Songs from 'The Dick Haymes Show'

Dick Haymes

The great baritone Dick Haymes had his own show on NBC and then CBS radio from 1944 to 1948, with Gordon Jenkins as music director and Helen Forrest as musical accomplice until the final year.

I have a variety of ancient bootleg LPs of the series, and I've done my best to resuscitate the sound of these relics, starting with today's selection of 18 songs.

The tonal balance was relatively easy to address, keeping in mind that these are AM radio airchecks, and so don't have any signal above 5kHz. The biggest challenge was pitch. None of the sources were on pitch; in some cases addressing this involved some informed guesswork. I am sure I have most if not all of them right, but let me know if you disagree. Finally, one or two selections have some peak distortion. 

The good news is that the performances are polished, pleasing and in generally more than listenable sound. Haymes recorded just four of the songs commercially, to my knowledge. Helen Forrest appears on only a few numbers, but Jenkins is a welcome presence throughout.

Gordon Jenkins

Some notes about the selections follow.

The program starts off with an infectious song that is not heard these days - "A Romantic Guy, I" by Del Sharbutt, Richard Uhl and Frank Stanton, from 1941. It maintained some popularity over the years, and became the theme of the Bob Cummings Show on television from 1955-59. 

The Four Hits and a Miss singing group joins Haymes here and on several other numbers. Note that this song has one unfixable skip, the only such flaw in the set.

"I Surrender, Dear" is an oldie, written by Harry Barris and Gordon Clifford in 1931. Gus Arnheim and His Orchestra recorded it with a Bing Crosby vocal, helping to make Bing a star. Dick's natural singing shows how much tastes had changed from the time of Crosby's melodramatic reading.

Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg wrote "Evalina" for their 1944 musical Bloomer Girl. David Brooks and Celeste Holm introduced the song on Broadway. Such a enjoyable number!

"Once in a While" was a relatively big hit for Tommy Dorsey in 1937. The writers were Michael Edwards and Bud Green. The song is still performed on occasion.

Cole Porter wrote "It's De-lovely" in 1936 for Ethel Merman and Bob Hope to sing in Red, Hot and Blue. It was a success then and was sung for many years thereafter. I can't hear it without thinking of an old De Soto ad. Helen Forrest joins in on this song. She and Dick were very well matched.

Well-matched: Helen Forrest and Dick Haymes

Adapting classical melodies was big in the 1940s. One of the notable examples was the overbearing "Till the End of Time," taken from Chopin's Polonaise, Op 53. Ted Mossman and Buddy Kaye were the musical culprits. In combination with the other songs so far, it demonstrates Dick's ability to handle a range of material. He recorded this number for Decca in 1945.

Another song that received a commercial recording was "It's Magic," the Cahn-Styne composition sung by Doris Day in the 1948 film Romance on the High Seas.

Next, two songs from the 1927 DeSylva, Brown and Henderson musical Good News - "Lucky in Love" and "The Best Things in Life Are Free." Good News became a film in 1947, which must have inspired the Haymes renditions. Dick and Gordon Jenkins make the latter song into a slow ballad.

"You'd Be So Nice to Come Home To" is one of Cole Porter's finest works. It comes from a 1943 musical film called Something to Shout About, where Don Ameche and Janet Blair did the vocals. Dick was to record the song for Decca in 1949.

Rodgers and Hart's "This Can't Be Love" comes from their superb 1938 score for The Boys from Syracuse. Eddie Albert and Marcy Westcott were the performers on Broadway. Haymes' reading may be brief, but it is one of the most enjoyable in the set.

Dick, Helen and Gordie plug the sponsor's plugs

Hoagy Carmichael sang his "Ole Buttermilk Sky" in the 1947 film Canyon Passage. Jack Brooks was the lyricist. Haymes is convincingly upbeat in this number.

"The Breeze and I" benefits from a colorful Jenkins arrangement, entirely apt for a song based on Ernesto Lecuona's "Andalucia," with English lyrics by Al Stillman. Jimmy Dorsey and vocalist Bob Eberly had a success with it in 1940. (There is a long post devoted to Lecuona's music here, including Haymes singing a few more numbers.)

"Penthouse Serenade" is one of those songs with two titles. Originally it was called "When We're Alone (Penthouse Serenade)," and under that name it was a hit for Ruth Etting in 1932. By the time Bob Hope and Shirley Ross recorded it in 1939, the title and subtitle had switched to "Penthouse Serenade (When We're Alone)." Regardless, it's a fine song, here done well by Haymes.

The earnest "There Is No Greater Love" was first recorded by its composer, Isham Jones, in 1936 with a vocal by the underrated Woody Herman. The lyrics are by Marty Symes. This kind of material was made for Dick.

In his earlier years, Dick was a band singer for Tommy Dorsey and Harry James

"To Each His Own" was the first big hit for songwriters Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, who were to specialize in film theme songs. The piece was huge in 1946 for Eddy Howard, the Ink Spots and Tony Martin, among others. Haymes handles it beautifully.

"I Got a Gal I Love (in North and South Dakota)" is a Cahn-Styne confection written for and recorded by Frank Sinatra in 1947. Novelty songs were not Dick's strength, but he gets through it well enough.

The singer reached back to 1927 and the Kern-Hammerstein classic Show Boat for "Why Do I Love You." This material is essentially operetta but even so is suited to the talents of Dick and Helen Forrest, so I've included it although the recording is not ideally clean.

That's all for this installment. I'll prepare another if there is interest.

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