Movies - Somewhere Over the Rainbow

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	Movies - Somewhere Over the Rainbow

"Over the Rainbow", music by Harold Arlen and lyrics by Yip Harburg, is one of the most famous songs of the late 1930s.

Many feel the song epitomizes the hopes and dreams of youthful aspiration for an ideal world of love and joy. The song was especially written to showcase Judy Garland's talents in the star vehicle The Wizard of Oz, and she was forever after called upon to sing it in all her public appearances, for it became her lifelong theme song.

Its plaintive melody and simple lyrics depict a pre-adolescent girl's desire for an escape from the "hopeless jumble" of this world, from the sadness of raindrops to the bright new world "over the rainbow". It expresses the childlike faith that "Heaven" will magically "open a door" to a place where "troubles melt like lemon-drops".

The song tops the "Songs of the Century" list compiled by the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment for the Arts. It also topped the American Film Institute's "100 Years, 100 Songs" list.

The American troops in Europe in WWII adopted the song, as well as Irving Berlin's "White Christmas" (in which Bing Crosby omitted the opening verse about a New-Yorker in California and made it a universal song of longing for home), as a symbol of the US, that faraway land that, after long years of war, seemed like a dream, beyond the rainbow. Modern listeners may be unaware that the song had an introductory stanza, as this was not sung in the film by Garland.

Modern-day recordings of the song

Hundreds of singers have recorded their own versions of "Over the Rainbow", most notably by Patti LaBelle, Melissa Manchester, Frank Sinatra, Willie Nelson, Linda Eder, Johnny Mathis, Jo Stafford, Doris Day, Martina McBride, Ella Fitzgerald, Olivia Newton-John, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Harry Connick Jr, Sarah Vaughan, Faith Hill, Tony Bennett, and the late Eva Cassidy. Sam Harris performed a winning rendition on the first season of the original Star Search. Barbra Streisand, Eric Clapton, Kylie Minogue, and Garland's daughters Liza Minnelli and Lorna Luft have sung the song in concert. One of the most interesting versions was recorded by the late Hawaiian singer Israel Kamakawiwo'ole whose medley of "Rainbow" and Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" was featured on the soundtrack of the films Meet Joe Black
, Finding Forrester
, and 50 First Dates
. James Stewart memorably warbled a rendition while carrying a "drunk" Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story
. Even horror legend Vincent Price did a version in the film Dr. Phibes Rises Again
.

British television comedian Kenny Everett sometimes did comedy segments that included the unique sound of a British police car siren and Everett singing the lyrics, "Behind me!" and "That's where you'll find me!"

The cover band Me First and the Gimme Gimmes covered the song for their 1999 album Are a Drag, and in the animated series The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Grey Delisle sang it as her character, Mandy. Guitarist Joe Satriani occasionally covers the song at his concerts. Guitarist Ritchie Blackmore would perform a few bars of the verse at the beginning of his concerts, when he Rocked the world with his band of Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow, in those years from 1975 to 1983.A beautiful song also illustrated in the affections of a love of a man for a woman.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Somewhere Over the Rainbow ]

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