FRIDAYS ARE FOR FRANK: “It’s Only A Paper Moon”

“It’s only a paper moon,
sailin’ over a cardboard sea,
But it wouldn’t be make believe,
if you believed in me.”

All the paper moons and pumpkins and skeletons from Halloween likely blew down after last night’s crazy wind storm. Winds will continue throughout the day as temperatures become decidedly more November-like on this, the first day of November.

With music by Harold Arlen and lyrics by Yip Harburg and Billy Rose, “It’s Only a Paper Moon” was written for an unsuccessful 1932 Broadway play called The Great Magoo.

The most famous version is arguably Ella Fitzgerald‘s 1945 take, while Frank did his first draft of a Paper Moon for Sing and Dance with Frank Sinatra, released by Columbia just before Halloween in October 1950. In 1961, he re-recorded it for Sinatra’s Swingin’ Session under the Capitol label.

“It’s a Barnum and Bailey world
Just as phony as it can be
But it wouldn’t be make believe
If you believed in me…”

(P.S.: Don’t forget to VOTE Tuesday!)

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