Noel Coward In New York

Half-Caste Woman

Noel Coward In New York
Orchestra Direction, Piano Accompaniment and Arrangements by Peter Matz
Columbia Masterworks ML 5163
1959

From the back cover: "I have only had two music session in my life," Noel Coward wrote for the dust jacket of Simon and Schuster's "Noel Coward Song Book. "These were the first steps of what was to have been a full course at the Guildhall School of Music, and they faltered and stopped when I was told by my instructor that I could not use consecutive fifths. He went on to explain that a gentleman called Ebenezer Prout had announced many years ago that consecutive fifths were wrong and must in no circumstances by employed. At that time Ebenezer Prout was merely a name to me (as a matter of fact he still is, and a very funny one at that) and I was unimpressed by his Victorian dicta. I argued back that Debussy and Ravel used consecutive fifths like mad. My instructor waved aside this triviality with a pudgy hand, and I left his presence forever with the parting shot that what was good enough for Debussy and Ravel was good enough for me."

Being steadfastly "unimpressed by Victorian dicta" was, it seems, destined to be a more integral part of Mr. Coward's fabulous career than any conceivable amount of music training he might have acquired. And in the end, even if he had graduated with his weight in diplomas, one feels he would have immediately turned to putting on paper the kind of enchanting and peculiarly telling songs that are so markedly his. Not what Ravel or Debussy would have written, but splendid enough in wit and finesse to match anything put on paper in Montmartre.

Twenty of his "opera" are here eight of them in the New York Medley. In the geography of Noel Coward, New York is next to London, which is half a day from anywhere. And so, in New York, he sings of India and gypsy life and the rolling seas. The world he sings about he carries with him, and if this is called Noel Coward in New York it is because New York is where he lifts today's particular cup of tea (and where Goddard Lieberson records him).

I Like America
Louisa
Half-Caste Woman
I Went To A Marvelous Party
Time And Again
Why Must The Show Go On
New York Medley
What's Going To Happen To The Tots
Sail Away
Wait A Bit, Joe
20th Century Blues
I Wonder What Happened To Him
The Party's Over Now