I've had a good time this month posting songs my mother taught me as a tribute to her. Now I'm down to the final two days of the month (and, yes, I actually do have one for Halloween) with one of my favorite songs saved for this post.......and I'm feeling burned out. So just a few words to say that I don't remember who sang On the Street Where You Live on the record my mother had. As I listened to many at youtube this one by Vic Damone sounded the most familiar. Evidently he had a popular hit with it after it became famous in My Fair Lady. I don't remember seeing My Fair Lady at the theater with my mother, and remember instead viewing it on TV later.
My mother liked On the Street Where You Live because she was a romantic and she no doubt had relationship memories or fantasies about the song. I absolutely loved the song and often requested she play it. I dreamed my way onto adventurous streets, down alleys with ivy-coated walls, past brick apartments with important-looking entries, along smooth pathways that peaked into gardens and uneven sidewalks that showed off the architecture of imaginary neighborhoods that - during the daytime - took on the intoxicating smell of bus fumes and snow in July, and - at nighttime - glowed golden behind drawn shades where silhouettes moved slowly to jazz sounds and one dog barked before being let inside. Back then the enticement for me of On the Street Where You Live had much more to do with visions of STREETS than with the YOUs who might live on them. Now the enticement is the great song itself, everything about it.
On the Street Where You Live - lyrics
I have often walked down this street before;
But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before.
All at once am I Several stories high.
Knowing I'm on the street where you live.
Are there lilac trees in the heart of town?
Can you hear a lark in any other part of town?
Does enchantment pour Out of ev'ry door?
No, it's just on the street where you live!
And oh! The towering feeling
Just to know somehow you are near.
The overpowering feeling
That any second you may suddenly appear!
People stop and stare. They don't bother me.
For there's no where else on earth that I would rather be.
Let the time go by, I won't care if I
Can be here on the street where you live.
I must include the video of Dean Martin singing On the Street Where You Live for the simple fact that my mother adored this man. I didn't understand it. I think it had something to do with his being (or acting as if he were) a high-functioning drunk, the kind of drunk she wished my father could have been. These days, as a woman older than my mother was during her "crush days" on Dean Martin, I understand his appeal. I also really like his version of this song.
top photo: NY East Village from The Weblicist of Manhattan
{This is the 15th in an undetermined number of songs my mother taught me I'm posting this month in her memory. For background, please visit the post containing the first song, Ivory Tower.}
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