It’s early March. It’s New York. It rained overnight and now it’s getting windy. The baseball games are starting down south. I found myself humming “Waters of March,” sung by Susannah McCorkle, with her English lyrics: “It’s the promise of life/ It’s the joy in your heart.” But wait: when Antonio Carlos Jobim wrote that song, in Portuguese, he was talking about March in Brazil, in the Southern Hemisphere. I checked with my friend Altenir Silva, film-writer, who lives in Rio, not far from the Tom Jobim statue. Altenir said the Portuguese lyrics mean, “It’s the rest of a bush in the morning light,” and he added, “Yes, March is a rainy month in Brazil.” Turns out, Jobim was caught in a major rainstorm, in the interior, far from the beaches of Ipanema. Apparently, McCorkle wrote the English version around 1993, giving it a northern take. She was a linguist, who sang in English, Portuguese and Italian, and a writer, published in magazines and working on a memoir when she committed suicide on May 19, 2001 at the age of 55. Her obituary was lovingly written by Leon Wieseltier in the June 4, 2001, edition of The New Yorker. McCorkle’s version of “Waters of March,” with terrific guitar backup by Howard Alden, survives her, as recorded music does. My friend Altenir followed up by sending me a version by Elis Regina, probably the most popular Brazilian pop singer when she died on Jan., 19, 1982, at 36, of an overdose. This sadness from both hemispheres is diluted by the music they left behind, the music of water, the rush of life, the little things we see and hear and feel, the things we take for granted: -- “a stick, a stone.” “É pau, é pedra.” McCorkle could have added a stanza about spring training. A bat, a ball, a glove, a cap. “It’s the promise of life/ It’s the joy in your heart.”
Altenir Silva
3/2/2016 09:23:38 am
Dear George,
George Vecsey
3/2/2016 09:57:41 am
I should have added, Altenir took wife and son to Yankee Stadium last time in NYC
Brian Savin
3/2/2016 07:37:09 pm
Then we should apologize to Altenir and his family for the destruction of baseball history. The new Yankee Stadium is in my opinion a featureless disgraceful sop to investment banker marketing convenience. There. I said it and I'm glad.
Altenir Silva
3/2/2016 08:12:28 pm
Dear Brian,
Brian Savin
3/2/2016 08:22:54 pm
I'm glad you had a wonderful time, Altenir. Interestingly to me today I had a doctors appointment and a meeting with a government official. Both are Yankee fans. Both talked of their excitement about spring training. And both volunteered that they hated the new stadium!
Sam Toperoff
3/3/2016 04:14:00 am
Sweet spot, George, sweet spot. 3/3/2016 12:13:16 pm
Delightful!
George Vecsey
3/3/2016 12:50:56 pm
Dear Sherridan: 3/8/2016 09:31:42 am
This is my all time favorite version of the song with Mr Jobim singing it live at Lincoln Center. As he sings, he speaks to the wonder and randomness that life presents to us...At least to me.
George Vecsey
3/9/2016 12:48:18 pm
Hi, thanks, I will look up a link for Jobim at Lincoln Center. I never saw him in person. Only Brazilian music I caught live with Astrud Gilberto with the amazing Emily Remler on guitar, on NYC's East Side. Remler also backed up Susannah McCorkle. I've got a DVD of Caetano Veloso in NYC with Jacques Morelenbaum...a classic. best, GV Comments are closed.
|
QUOTES
“They may hate the cultural context they now find themselves teaching in, but they love their work. The Achilles’ heel of schoolteachers, one all too easily exploited by politicians, is that they love their students.” (One of the best reads in the NYT these days is Margaret Renkl, in Nashville. In her latest post, Renkl describes the dedicated core of “born teachers” – the majority, she submits.) *** (From Madeleine Albright in one of her final interviews in February): “Putin is small and pale,” I wrote, “so cold as to be almost reptilian.” He claimed to understand why the Berlin Wall had to fall but had not expected the whole Soviet Union to collapse. “Putin is embarrassed by what happened to his country and determined to restore its greatness.” – Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, recalling her first meeting with the relatively unknown Vladimir Putin in 2000. – The New York Times, Feb. 23, 2022. Categories
All
|