Paris At Midnight - Skitch Henderson

 

If You Love Me

Paris At Midnight

Skitch Henderson, His Piano and Orchestra

Decca Records DL 8339

1960

From the back cover: MIDNIGHT IN PARIS is an hour that is filled with an aura of promise. All that is lovely, gay, and beautiful seems to be awaiting immortality – to be set on canvas, written to music, or capsuled with a sonnet.

This is the hour when dark cellars of the "bas fonds" on the Left Bank are magically transformed into dimly-lit dens of pleasure. At Le Petit Balcon, an apache and his gigolette are engaged in a frenzied dance. From the Vieux Colombier and Le Club St. - Germain-des-Prés blaring trumpets and syncopated rhythms lure lovers of le jazz hot. The Place Pigalle boasts nightclub acts guaranteed not to be seen else – where: the Naturiste, Chez Eve and Romance present continuous spectacles glorifying the female.

This is the hour when aspiring artists seek the colorful Paris night-life that inspired Toulouse-Lautrec. In the Montmartre district they cluster around sidewalk tables at the Café Flor sipping cognac and coke. The white domes of the Sacre Coeur serve as an incongruous background for Le Mabillon Café and other restaurants on the Place du Tertre which are packed with arty young Parisians intent on the unconventional.

This is the hour when theatre-goers gush forth from the Opéra, the Comédie- Française, and the Odéon, and scurry to their favorite midnight haunts: to Maxim's for a sumptuous supper, to the Lido on the Champs Elysées for a brassy cabaret show, to the Shéhérazade for gypsy fiddlers, or to the Nouvelle Eve for champagne.

This is the hour when the gourmet's dreams are fulfilled. In Paris kitchens are shrines, chefs are national heroes, and menus are sheer poetry. Food is prepared lovingly, served ceremoniously, and eaten reverently. At such world-famous restaurants as the Café de Paris, the Ritz, George V, or the Crillon, eating is an art – and mating the right wine with the right course is a matter for serious discussion. From Apéritif to brandy, each dish is a never-ending delight: escargots (snails) stuffed and baked with parsley-and-garlic butter; noisette d'agneau truffé (lamb and truffles); quenelles de brochet (a breaded river fish topped with a mushroom and cream sauce); banana soufflé; crêpes with flaming liqueurs; the wines-Chablis, Burgundy, Bordeaux; and the cheeses-Brie, Camembert, Gruyère. Paris is accurately named the Capital of Great Eating.

This is the hour when Paris, the grande dame of cities, is her most provocative and exciting. As beautiful as any masterpiece in the Louvre, as ageless as the Notre Dame, as majestic as the Arc de Triomphe, as turbulent as the sinuous River Seine ... this is Paris at Midnight.

Parlez Moi D'Amour

La Vie En Rose

Pigalle

The Last Time I Saw Paris

My Lost Melody (Je N'en Connais Pas La Fin)

Valentine

I Wish You Love (Que Rest-t-il de nos Amours?)

Padam... Padam... (How It Echoes The Beat Of My Heart)

If You Love Me (Hymne A L'Amour)

April In Paris

Under Paris Skies (Sous Le Ciel de Paris)

Comme Ci, Comme Ca

Mimi

Domino

Autumn Leaves (Les Petite Valse)

Un Grand Amour (A Great Love)