Johnny Mercer meets The Beatles

The Beatles included the song "I Remember You" (music by Victor Schertzinger, lyrics by Johnny Mercer, 1941) in their 1962 live performances, with Paul McCartney on vocals. The Beatles' arrangement of "I Remember You" was a duplicate of the 1962 recording issued by Frank Ifield.

"P.S. I Love You" (music by Gordon Jenkins, lyrics by Johnny Mercer, 1934) has been recorded many times. Rosemary Clooney, Frank Sinatra, Kay Starr, among others.

In 1962, The Beatles recorded a Paul McCartney - John Lennon composition also titled "P.S. I Love You". McCartney was probably aware of the Mercer song. But you can't copyright a song title.

Producer Ron Richards: "I was originally a music publishing man, a plugger, so I knew someone had done a record with that title. I said to Paul [McCartney] 'You can have it as B-side, but not an A-side.'"

Mercer's biographer Gene Lees expressed annoyance at this duplicate title.

Johnny Mercer co-founded Capitol Records in 1942. The Beatles joined Capitol in 1963. Johnny was gone from Capitol by then.

Ringo Starr sang Johnny Mercer's 1944 song "Dream" (produced and arranged by George Martin) for his 1970 standards album Sentimental Journey.

Paul McCartney contacted Johnny Mercer in the 1970s in an attempt to write a song with Johnny. But Mercer was already ill and nearing the end of his life.

The 2012 Paul McCarney album Kisses On The Bottom includes "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive" (music by Harold Arlen - lyrics by Johnny Mercer, 1944).

Waitin' For The Evenin' Mail

18 November 2011 is the 102nd anniversary of the birth of Johnny Mercer.

Comments on this blog:

this is well done. it's cool to learn more about him.
lynn paden

On Dearly Beloved:
[Fred Astaire] looks so sexy in his white tux jacket, singing this song in the movie...
Chris Bamberger

Two 'Must Haves' for Mercer fans and all fans of pre R&R American pop music are 'Johnny Mercer: The Dreams on Me', a two disk TCM - Warner Bros. DVD documentary and 'The Great American Songbook' Warner Bros. DVD hosted by Michael Feinstein. Both are entertaining as they are instructive.
NewRoc

Thanks, Mark. I hadn't realized how productive he was as a songwriter. I suppose most of his work was for the lyrics.
Even if he hadn't written a word, he would be with the angels, having co-founded Capitol Records in the early 1940s.
Mike McGregor

On the death of Gene Lees, Johnny Mercer's biographer: ‎
:-(
Mark Carroll

A head-'em-off-at-the-pass note for the persnickety: I know, Waitin' For The Evenin' Mail is not a Johnny Mercer composition. It's by Billy Baskette, from 1923. But Johnny did sing it on the radio.

Gene Lees, Johnny Mercer's biographer

Gene Lees, author of the definitive biography of Johnny Mercer, has died.

Elaine Woo, Los Angeles Times:
"Gene Lees, a jazz historian and critic known for his pugnacious, highly personal essays and biographies of such jazz greats as Oscar Peterson, Woody Herman and Johnny Mercer, died Thursday [22 April 2010] at his home in Ojai."

Matt Schudel, Washington Post:
"Much of Mr. Lees's writing grew out of his friendships with leading musical figures, including trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, singer Peggy Lee and songwriter Johnny Mercer."

"He wrote biographies of bandleader Woody Herman, Mercer and the composing team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe and was the co-author of Henry Mancini's autobiography."

"As for songwriting," he said, "the best training I know is to sing -- and study the works of the great writers such as Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter, and Harold Arlen, who gave us an astonishing body of masterpieces before rock-and-roll brought our musical culture crashing down."

Peter Keepnews, New York Times:
"In addition to seven collections of Jazzletter essays, Mr. Lees's books include biographies of Woody Herman, Oscar Peterson, Johnny Mercer and the songwriting team Lerner and Loewe."

A Kind of Poet
Terry Teachout, Wall Street Journal:
"Most of the essays that went into his books were originally published there [in his Jazzletter], and many of the best of them are matchlessly vivid profiles of the artists whom he knew, including such giants of jazz and prerock pop as Jobim, Sinatra, Paul Desmond, Bill Evans, Dizzy Gillespie, Peggy Lee and Johnny Mercer. Such volumes as "Meet Me at Jim and Andy's," "Singers and the Song," "Waiting for Dizzy" and his biographies of Mercer and Woody Herman are now part of the permanent literature of American popular music."

"He idolized Mercer, whom he thought to be "the finest lyricist in the English language," and when I heard the news of his death I thought of a line from one of Mercer's best songs, "One for My Baby": "You'd never know it, / But buddy, I'm a kind of poet, / And I've gotta lotta things to say." Even when he was writing prose, Gene Lees was a kind of poet, and what he had to say will be worth hearing a hundred years from now."

London Times:
"This [writings on Gillespie, Benny Carter, Shaw, Peterson] was followed (in parallel with further collections of shorter pieces) by lives of Woody Herman, Lerner and Loewe, and Johnny Mercer."

Michael Posner of the Toronto Globe and Mail did not mention Johnny Mercer in his obit for Gene Lees.