"Puttin' On the Ritz" - addenda
The Readers Speak! (plus a special invitation or two)
From Dan Weinstein:
A very important facet of the musical structure of this song is Berlin's use of rhythmic displacement. The first three notes are a simple ascending minor triad arpeggio, which then adds a fourth note (a lower "5" of the triad) and places the arpeggio three more times, on different beats and with different rhythms each time. This tricky approach seems to me as if Berlin is channeling Gershwin, who used this type of rhythmic displacement many times, particularly in his songs of the 1920s. "Fascinatin' Rhythm" is the most famous and obvious example, where the lyric content is all about this interesting, jazzy (or actually raggy) approach to musical composition. The use of the Charleston rhythm in the bridge is also notable, though the Charleston rage had somewhat passed by 1930. Please share with your followers if you wish.
PS: George Gershwin also uses rhythmic displacement in his concert works. The third movement of the Concerto in F has some notable examples.
From George Connolly:
Judy Garland took a crack at the song too: 1960 studio recording:
Diff'rent types who wear a day coat
Pants with stripes and cut-away coat
Perfect fits
Puttin' on the Ritz
She sang those words on the studio recording but in the following three live performances, she sang:
Diff'rent gowns upon a bevy
Of high-brow(n)s from down the levee
All misfits
Puttin' on the Ritz
(I think she sings "highbrows" instead of "high-browns" which skirts the racism but hurts the rhyme.)
1960 Amsterdam concert:
1961 Carnegie Hall:
1963 TV (at 43:10):
followed by her JFK tribute, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"
George
P.S. Gary Cooper warn't always in buckskin....
A final anecdote: I worked at Tower Records in the mid-1980s, for the princely sum of $3.85 an hour, alongside such notables as Eric Comstock, Brian Bacchus, and the late Butch Morris and Frank Lowe. One day the phone rang, and the voice on the other end asked, “Do you have a record of ‘Puttin’ on the Ritz’ by Irving Berlitz?” Of course I answered, “Irving Berlitz didn’t actually write it - he only translated it from the German.”
Lastly, a few readers, including Sam Brylawski, who spent most of his career at the Library of Congress, and our friend Ken Levene in Canada, forwarded this surprising and exceptional treatment of “Puttin’ on the Ritz” as spontaneously performed by a flash mob (remember those?), this one in Moscow (not Idaho). Berlin, who was born in Siberia in 1888, would have certainly approved. Thank you George and Daniel - and Sam and Ken!
Very Special thanks to the fabulous Ms. Elizabeth Zimmer, for expert proofreading of this page, and scanning for typos, mistakes, and other assorted boo-boos!
TWO HIGHLY-RECOMMENDED FORTHCOMING EVENTS AT THE TRIAD:
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Read Arlen’s article about “The Twilight Zone and The Swimmer”: bit.ly/47y8sxY
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starring ZERO MOSTEL, JACK GILFORD, MICHAEL CRAWFORD. PHIL SILVERS & BUSTER KEATON
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