Mark Pentleton » d-min

356/365 Songs: Walking in the air – Theme from the Snowman

admin — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 20:06:34 +0000

Today’s song is the theme from the 1982 film The Snowman based on the children’s book Raymond Briggs. It was written by Howard Blake and sung by Peter Auty in the film, but popularised by Aled Jones in a single which reached number 5 in the UK charts at Christmas 1985. It has been parodied, much to the hilarity of my son Ewan, in an Irn-Bru advert which you can see here!

305/365 Songs: SOS – Abba

admin — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 06:21:33 +0000

Today’s song – the first song of my penultimate month on 365songs – is Abba’s SOS from the 1975 Abba album. It is one of the group’s best-known songs and reached #6 in the UK charts on its release in September 1975. It was #1 in Australia, Belgium, West Germany, New Zealand and South Africa! SOS was also recorded in Swedish by Agnetha Fältskog and featured on her album Elva Kvinnor i ett Hus along with last month’s Tack för en underbar vanlig dag.

Image courtesy of the Abbaworld blog

The reason I chose to play this song today is that today marks the 40th anniversary of the first live performance by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvæus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Benny Andersson at the Festfolk på Trägård’n in Gothenburg. It was 2 or 3 years before they started calling themselves ABBA, and apparently the performance didn’t go too well, but it was also when the group apparently learned what not to do at a live event. There’s more info here.

287/365 Songs: I still believe – Miss Saigon

admin — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 06:03:49 +0000

This song is for my friend and colleague Lisa Steven who celebrated her birthday yesterday and who requested something from Miss Saigon for her special day. I hope she didn’t mind waiting a day given the events in Chile! I Still Believe is from the 1989 musical Miss Saigon written by Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil. Per molts anys, Lisa!

61/365 Songs: Bésame mucho

admin — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 07:10:51 +0000

Wales yesterday and Mexico today… Bésame mucho was written in 1940 by Mexican songwriter Consuelo Velázquez. For those of you who like singing along to my performances, here are the lyrics with a translation below. It somehow sounds so much better in Spanish, especially with that imperfect subjunctive in the second line!

Bésame, bésame mucho,
Como si fuera esta noche la última vez.
Bésame, bésame mucho,
Que tengo miedo a perderte, perderte después.

Quiero tenerte muy cerca,
Mirarme en tus ojos, verte junto a mí.
Piensa que tal vez mañana
Yo ya estaré lejos, muy lejos de tí.

Bésame, bésame mucho,
Como si fuera esta noche la última vez.
Bésame, bésame mucho,
Que tengo miedo a perderte, perderte después.

Translation

Kiss me, kiss me a lot,
As if tonight was the last time.
Kiss me, kiss me a lot,
I fear to lose you, to lose you afterward.

I want to have you very close,
See myself in your eyes, see you next to me.
Think that maybe tomorrow
I’ll be far, far away from you.

Kiss me, kiss me a lot,
As if tonight was the last time.
Kiss me, kiss me a lot,
I fear to lose you, to lose you afterward.