of, either). Bennett recorded it for his 1959 album Strike Up the Band with Count Basie, then revisited it in 2006 as a duet with Elvis Costello for Duets: An American Classic.

Firefly — Cy Coleman again! He and Carolyn Leigh wrote this in 1958 as an audition song for the musical Gypsy. It didn’t make the cut for the show, but Bennett picked it up and took it to #20 on the Billboard Hot 100. He recorded it for 1959’s In Person! with Count Basie, and revived it again more than 55 years later on Cheek to Cheek with Lady Gaga in 2014.

It’s All Right with Me — Cole Porter wrote this for his 1953 musical Can-Can. Bennett recorded it as part of a sprawling Cole Porter medley on his 1975 album Life Is Beautiful/The Complete Improv Recordings cut for Improv Records — the independent label he and manager Bill Hassett founded after breaking from Columbia in frustration over being pushed toward rock material.

See you on Aug 3 for Are You Having Any Fun: Elizabeth Bougerol Celebrates Tony Bennett at 100, where I’ll be joined by Kat Edmonson, Geoff Burke, John Manzari, Emeline O’Rourke, Paul Brandenburg, Matt Ray, J. Walter Hawkes, Jen Hodge, Todd Londagin and David Berger. Tickets here.

xo Elizabeth