I wrote this song about 45 years ago. A “true life song”, as Bill Monroe would call it. It describes an actual piece of my life. The song appears with all the lyrics written out in the second or third chapter of my obviously autobiographical, but not quite, first novel titled Up in the Bronx.
I can’t remember why working on this song was such a significant incident or feeling to me that I thought to put it in the book. But I did. The scene shows a young Jack Isaacson sitting in his Bronx apartment having come in from the rain. And sitting down with his new Martin guitar to compose this song about his situation. When I made my soundtrack CD to the Bronx novel, I used this song plus some folk songs and a few others I composed back in the Bronx. This song, Sweet Dreams and Happiness, uses an old doo-wop progression, which to me feels like the Bronx. Maybank and I were playing it last nite, and this morning I added a simple rhythm track.
Sweet dreams and happiness/Baby don’t you fall/Go home/Go home/Pick up what’s left/I’ll meet you in the hall//All I need’s my baby when I call/All I need’s my baby when I call//Love is around the corner/So why’d ya walk all around the block?/Go on/Go on/Do what you wanna/Someday you know it’s gonna have to stop/All I need… Click to hear it. The full CD used to be available. But the book Up in the Bronx is available on Amazon
All of Me, written by Gerald Marks and Seymour Simons back in 1931, and sung by all the greats….. I know. I know. John Legend also has a song titled All of Me – which is also a real good one. But I’m talking about the old All of Me, written as I said back in 1931. It’s just a great song. Last post I talked about the little soundtrack albums I recorded to accompany my novels. In the first album, the Up in the Bronx and Down in LA one, however, I omitted one song that is mentioned in the book twice. That’s right! All of Me. A serious omission! But not because I didn’t love the song. It was because I felt I couldn’t play it well enough. Although that is definitely still the case, here’s me and Maybank giving the song another go anyhow. It’s coming along, but still a “work in progress” – a designation I’m kinda getting used to!
Maybe it wasn’t the most clever idea, but I self-recorded soundtrack albums to accompany my novels. I noticed that my first novel, Up in the Bronx mentioned several Ellington numbers, so I recorded my own modest attempts. Following a passage where the protagonist (a thinly veiled version of myself?) is writing a song called Sweet Dreams and Happiness, I recorded that one too. Eventually, I recorded some other songs mentioned in the book, and came up with a CD called Up in the Bronx and Down in LA.
My second novel, One Life or the Lives of Chester Knowles and its sequel The Phantom Speaks or More in the Lives of Chester Knowles also earned its own CD, called Chester’s Songs. Here’s a link to the playlist, which is on Soundcloud. The books are available on Amazon, or via Bumba Books. The ebooks cost just 99 cents, so I hope people will read (and listen) to them and spread the news around.
Bumbastories is proud to make available to the reading and listening public both the book Up in the Bronx and the accompanying soundtrack CD Up in the Bronx and Down in L.A.
This “aesthetically rewarding” combination of a literary novel together with a soundtrack of songs performed by the author – so as to complement and illuminate the Up in the Bronx story!…. well, these things don’t come around every day.
Bumbastories is presenting both the book and the CD for purchase at historically unprecedented prices. (Well, it’s the lowest I’ve seen them)
The novel is available for just $15 (which includes all domestic (USA) shipping and handling). Pick up the CD for just $8 (includes S&H) Buy ’em both for just $20 bucks (includes all domestic S&H). And after all that handling, I hope you will click on the picture of the book pictured below to be the first in your borough………..And when you click, scroll to the bottom for purchase info for Up in the Bronx
Stephen Baum, AKA Bumba, has three books and two soundtrack CDs that you can read and/or listen to. Click on Bumba Books for reviews – and for info on how to buy them at popular prices (well, I like ’em). Obtain the music CD for One Life at CD Baby (99¢) or Soundcloud (free) and listen while you read! To simply buy the books on Amazon just click on the cover photos (above). Amazon Kindle has them as ebooks too, and I’ve succeeded in pricing both One Life and The Phantom Speaks at 99 cents.
Fighting a Losing Battle But Having a Lot of Fun Trying to Win
is one of the finest song lyrics I know. It’s one of my favorites; Maybank and I were playing it the other night, so here it is again. I’ve also posted on x and z. It’s even on that Up in the Bronx/Down in LA CD that I recorded to accompany my first novel of the same name, as I used to play it in the Bronx. (Scroll down on the Bumba Books page)
You know it’s hard to love another man’s girlfriend
Can’t see her when you want to, got to see her when you can
I may be fighting a losing battle, but I’m having a lot of fun trying to win
I thought it over
These two points of view
You know a one-way lovin
Ain’t no good for two.
We may be fighting a losing battle….
I watch the sun come up and I watch it fade away
All I ever seem to have are these sleepless nights and endless days.
I asked that woman: Should I go away?
Your man wants me to leave
Do you want me to stay?
I may be fighting a losing battle, but having a lot of fun trying to win.
Brownie McGee wrote this one back in the late fifties or sixties. He uses this progression on several songs, and it is a great one. If you like this, check out Brownie McGee and Sonny Terry.
All of Me was written by Gerald Marks and Seymour Simons in 1931. Played by all the jazz greats from Ellington to Armstrong, as well as by singers from Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald to Willie Nelson, it’s simply a lovely song to sing and to sing along with (please sing along).
As you may or may or not know, Baum (that’s me) is in the habit of making companion CDs to his novels. This song should have been on the Up in the Bronx and Down in LA CD, but Baum felt that he didn’t sing it well enough. He was right. And he still can’t sing it at all. But you can’t blame him for trying. Last week he and Maybank took a stab at it, stab being an apt word for a bloody butchering of this fine lyric and tune. All the same it’s a great song. The song is mentioned twice in Baum’s novel Up in the Bronx. Below are the excerpts…
On page 25 when Maria moves in with Jack…..
So she went to her suitcase and took out a change of clothes, and then went into the bathroom, closing and locking the door with the hook latch. Jack put on the other side of the Ellington album and sat himself down on the sofa. There was a lot to think about. At least he thought there was a lot to think about. But when he tried to think he couldn’t get anywhere. Ellington was “Tootin’ through the Roof “, and Jack pictured the trumpet players with their horns angled upwards, playing so hard and so pure that they could indeed “toot” right through the roof. He soon forgot that he was supposed to be thinking about Maria and what to do. As the saxophonist Johnny Hodges was bending his way through “All of Me”, Maria emerged from the bathroom dressed in jeans and a shiny, blue blouse. Her hair was still wrapped in a towel.
And then later in the book on page 105 when Jack goes to Barry’s wedding and meets Madeleine:
“Would you like to dance?” he asked after a moment.
She examined the napkin again for a second, and then smiled briefly, and answered “Sure.” The two of them got up from their chairs to walk toward the dance-floor. The band began to play a slow version of All of Me.
They began to dance awkwardly at first. He held her at a distance. At a certain indeterminate point, though, they seemed to relax. Jack noticed he was holding her closer. Madeleine smiled at him. They danced well together. It was a fox trot. Up on the stage, the trumpet player stopped blowing, took out his handkerchief, and wiped his mouth and face a la Louie Armstrong. He sung the lyrics slowly. It was one of those songs meant to be played fast, but the band was doing it slow and very sentimental. Finally the singer came to:
Jack held her closer as they shuffled around the parquet floor. He smelled her odor, and began to feel a warmth in his body, in his loins. There was a hint of perfume, but it was mostly the smell of her. He touched his nose to her hair. She leaned her head back and looked at him. She looked hard into his eyes. They found themselves smiling, grinning at each other – almost laughing. They continued to dance for several moments after the band had finished the song. They smiled at each other, as they let their hands fall to their sides. The band then went into its medley of Jewish hora tunes, starting with Hava Nagilah and Mayim Mayim B’sassone.
“Hey everybody, it’s time to dance…. the Hora!” urged the bandleader, “Hey! Hey! Hey! It’s Hora time!”
I wrote this song back in the Bronx nearly forty years ago. Yikes! And I still play it every now and then! A couple of days ago I was playing around with it and with adding back-up tracks. The song is included somehow in my novel Up in the Bronx.The lyrics, as well as two paragraphs of explanation about the chord progression, are actually on page 25 of Up in the Bronx. It’s true. I’m not sure anymore why I put the scene into the book. I guess I simply wanted to share my love for the music. It’s an enchantment with that urban rock and roll progression, the doo-wop song. A nostalgic sort of feeling for the Bronx I suppose. As I was saying, it’s in my novel Up in the Bronx, which is largely an autobiographical coming-of-age in the Bronx in the seventies novel.
The song Sweet Dreams and Happiness is presented on that CD I recorded to accompany the book, which is titled not surprisingly Up in The Bronx And Down in LA. To find out how to purchase the book and/or the CD go to Bumba Books. Anyhoo, here’s a Bronx song.
The notion of a better world to be is a universal one, an archetype, a part of our collective unconscious. As for myself, I’m not figuring on too much angel cake after my death. My grandfather said that “when you die, it’s six feet under and that’s it”. He told me these blunt words when he was on his deathbed. He said “the heaven and hell stuff is a lot of bullshit”.
Blaise Pascal, in his famous Pascal’s wager, made an argument for belief in God and the afterlife based on the heavily weighted negative consequences of a wrong bet (ie, If you don’t believe in God and an afterlife and then, oops, there is one, well it’s fire and brimstone for you, Jackson). So, with apologies to Blaise Pascal, I’m holding off on all bets. I figure to play it by ear.
Interestingly, the Old Testament makes no mention of any afterlife and you would think think that some of those old-timers might have been privy to some of the inside info. Myself, I am sometimes aware of the spirit that is in all things and of which I am a part. This admittedly occasional experience would seem to transcend time and is quite sufficient for me. Meanwhile, I think it prudent to keep on playing that country music.
I wrote this song about a Better World To Be years ago, back in the Bronx, when belief in a life after death, a better world to be, was still in play for me. It’s a song that goes together with my Sweet Dreams and Happiness song (which appears on my CD Up in the Bronx and Down in LA, and which is available together with the Up in the Bronx book). Click if you want to hear the two songs played together, back to back.
Meanwhile, keep on playing that country music!
Here’s a little excerpt from the novel. In chapter III, our hero Jack Isaacson returns home from a walk in the rain and sings this song.
Hey! There’s Up in the Bronx on the shelves at the Los Angeles Public library
When Jack returned home, he changed to some dry clothes, and picked up his twangy, Harmony steel-stringed guitar, his prized possession, his only prized possession. A tune was in his head. Chords. A rock & roll progression. The kind that goes from G to E minor, and then to C and to D, and then finally back to G. But this one just sat there alternating between the G and E minor for a long time. And the rhythm took over. Back and forth from the tonal to its friend in minor:
“Sweet dreams and happiness.
Baby, don’t you fall.
Go home, pick up what’s left.
I’ll meet you in the hall.”
“All I need’s, my baby when I call,” said the refrain in C.
Jack felt very pleased about the tune and the lyrics. But somehow, he thought, it wasn’t fair to that poor baby – who’s needed and called upon like that. Is that all I need? he asked himself. Would that be right? Would that set everything straight?
I’ve posted this before, but I was singing it again today. I dedicate this song again to my friend George Schulman, who passed away on us a long time ago, but who I still remember so fondly. May his memory be blessed.
The song was written by Tom Paxton – one of his signature songs.
I never care much for nostalgia. Sure, I love to talk about the Bronx and things like the Jack Benny Program or You Bet Your Life, and all the other favorites from my childhood. I could go on about the 1969 NY Knicks, or my favorite rock groups. But I won’t. It’s too easy a rap. I wrote a book about the Bronx and it recalls the Bronx of the seventies and my life there. However, in my opinion it’s not nostalgic or nostalgia-driven.
George is in it. He’s the only one I consciously put in. He’s called Frank Lombardo in the book. Anyhow, we had some good times. That’s not nostalgic, is it?
I wrote this song about 45 years ago. A “true life song”, as Bill Monroe would call it. It describes an actual piece of my life. The song appears with all the lyrics written out in the second or third chapter of my obviously autobiographical, but not quite, first novel titled Up in the Bronx. 
I wrote this song back in the Bronx nearly forty years ago. Yikes! And I still play it every now and then! A couple of days ago I was playing around with it and with adding back-up tracks. The song is included somehow in my novel Up in the Bronx.The lyrics, as well as two paragraphs of explanation about the chord progression, are actually on page 25 of 
An Occasional Story or Magazine 