I watched So You Think You Can Dance on Wednesday night. I watch the show each week and I have no idea who will win…but I enjoy seeing the beautiful talent.
Last night, one of the couples danced to Shirley Bassey singing Where Do I Begin, the theme from Love Story. I am sure the couple danced well, but I got a bit distracted. I kept remembering how wonderful Clay Aiken sounded when he sang the song on his Tried & True Tour. It was amazing. Dame Shirley Bassey is a very talented singer, but I kept wishing that it were Clay that the dancers were performing to.
Where Do I Begin was a popular song that was published in 1970. The song was first introduced as an instrumental piece in the 1970 film Love Story. It wasn’t until the theme became popular that the lyrics were added.
Francis Lai wrote the haunting music to Where Do I Begin and the popularity of the song was one thing that made him so popular.
Composer Francis Lai was born April 26, 1932, in Nice, France. It was his work on Claude Lelouch’s 1966 hit A Man and a Woman that elevated Lai to international renown, and an Academy Award. He won a second Oscar for the 1970 Arthur Hiller blockbuster Love Story, and the film’s theme, Where Do I Begin. The song became a Top 40 hit for Andy Williams and Henry Mancini.
Carl Sigman was a lyricist whose compositions were recorded by Frank Sinatra from 1940 to 1995. Carl was born in Brooklyn in 1909. His most famous songs are Pennsylvania 6-5000, Dream Along with Me, Ebb Tide, and What Now My Love. Carl is the artist who added the beautiful words to Lai’s haunting music to make Where Do I Begin a real hit!
I saw Clay in San Francisco at The Tried & True concert. It was a popular event in San Francisco and I will never forget sitting there and hearing Clays voice filling the theatre from backstage. And when the curtains parted, we all looked up to see JEROME standing at the mike, pretending that he was the artist for the night!! It was a fun touch for the final concert.
However, I also remember listening in to the first cellcert and hearing Clay’s pure voice coming through my computer as he sang Where Do I Begin as he opened the tour on February 10th in Miami, Fl. Oh how I wished I were at the Knight Concert Hall that night!!
Did you hear Clay “live” when he sang Where Do I Begin...or did you hear him through your computer?
The two videos are great……..the second one from San Francisco shows Clay’s STAND-IN for the night!!