{"id":90,"date":"2005-07-27T21:28:14","date_gmt":"2005-07-28T04:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=90"},"modified":"2005-07-27T21:34:53","modified_gmt":"2005-07-28T04:34:53","slug":"bea-arthur-billy-goldenberg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=90","title":{"rendered":"Bea Arthur & Billy Goldenberg"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was working today on the list of people that I hope to interview for the Luther Henderson biography. It’s a diverse group of folks that includes singers and musicians, actors and actresses, choreographers and conductors, composers and arrangers, producers and directors, not to mention family, friends, and business associates. The variety among the females singers, alone — Barbra Streisand, Ruth Brown, Bea Arthur, Polly Bergan, Lena Horne, and Jessye Norman, to name just a few — attests to the ecclecticism and wide range of Luther’s talents.
\nOf the six ladies mentioned, I’ve met three: Ruth Brown is a friend, Lena Horne I encountered years ago during my days as a talent coordinator, and Bea Arthur attended the West Coast memorial for Luther in June of 2004. Last month I posted a description of the Canadian Brass’ appearance at the memorial<\/a>. Here, then, is the excerpt about Bea Arthur and composer Billy Goldenberg:<\/p>\n

Bea Arthur, accompanied by Billy Goldenberg, was on hand that Sunday to share some memories. As Billy got settled at the piano, Bea told us a story about her invitation to sing a song called It Amazes Me <\/em>at an affair honoring Cy Coleman twenty-five years ago. <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I thought, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI know there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to be a lot of terrific talent honoring Cy,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 and I decided that rather than just slide in and go to rehearsal next day, I thought, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcNo. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m going to go a day earlier and work with Luther and really kill the people.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

We had no idea how the story would end, but already we were laughing.<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153So I did, and we worked; we worked all that day. Quite wonderful. And then the night of the event, which was, I remember, at Peacock Alley at the Waldorf \u00e2\u20ac\u201c black tie, oh, I mean it was fabulous \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a number of people got up and performed Cy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s stuff. And then Tony Bennett came and started singing and, of course, he leveled the place, just tore the place up to such a degree that \u00e2\u20ac\u201c I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if you remember this, Billy \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that he had to do an encore. So Cy sat down at the piano and Tony sang\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6It Amazes Me<\/em>. I never in my life \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 I was so devastated! So after that, we just went to the bar and got loaded.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

We, too, were ready to go to the bar and get loaded, but we quieted down as Bea, casually dressed in white pants, tunic top, and sandals, regal as ever, began to sing. Even without a microphone, her voice was strong and sure, her delivery, striking. She gave us two songs, It Amazes Me<\/em>, and Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t Miss the Chance to Sing<\/em>, composed by Billy with lyrics by Tom Jones. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t learn until later that while I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been at home watching twenty-year-old reruns of The Golden Girls<\/em>, Bea has been on the road with her one-woman musical show And Then There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Bea<\/em>, later renamed Bea Arthur On Broadway<\/em>. <\/p>\n

Billy Goldenberg had a story too. It was 1964, Billy was in his twenties, and had been hired to do the rehearsal piano and dance music for a show called High Spirits<\/em> with Tammy Grimes and Beatrice Lillie, directed by Noel Coward. Hugh Martin, the show\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s composer, asked Billy if he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d like to write the overture. Billy was ecstatic, and petrified. It was Luther, a man had had never met before, who came to his rescue by helping him to orchestrate the overture. <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Luther came in and he looked at this sketch and he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcThis is really interesting.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcIs it really, Luther? You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re the best. If you can do it, make it sound good.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 I said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcYou know, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve done my best here, but I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really orchestrate.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWhat do you mean, you can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t orchestrate?\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcYou\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve already done it here.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 He said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll add a few things and see if you like it.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 I said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcSee if I like it!\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 I said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWhat does that matter?\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 I said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcYou do your genius thing,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 you know. Anyway, he did it, and well, everybody, the whole cast, they all stood up and clapped after the first orchestra rehearsal. And Luther came over to me and he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcNext time you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re going to do it.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 And I did. And from then on, I did all my own things: stage, and then television and movies, and all of it. But it was Luther who said to me, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcYou can do it.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all he had to say. For someone who was so important to me, really to say that, changed my life. It really did. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll always remember him for that. Thank you, Luther.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was working today on the list of people that I hope to interview for the Luther Henderson biography. It’s a diverse group of folks that includes singers and musicians, actors and actresses, choreographers and conductors, composers and arrangers, producers and directors, not to mention family, friends, and business associates. The variety among the females … Continue reading “Bea Arthur & Billy Goldenberg”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-people","category-writing-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=90"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=90"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=90"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=90"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}