One Man And His Uke
Well-known member
For Season 405 please bring me any of the songs featured in Dennis Potter’s TV Series, Pennies From Heaven, The Singing Detective, and Lipstick On Your Collar.
The first of these, starring Bob Hoskyns, as a humble sheet music salesman, who wishes life could be more like the songs he sells, features the dramatic device of the characters lip syncing to recordings of songs from the 1920s and 1930s.The songs also carry and reinforce the narrative of the story. Might sound a bit weird. Why not just have the actors sing the songs? Well, personally I don’t think it would have had the same dramatic impact. If you’ve seen these programmes you’ll know what I mean.When Pennies came out in 1978 I had never seen anything like it before. Potter went on to use the same device in The Singing Detective and Lipstick On Your Collar, with music from the 1940s and 1950s respectively. So, fairly straightforward. I have toyed with the idea of doing this as a Season ever since Rob’s Boardwalk Empire season a while back, because these old songs are just brilliant. Dennis Potter was a big fan of Al Bowlly by the way.
Links to lists of the music featured in each of the series are below. You will find chords, words etc, for a lot of the songs on the Dr Uke site, and of course other resources are available. PM me if you are struggling to find anything, or have your heart set on a particular song but can’t find the music.
Pennies From Heaven: https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&r...N82FYI4VJzOD&usg=AOvVaw2vQdl8fULXI157uNiG4pDe
The Singing Detective: https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-singing-detective-music-from-the-bbc-tv-serial-mw0002002382
Lipstick On Your Collar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipstick_on_Your_Collar_(TV_series)
Both Pennies and Detective were later made into feature films. It’s a long time since I’ve seen the film version of Pennies. It wasn’t as good as the TV original, but it wasn’t bad, and featured Steve Martin, and the wonderful Bernadette Peters in the Cheryl Campbell role. Quite ironic to have a great singer like Peters lip syncing, however, here’s a clip from the film to illustrate how the lip syncing worked.
For those of you who like to throw in one or two originals...well, I struggled with that...but how about this; Dennis Potter, who died from pancreatic cancer in 1994, revealed in a TV interview towards the end of his life, that he called his cancer Rupert....after a well known media mogul. Some of this mogul’s British newspapers were quick to criticise Potter for some of the adult elements in his work, while at the same time happily showing naked breasts and bums every day, and revelling in salacious gossip. So any originals on the theme of hypocrisy or double standards are very welcome.
Right, I think that just about covers it.
No prizes at time of writing, this might change, but assume there are none for the time being.
The usual rules apply of course. Please check out and comment on other people videos, and most of all, have fun playing and singing these amazing old songs. And Don’t forget Ryan’s great Aussie season still has a day to go....
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTNUmu6DfdZkk9ivbfwI6AoStrvY-Ygsx
The first of these, starring Bob Hoskyns, as a humble sheet music salesman, who wishes life could be more like the songs he sells, features the dramatic device of the characters lip syncing to recordings of songs from the 1920s and 1930s.The songs also carry and reinforce the narrative of the story. Might sound a bit weird. Why not just have the actors sing the songs? Well, personally I don’t think it would have had the same dramatic impact. If you’ve seen these programmes you’ll know what I mean.When Pennies came out in 1978 I had never seen anything like it before. Potter went on to use the same device in The Singing Detective and Lipstick On Your Collar, with music from the 1940s and 1950s respectively. So, fairly straightforward. I have toyed with the idea of doing this as a Season ever since Rob’s Boardwalk Empire season a while back, because these old songs are just brilliant. Dennis Potter was a big fan of Al Bowlly by the way.
Links to lists of the music featured in each of the series are below. You will find chords, words etc, for a lot of the songs on the Dr Uke site, and of course other resources are available. PM me if you are struggling to find anything, or have your heart set on a particular song but can’t find the music.
Pennies From Heaven: https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&r...N82FYI4VJzOD&usg=AOvVaw2vQdl8fULXI157uNiG4pDe
The Singing Detective: https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-singing-detective-music-from-the-bbc-tv-serial-mw0002002382
Lipstick On Your Collar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipstick_on_Your_Collar_(TV_series)
Both Pennies and Detective were later made into feature films. It’s a long time since I’ve seen the film version of Pennies. It wasn’t as good as the TV original, but it wasn’t bad, and featured Steve Martin, and the wonderful Bernadette Peters in the Cheryl Campbell role. Quite ironic to have a great singer like Peters lip syncing, however, here’s a clip from the film to illustrate how the lip syncing worked.
For those of you who like to throw in one or two originals...well, I struggled with that...but how about this; Dennis Potter, who died from pancreatic cancer in 1994, revealed in a TV interview towards the end of his life, that he called his cancer Rupert....after a well known media mogul. Some of this mogul’s British newspapers were quick to criticise Potter for some of the adult elements in his work, while at the same time happily showing naked breasts and bums every day, and revelling in salacious gossip. So any originals on the theme of hypocrisy or double standards are very welcome.
Right, I think that just about covers it.
No prizes at time of writing, this might change, but assume there are none for the time being.
The usual rules apply of course. Please check out and comment on other people videos, and most of all, have fun playing and singing these amazing old songs. And Don’t forget Ryan’s great Aussie season still has a day to go....
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTNUmu6DfdZkk9ivbfwI6AoStrvY-Ygsx
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